Turkey
Israeli AI ‘using WhatsApp data’ to target Gaza families for bomb strikes
‘Lavender’ AI set to prioritise hitting targets at home with their families and is said to be using WhatsApp data for its process – but how is Israel getting hold of it?
Israel’s AI system for targeting people for murder in Gaza uses WhatsApp data among its targeting criteria, according to a report in the Israeli 972 magazine and analysis by Paul Biggar of Tech for Palestine.
The platform is marketed as encrypted ‘end to end’, supposedly offering complete security, and WhatsApp told Middle East Monitor that:
WhatsApp has no backdoors and we do not provide bulk information to any government. For over a decade, Meta has provided consistent transparency reports and those include the limited circumstances when WhatsApp information has been requested. Our principles are firm – we carefully review, validate and respond to law enforcement requests based on applicable law and consistent with internationally recognized standards, including human rights.
However, a 2021 Freedom of Information Request to the FBI revealed that WhatsApp’s owner provides ‘near real-time’ information to US authorities – not the content of messages in most cases, but of who is sending and receiving messages:
WhatsApp will produce certain user metadata, though not actual message content, every 15 minutes in response to a pen register [a special type of federal request], the FBI says. The FBI guide explains that most messaging services do not or cannot do this and instead provide data with a lag and not in anything close to real time: “Return data provided by the companies listed below, with the exception of WhatsApp, are actually logs of latent data that are provided to law enforcement in a non-real-time manner and may impact investigations due to delivery delays.”
This potentially fits with reports in Israeli media that Israel is using an artificial intelligence platform named ‘Lavender’ to identify thousands of human targets in Gaza and flag them for an airstrike, with WhatsApp data forming a key part of the AI’s decision process, based on the WhatsApp connections of supposed ‘militants’ – and that the system is designed to kill large numbers of civilians. One source told 972 that when Lavender identifies a target, Israeli forces:
bombed them in homes without hesitation, as a first option. It’s much easier to bomb a family’s home. The system is built to look for them in these situations.
But of course, people are in WhatsApp groups of all kinds of topics and for all kind of reasons – and merely being in a group which has a ‘militant’ member is no guarantee of any kind of ‘guilt’ – even if the right to resist occupation is disregarded, as Israel, the US and UK do.
This pattern raises the possibility that Israel is obtaining WhatsApp data, whether directly or from the US government. Another possibility is that Israel is accessing the data through the notorious ‘Pegasus’ hacking programme that has been shown to target WhatsApp users, hijacking their phones through WhatsApp even, in the later Pegasus versions, if they don’t open any suspicious links. Journalists, politicians, human rights activists and others are known to have been hacked by governments using the software, including its use by the Saudis against dissident Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi.
So serious was the issue that in 2021 tech firm Apple sued NSO, the maker of Pegasus, for targeting Apple users. NSO claimed that the software is used only against ‘terrorists’ – as which Israel, the UK, US and some others have designated Palestinian resistance groups – but there is clearly no guarantee that the definition of ‘terrorist’ is not extended in practice to anyone targeted by Israel. Biggar has accused WhatsApp’s owners of breaking international law and violating human rights.
Facebook, which belongs to the same Meta parent group as WhatsApp, has been accused of shutting down the circulation of pro-Palestinian and anti-Zionist posts and treating the term ‘Zionist’ as hate speech. In 2020, the company admitted changing its algorithms to filter out left-wing news and analysis from users’ feeds while allowing right-wing propaganda to flow unchecked.
However Israel is accessing the WhatsApp data it is said to be using to target Palestinians and their families, undoubtedly a war crime, the news that it is doing so is a warning for those who dissent from Establishment narratives and use ‘private’ messaging services to do so.
Meta continued its statement to Middle East Monitor:
Our principles are firm – we carefully review, validate and respond to law enforcement requests based on applicable law and consistent with internationally recognized standards, including human rights.
The US and UK governments, however, continue to insist that Israel is following international law and recognised human rights standards, even as it murders tens of thousands of civilians, mostly women and children.
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Industrial Policy in Turkey: Rise, Retreat and Return – review
In Industrial Policy in Turkey: Rise, Retreat and Return, Mina Toksoz, Mustafa Kutlay and William Hale analyse Turkey’s industrial policy over the past century, highlighting the interplay of global paradigms, macroeconomic stability and domestic institutional contexts. The book offers a timely analyses of industrial policy’s past and possible future trajectories, though it stops short of interrogating exactly how cultural, social, political and economic factors shape state-business relations and bureaucracy, writes M Kerem Coban.
Industrial Policy in Turkey: Rise, Retreat and Return. Edinburgh University Press. 2023.
Is industrial policy back? The Biden administration’s Inflation Reduction Act and the CHIPS and Science Act, or the 2016 UK industrial policy are only two contemporary examples. These policies seek to address value chain bottlenecks, as well as the question of how to “take back control” in manufacturing and key sectors, along with concerns about gaining or sustaining economic edge and autonomy
In this context, the Turkish experience is illustrative for making sense of the trajectory of industrial policy in a major developing country. Mina Toksoz, Mustafa Kutlay and William Hale examine the evolution of industrial policy in Turkey. They present an accessible, detailed account of the trajectory and evolution of the policy since the establishment of the Republic, which argues that we had better study “the conditions under which state intervention works, rather than whether the state should intervene in the economy” (26, emphasis in original).
[The authors] suggest that effective industrial policy is the outcome of the interaction between global development policy paradigms, macroeconomic (in)stability, and the domestic institutional context.
The book is divided into five chapters. Chapter One discusses the political economy of industrial policy and sets out an analytical framework. The authors assert that analyses should go beyond dichotomies (eg, horizontal vs. vertical policies; export-led vs. import-substituting industrialisation) and that a broader understanding requires identifying the factors and conditions of effective industrial policy. They suggest that effective industrial policy is the outcome of the interaction between global development policy paradigms, macroeconomic (in)stability, and the domestic institutional context. Global development policy paradigms evolved from étatism of the 1930s, import-substituting industrialisation in the 1960s and the 1970s, neoliberalism of the 1980s, and the return of industrial policy after the 2008 Financial Crisis. Macroeconomic (in)stability drives (un)certainty regarding economic policies and instruments and the trajectory of economy, which, in turn, regulates investment decisions. Finally, the domestic institutional context concerns how state-society, or state-business, relations are structured, whether the state capacity is sufficient to resolve conflicts, discipline and coordinate actor behaviour, and whether bureaucracy has capabilities to formulate and implement policies. Figure 1 seeks to summarise the main argument of the book.
Figure 1: Flow chart summarising the book’s main argument. Source: M Kerem Coban.
Chapter Two focuses on the longue durée between 1923 and 1980. From the ashes of incessant wars that ruined the already unsophisticated infrastructure and demographic challenge, the new Republic had to build a new nation. Yet the rise of the state interventionist era in the 1930s drove policymakers towards the first industrialisation plan and the opening of many industrial sites across the country. When the Democrat Party assumed power, the interventionist, planning-based industrial policy was scrutinised for liberalisation that even included state-owned enterprises to be released to set up their own prices (73).
At the same time, business was encouraged to invest. For example, the fruits of these included Otosan or BOSSA (75). Between 1960 and 1980, the authors underline the second planning period with the establishment of the State Planning Organisation (SPO). SPO boosted bureaucratic and planning capacity and capabilities for disciplined, systematic industrial policy during the era of import-substitution.
Between 1980 and 2000 […] Turkey shifted to export-led growth and liberalised trade and financial flows. These shifts had profound implications for bureaucracy
The third chapter examines demoted industrial policy between 1980 and 2000 when Turkey shifted to export-led growth and liberalised trade and financial flows. These shifts had profound implications for bureaucracy: SPO was sidelined, parallel bureaucratic networks of Ozal were implanted with the opening of new offices or agencies. Consequently, the role of state became less coherent, as political uncertainty driven by unstable coalitions eroded the market-shaping role of the state. The financial sector did not help industrial policy, since banks were dominantly financing chronic budget deficits during a period of high inflation (111). What is more, business, including Islamic conservative SMEs in Anatolia, reduced or ignored investments in manufacturing given the clientelist state-business relations that incentivised construction, real-estate development (115), emphasis in original). Finally, the external conditions were not disciplinary: accession to the Customs Union with the European Union and the World Trade Organization ruled out export support and import restricting measures, among other trade regulatory instruments.
The fourth chapter claims that industrial policy retreated between 2001 and 2009. The first years of this period was marked by political instability and a local systemic banking crisis and its resolution, and Justice and Development Party (AKP in Turkish) assumed power. During this period, industrial policy was dominated by institutionalisation of the regulatory state and the privatisation of state-owned enterprises, the establishment of autonomous regulatory agencies and are structured banking sector. While the regulatory capacity of the state increased, privatisation and the regulation of the market were highly politicised. For example, “a major cycle of gas privatisation saw ‘politically connected persons’ winning fifteen out of nineteen metropolitan centres and serving 76 percent of the population” (161). In such a politically compromised setting, which was accompanied by the institutionalisation of the capital inflow-dependent credit-led growth model that prioritised “rent-thick” sectors, industrial policy could not flourish.
While the regulatory capacity of the state increased, privatisation and the regulation of the market were highly politicised.
The fifth chapter locates the policy within the global ideational and political economic context that marks the return of industrial policy in various forms. In line with policy documents such as the 11th Development Plan, horizontal measures, private and public R&D spending on high-tech initiatives, electric vehicle manufacturing attempt, and most notably the advancements in defence sector have constituted the revival of industrial policy. At the same time, the authors point to several challenges such as eroded academic research and quality and a lack of investment in ICT skills. Additionally, R&D subsidies or other industrial policy measures require thorough performance criteria and measurement to discipline actor behaviour and regulate the incentive structures.
Industrial Policy in Turkey is a timely contribution to the current debate. Its historical account and analysis of current policies, instruments, and the potential trajectory of industrial policy are its main strengths. Still, there are several caveats. First, the book’s framework is not systematic, which causes some confusion. For example, the book does not demonstrate a convincing link between the role and impact of autonomous agencies on industrial policy. Second, the book leaves the reader with more questions than answers, one of which relates to the effect of bureaucratic fragmentation in shaping industrial policy. Another is around the implications of state-business for bureaucracy, and consequently, industrial policy.
The book leaves the reader with more questions than answers, one of which relates to the effect of bureaucratic fragmentation in shaping industrial policy.
Third, the trajectory of industrial policy cannot be considered independently from the shifts in growth models. Yet the fact these shifts occur because the country depends on hard currency earnings for capital accumulation and to finance consumption and investments: Turkey either relies on capital flows or export earnings, in addition to tourism and (un)recorded (illicit) flows. Pendulums between these channels imply that the country cannot design and implement disciplined, systematic industrial policy. Put differently, there are macroeconomic and financial structural impediments against generating hard currency earnings. Industrial policy is one of the remedies, however, the macroeconomic and structural transformative consequences of the latest episode of emphasis on industrial policy and the export-driven growth experiment in Turkey are yet to be seen.
Finally, and perhaps most importantly, the book tends to relegate a core problem of coordination, long-term policy design and implementation to “governance issues”. Deeper cultural, social, political and economic factors determine the clientelist state-business relations and their effect on bureaucracy and bureaucratic autonomy. Such deeper ties have been masked by instrumentalised “democratisation reforms” or higher economic growth rates in the previous years. In this context, is the more critical problem the purposefully immobilised or challenged infrastructural power to coordinate societal actors? If that is true, then should we make interdisciplinary attempts to identify this problem’s core determinants?
Note: This interview gives the views of the author, and not the position of the LSE Review of Books blog, or of the London School of Economics and Political Science.
Image credit: Chongsiri Chaitongngam on Shutterstock.
One Year After the Earthquake
Inside a prefabricated house atop a hill in Antakya, Turkey, Saniye Yılmaz is sitting on a beige velvet sofa, charging the beeping pill installed in her heart. She is shaking, and struggles to speak. “Everything got worse after the earthquake,” she says, adding that the stress has made the symptoms of her Parkinson’s disease even more unbearable. “We’re the living dead.” It’s been over a…
14 nations with greater population than US and EU combined co-sponsor ICJ Gaza genocide case
Nations covering over a billion people back prosecution while UK shamefully fails to back case – despite backing Myanmar genocide case at ICJ just six weeks ago
Fourteen nations with a population of over a billion people – more than the combined populations of the US and EU – have formally co-sponsored South Africa’s case at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) accusing Israel of genocide. The nations are:
Turkey
Indonesia
Malaysia
Bolivia
Nicaragua
Maldives
Venezuela
Namibia
Morocco
Bangladesh
Pakistan
Saudi Arabia
Iran
Jordan
Despite co-signing a genocide case against Myanmar only six weeks ago – specifically because of Myanmar’s crimes against Rohingya children – the UK continues to refuse to back South Africa’s ICJ case against Israel, which has murdered more than thirty thousand people, including around thirteen thousand children.
Yet again, the UK and US are backing the oppressors against the oppressed – and the world knows it.
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Video: Israeli police kick journalist repeatedly in head – now hospitalised with ‘serious’ injuries
Yet more brutality from apartheid regime
Turkish photojournalist Mustafa Haruf has been kicked repeatedly in the head, without provocation, by Israeli police in occupied East Jerusalem, leaving him hospitalised in a serious and not yet stabilised condition.
Haruf, who works for Turkish news agency Anadolu, was first struck in the head with a rifle then yanked to the ground and set on by two uniformed thugs as others looked on and others tried to prevent filming:
Mr Haruf was subsequently able to speak to colleagues from his hospital bed. In Gaza, an Israeli airstrike killed Al Jazeera journalist Samer Abu Daqqa today and wounded Wael Al-Dahdouh, the Al Jazeera reporter whose family was killed in a targeted airstrike early in Israel’s genocidal assault, as they reported on yet another UN school being bombed.
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Israel says it will pursue Gazan Palestinians on Lebanese, Turkish and Qatari territory
Israeli security service director’s threat on Israeli national TV
The director of Israel’s domestic security service, the Shin Bet, has said that the Israeli government intends to pursue Palestinian resistance activists outside Palestine – specifically threatening Turkey and Qatar.
Speaking to Kan, Israel’s national broadcaster, and reported by Israeli paper Haaretz, Ronen Bar compared the 7 October kibbutz raid to the 1972 massacre of Israeli athletes, saying:
This is our Munich. Everywhere – in Gaza, in the Palestinian territories, in Lebanon, in Turkey, and in Qatar. It will take us a few years, but we will be there to do it… we are drawing our lessons from the events and are already passing them on to other arenas, not just in the Gaza Strip…
the scope of threats facing the State of Israel is unprecedented in the past year, even before these
events. Even in this case, the main thing is hidden from the eye. There are many things brewing beneath the surface.
As well as constituting an open threat to the sovereignty of three nations, Bar’s comments are exposed as a farce by the fact that Israel knew what Hamas was planning at least a year before the kibbutz raid and did nothing – and that a growing mountain of evidence now shows that the bulk of Israeli casualties during the raid were caused by the Israeli military firing on buildings and vehicles that contained Israeli citizens, and at people on foot that pilots and tank commanders did not pause to identify before destroying.
Despite the mounting evidence, UK and western media have refused to cover the fact of Israeli ‘friendly fire’ under the military’s ‘Hannibal doctrine‘, as it would fatally undermine Israel’s attempts to justify its genocide of Palestinians in Gaza.
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Solidarity with Turkish Academics
“We ask the state to put an end to violence inflicted against citizens right now, we as academics and researchers of this country declare that we won’t be a party to this crime and promise that we will sustain our stance in the presence of political parties, parliament and international public”.
Over 1,400 academics and researchers from Turkey and abroad have signed a statement titled “We will not be a party to this crime”.
A campaign has been launched by Academics for Peace by releasing a press statement held simultaneously in İstanbul and Ankara to contest ongoing state violence in Turkey.
1,128 academics from 89 universities in Turkey, and over 355 academics and researchers from abroad including figures such as Noam Chomsky, Judith Butler, Etienne Balibar and David Harvey have signed a text calling on the state of Turkey to end state violence and prepare negotiation conditions.
The petition is ongoing.
The full text of the petition (in English, French, German, Spanish, Arabic, Russian and Greek) is HERE
For international support, please send your signature, name of your university and your title to: info@barisicinakademisyenler.net
Further petitions have unfolded, including:
- A letter of support for academics in the UK or with links to the UK, available HERE. The letter is to be sent to the UK national press on Monday 18th January, 10am. To sign, please email your title, name, and institutional affiliation to: ukacademicsforpeace@gmail.com;
- Scholars associated with colleges and universities in the US have penned the following letter, available HERE. To sign, please email your title, name, and institutional affiliation to: academicsUS@gmail.com; and
- Scholars associated with colleges and universities in Canada have penned the following letter, available HERE. To sign, please email your title, name, and institutional affiliation to: canadaacademicsforpeace@gmail.com; and
- An international petition for UK, US, and Canadian academics in support of Academics for Peace, is available HERE.
On 18 January the European International Studies Association (EISA) released a Public Statement on the Persecution of Academics in Turkey.
On 21 January the International Studies Association (ISA) released a Public Statement Regarding the Persecution of Academics in Turkey.
There is also the 22 January British International Studies Association (BISA) Public Statement Regarding the Situation for Academics in Turkey.
The Political Studies Association has also written a letter on 26 January to the Council of Higher Education, Turkey (COHE) on the recent treatment of academics in Turkey who were threatened, detained and investigated for using their right to freedom of expression.
On 2 February the Council of the European Association for Evolutionary Political Economy (EAEPE) also affirmed its profound concern about the intolerable decline of academic freedoms in Turkey and the discrimination of fellow academics.