HACKERS VOW TO WIPE THE ZIONIST ENTITY OFF INTERNET MAP

      Cairo, 27 Jumadil Awal 1434/8 April 2013 (MINA) – In a show of solidarity with the Palestinians against decades-long occupation, hackers have launched massive cyber attacks against Israeli websites, vowing to wipe the Jewish state off internet map.

     “You have not stopped your endless human right violations,” hacker group Anonymous said in a post addressed to Israel’s government and cited by Haaretz, OnIslam net quoted by Mi’raj News Agency (MINA) as reporting.

      “You have not stopped illegal settlements. You have not respected the ceasefire. You have shown that you do not respect international law.”

       Dubbed  OpIsrael, hackers attacked Israeli websites in solidarity with the Palestinian people against Israeli practices in the occupied lands.

       The attack has left dozens of Israeli website down as of early Sunday, April 7, The attacks came in a second wave by hacking group Anonymous and similar collectives on Israeli sites on Saturday.

       Organizers of the hacking campaign threatened to wage “the largest Internet battle in the history of mankind” that would eventually “wipe Israel off the map of the Internet.”

        The cyber attacks followed a warning from Anonymous, which said it would launch a massive attack on Israeli sites.

       “You have shown that you do not respect international law,” said the group in a video released online addressing the Israeli government.

       “This is why that on April 7, elite cyber-squadrons from around the world have decided to unite in solidarity with the Palestinian people against Israel as one entity to disrupt and erase Israel from cyberspace.”

        Sites serving government agencies, including the Israel Securities Authority, the Ministry of Immigrant Absorption and the Central Bureau of Statistics were said to have been brought down, according to a list posted on hackersnewsbulletin.com.

        Some 19,000 Israeli Facebook accounts were said to have been hacked as well, although a list to that effect has yet to be released.

        Peace talks between Israel and the Palestinians to end the decades-long occupation of the West Bank have stalled over Israel’s refusal to halt settlement building in the occupied territory.

        Israel has also slapped years-long blockade on the Gaza Strip since the Islamist group captured the enclave in 2007.

        Israel has repeatedly launched deadly offensives into Gaza, which left hundreds of Palestinians dead.

       In 2008, more than 1400 Palestinians were killed in a three-week Israeli onslaught on Gaza.

Cyber War

       Trying to minimize their scale of damage, Israeli hackers launched a counterattack, turning the issue into cyber war.

       “It appears that many organizations have made great efforts to block attacks or at least minimize the damage,” Roni Bachar, a cyber-security expert at the Avnet Information Security, told Haaretz.

        He believed that while much hacker activity has been detected, it was not enough to cause the serious damage that was pledged.

        However, other experts have warned that the hackers may attempt to deploy malware such as “Trojan horses”, which can steal information and harm host computer systems.

        The cyber attack has won plaudits from the Hamas government in Gaza.“God bless the minds and the efforts of the soldiers of the electronic battle,” Ihab Al- Ghussian, Gaza’s chief government spokesman, wrote on his official Facebook page.

        Anonymous launched the first ‘OpIsrael’ cyber-attacks in November 2012 during an Israeli offensive on the besieged Gaza Strip.

        Some 700 Israeli website suffered repeated DDos attacks, which targeted high-profile government systems such as the Foreign Ministry, the Bank of Jerusalem, the Israeli Defense Ministry, the army blog, and the Israeli President’s official website.

        The Israeli Finance Ministry reported an estimated 44 million unique attacks on government websites over a four day period.

        Following ‘OpIsrael,’ Anonymous posted the online personal data of 5,000 Israeli officials, including names, ID numbers and personal emails.

        The group also took part in an attack in which the details of some 600,000 users of the popular Israeli email service Walla were released online. (T/P012/E1)

Miraj News Agency (MINA)