zamel, joel bot
see geo nader
SEE MUELLER
SEE COLLUSION
SEE CAMBRIDGE ANAL
SEE PSY-GROUP
OLEG DERIPASKA
gingrich --> kushner?
KUSHNER
MBZ
MILLER
DON JR APPROVED ZAMEL
ERIK BLKWATER
FLYNN
see wikistrat
LIARS COVINGTON CYA AND MARC MUKASEY DEFENSE?
---
TOOL: Epstein Graph - Searchable Epstein Document Archive
Zamel
5 mentions3 documents1 emails5 connections
Top Connections
Deripaska(3)mbs(3)](https://epsteingraph.com/people/mbs)[Nader(3)Prinz(3)](https://epsteingraph.com/people/prinz)[Miro(2)HBJ(2)](https://epsteingraph.com/people/hbj)[Kwok(1)Lawtemc(1)](https://epsteingraph.com/people/lawtemc)[Self(1)J (jeevacation@gmail.com)(1)Nikki haley(1)Paul Singerman(1)Steve Bannon(1)Donald Trump(1)Emir(1)](https://epsteingraph.com/people/emir)[Sender [redacted](1)[Kashoggi(1)](https://epsteingraph.com/people/kashoggi)
[EFTA00517065 phone record
Exported iMessage conversation (iMessage archive) from a device showing exchanged messages on 2018-10-09 and 2018-10-10 discussing a proposed final version of a document, negotiation of items, travel locations, and international political topics.](https://epsteingraph.com/documents/EFTA00517065)[EFTA01615404
correspondence
iMessage conversation (2018-10-09 to 2018-10-10) involving Steve Bannon discussing international politics, a potential Nikki Haley primary challenge to Trump, Brazil, and the Khashoggi/Saudi issue.](https://epsteingraph.com/documents/EFTA01615404)[HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_027450 email
Printout of email correspondence dated 2018-10-09 containing short messages referencing multiple countries, several personal names (Zamel, Nader, Prinz, Deripaska), and phrases such as "Fingerprints everywhere" and a list of countries described as "So deeply fucked up."](https://epsteingraph.com/documents/HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_027450)
---
SOME TALK
Joel Zamel (born 1986) is an Australian-Israeli inventor and entrepreneur. He owns and operates several private intelligence and political analysis agencies that offer services for forecasting simulations, wargaming, influence operations, social media campaigns, private investment brokering, and election‑campaign strategy. These agencies include the Joel Zamel Investment Group (JZIG), the geostrategic consultancy Wikistrat, and Psy-Group, a now‑defunct private intelligence firm that shut down after it was revealed to be under investigation by Robert Mueller.[1][2][3][4][5][6]^
Early life and education
Joel Zamel was born in 1986 in Australia.[4]^ He is the son of Gary Zamel, a wealthy Australian mining engineer and businessman.[3]^ Zamel attended the University of New South Wales in Sydney, where he earned a bachelor's degree in mining engineering. He later moved to Israel, where he studied at the Interdisciplinary Center, Herzliya, specializing in counter‑terrorism and homeland security, and earned a master’s degree in government, diplomacy, and strategy.[2][3]^ He is also a member of the Central Eurasia Leadership Alliance network.[7]^
Career
Zamel is the founder of several private intelligence and political analysis agencies, including the geostrategic consultancy firm Wikistrat and the Philippines-based private intelligence agency WhiteKnight. Zamel gained widespread visibility and public attention during Robert Mueller's Special Counsel investigation in 2018, when The New York Times reported on his dealings with Donald Trump's electoral campaign.[8]^
Zamel's agencies have a broad network of analysts, consisting primarily of former government officials and private experts. He is also an active investor in the cybersecurity sector, particularly in firms focused on CVE efforts.[9]^ He has established various social media influence companies in Eastern Europe and Asia, and has formed a close advisory team of former government officials who served in senior positions in the U.S., U.K., and Middle Eastern governments.[2][10]^
In 2015, Zamel's Wikistrat spent a week running scenarios, called the "Cyber Mercenaries project," on how a U.S. election-interference campaign could be carried out by Russian cyber actors. These were later reported to Donald Trump Jr. in 2016.[5]
On August 3, 2016, Zamel participated in a high-level meeting with Donald Trump Jr., Blackwater founder Erik Prince, Stephen Miller, and George Nader, where Zamel reportedly pitched a social media manipulation campaign to help Donald Trump win the 2016 presidential election.[8]^ This was followed by a post-inauguration meeting in December 2016 with George Nader, Steve Bannon,[11]^ and Jared Kushner.[8][12]
After the 2016 Trump election win, Zamel's company, Psy Group, formed a partnership with Cambridge Analytica to jointly bid for contracts with the American government.[13]^ In December 2016, George Nader purchased a presentation from WhiteKnight that demonstrated the impact of social media campaigns on Donald Trump's electoral victory.[8]
Zamel had first met Nader at the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum in June 2016.[4]^ In November 2016, George Nader paid Zamel $2 million for undisclosed reasons.[14][4]^ Blackwater founder Erik Prince later lied about it to Congress. ^[15]^
The meeting with Trump was later scrutinized by Robert Mueller's Special Counsel investigation and subsequently led to investigations into his links to Trump officials, which continued after the Mueller investigation finished.[8][16]^ Zamel's meetings with Saudi officials were also scrutinized by Mueller.[17]^
In February 2019, federal agents detained Zamel at a Washington airport, and he appeared before a grand jury to give evidence to Robert Mueller about his links to George Nader.[8][18][3]^ Zamel bragged to Nader that he had conducted a secret campaign which had been influential in Trump's victory, a characterization which Zamel's lawyer has disputed.[4][5]^ Zamel also had contact with Michael Flynn.[19]^
On April 5, 2019, the Senate Intelligence Committee sent a letter to Walter Soriano, the owner of USG Security Limited, based in Britain, for his communication with Paul Manafort, Michael Flynn, Psy-Group, Wikistrat, Black Cube, and Orbis Business Intelligence (a firm co-founded by Christopher Steele). Soriano has links to Oleg Deripaska.[20]
Zamel's firms have completed work for Oleg V. Deripaska and Dmitry Rybolovlev.[8]^
Zamel has been represented by Marc Mukasey, who specializes in reputation protection.[21]^ Mukasey, a former law partner of Rudy Giuliani, also represented President Donald Trump.
Beliefs
Zamel believes Bitcoin is a "truth machine protected by a fortress of misconceptions."[22]^
Zamel believes in information operations as an underutilized tool for countering extremist ideologies. He believes "dictators are beating the West when it comes to sophisticated information operations."[23]^ He has advocated for "exploiting the frequent protest movements in Iran and the ever-present disgust with the regime through covert on-the-ground and digital support".[24]^
See also
References
-=-=
GGL 3 26
[### Israel • Leaked emails shed light on former Israeli leaders ...
Intelligence Online
https://www.intelligenceonline.com › 2025/09/19 › leak...](https://www.intelligenceonline.com/middle-east-and-africa/2025/09/19/leaked-emails-shed-light-on-former-israeli-leaders--dealings-with-private-intelligence-companies,110523820-eve)
Sep 19, 2025 — According to some of the emails, Zamel was introduced to Gantz by Pinchas Buchris, the former head of Unit 8200, the Israeli military signals ...Read more
Ehud Barak, secret correspondence (2/2) - Ehud Barak and Benny Gantz discussed cooperation opportunities with Black Cube and with Wikistrat founder Joel Zamel, according to a new trove of emails. [...]
Published on 19/09/2025 at 04:00 GMT Reading time 3 minutes Matt Bernardini
[### Jeffrey Epstein laughed off Israeli spy claims : r/geopolitics
Reddit · r/geopolitics
290+ comments · 8 months ago](https://www.reddit.com/r/geopolitics/comments/1m0dend/jeffrey_epstein_laughed_off_israeli_spy_claims/)
Joel Zamel appears to have came up with the idea of getting Russia to help Trump win: "In 2015, Zamel's Wikistrat spent a week running ...Read more
[### Jeffrey Epstein's conversations about “race science” with ...
Facebook · The Atlantic
140+ reactions · 1 month ago](https://www.facebook.com/TheAtlantic/posts/jeffrey-epsteins-conversations-about-race-science-with-some-of-the-most-powerful/1287237583275649/)
Perhaps most disturbing, Epstein allegedly discussed plans to impregnate multiple women at his New Mexico ranch in an attempt to spread his DNA ...Read more
People also ask
What does Epstein mean in German?
Was Ehud Barak former prime minister of Israel?
Who is Daniel Epstein?
Who was Michael Epstein?
Feedback
[### Mohammed Jameel - Epstein's black book
epsteinsblackbook.com
https://epsteinsblackbook.com › names › mohammed-ja...](https://epsteinsblackbook.com/names/mohammed-jameel)
Mohammed Jameel is listed in Epstein's black book on page 29. Epstein recorded 2 phone numbers and no addresses under this name.Read more
[### The Dark Truth About Cambridge Analytica's Ties to ...
Vanity Fair
https://www.vanityfair.com › News › analytica](https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2018/05/the-dark-truth-about-cambridge-analyticas-ties-to-trumpworld?srsltid=AfmBOop_2YsL7g16tflO7Jem3zP-_qK9-W7Py0ruiKks-0qH1mqvCj8h)
May 23, 2018 — Zamel has met with Mueller's team, though his lawyer told the Journal that his client is “not a target” of the special counsel's investigation.Read more
[### Ambassador and Trump confidant Tom Barrack kept ...
Facebook · CBS News
:{:{430+ reactions · 3 weeks ago]}:
https://www.facebook.com/CBSNews/posts/exclusive-ambassador-and-trump-confidant-tom-barrack-kept-in-regular-contact-wit/1314681350523706/)}:
EXCLUSIVE: Ambassador and Trump confidant Tom Barrack kept in regular contact with Jeffrey Epstein for years, documents show.
[### After Trump attacks New York Times, Giuliani tells paper ...
The Guardian
:{:{https://www.theguardian.com › us-news › may › donal...](}:
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2018/may/20/donald-trump-new-york-times-nader-zamel-prince
May 20, 2018 — Marc Mukasey, a lawyer for Zamel, said: “Joel Zamel offered nothing to the Trump campaign, received nothing from the Trump campaign ...Read more
Trump attacked the New York Times on Sunday, after the newspaper said his oldest son and other aides met in August 2016 with a representative of two Gulf states offering to help the Trump campaign.
[
Facing Trump, a historian appeals to America's soul: 'I think we'll survive'
Read more](https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2018/may/20/donald-trump-jon-meacham-soul-of-america)
The Times said the emissary for Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates and another attendee at the meeting had co-operated with Robert Mueller, the special counsel investigating Russian election interference and links between Trump aides and Moscow.
Later on Sunday the president’s attorney, Rudy Giuliani, told the Times Mueller told the White House he intends to finish his investigation by 1 September this year. Giuliani told Fox News that Mueller had told him he wants to interview Trump in mid-July.
Opening his Sunday morning fusillade, Trump tweeted: “Things are really getting ridiculous. The Failing and Crooked (but not as Crooked as Hillary Clinton) @nytimes has done a long & boring story indicating that the World’s most expensive Witch Hunt has found nothing on Russia & me so now they are looking at the rest of the World!”
The Times reported that Donald Trump Jr met George Nader, the purported emissary; Joel Zamel, an Israeli specialist in social media manipulation; and Erik Prince, the founder of the private security firm formerly known as Blackwater. The meeting at Trump Tower in Manhattan “was convened primarily to offer help to the Trump team”, the paper said.
The offer met with Trump Jr’s approval, the Times said, and Nader later met with Donald Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner and Michael Flynn, the former national security adviser also now cooperating with Mueller.
A lawyer for Trump Jr, Alan Futerfas, said Trump Jr “was not interested and that was the end of it”. Marc Mukasey, a lawyer for Zamel, said: “Joel Zamel offered nothing to the Trump campaign, received nothing from the Trump campaign, delivered nothing to the Trump campaign and was not solicited by, or asked to do anything for, the Trump campaign.”
Mueller has been looking into another meeting, in January 2017 in the Seychelles, that Nader and Prince held with Abu Dhabi’s crown prince, Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, and Kirill Dmitriev, a Russian banker with ties to the Kremlin.
The Times quoted a lawyer for Nader as saying he had “fully cooperated with the special counsel’s investigation and will continue to do so”. “A senior official in Saudi Arabia”, the Times said, denied Nader had been authorised to speak for the government. Prince declined to comment. The White House did not comment.
On Sunday, speaking to the Times, Giuliani said the White House wanted Mueller’s report completed before the midterm elections in November.
“You don’t want another repeat of the 2016 election where you get contrary reports at the end and you don’t know how it affected the election,” he said, referring to then FBI director James Comey’s reopening and then closing of an investigation of Hillary Clinton’s use of private email.
Trump fired Comey last May, precipitating the appointment of Mueller. Comey has emerged as a leading critic of Trump. The firing of Comey and whether Trump obstructed justice are under consideration by Mueller.
“We want the concentration of this to be on Comey versus the president’s credibility, and I think we win that and people get that,” Giuliani told the Times, advocating a criminal investigation into Comey for perjury and the sharing of information with the Times.
Giuliani also said he was continuing to negotiate an interview between Trump and Mueller, and said Trump wanted Mueller’s final report to be public. A spokesman for the special counsel declined to comment, the Times said.
The New York Times reported that Donald Trump Jr and other aides met in August 2016 with a representative of two Gulf states offering to help the Trump campaign.
Photograph: Carolyn Kaster/AP
On Sunday, Trump’s tweet salvo contained a complaint that the Russia investigation would “put some hurt on the Republican Party” in the midterms. Inaccurately, the president called the investigation a “$20,000,000 Witch Hunt, composed of 13 Angry and Heavily Conflicted Democrats and two people who have worked for Obama for 8 years”.
Mueller is a Republican appointed FBI director by a Republican president, George W Bush, and made special counsel by a Republican deputy attorney general, Rod Rosenstein. Some of Mueller’s investigators are Democrats or have donated to Democratic campaigns.
The Virginia senator Mark Warner, the top Democrat on the Senate intelligence committee, discussed the reported Trump Tower meeting on CNN’s State of the Union.
“If the Times story is true we now have a second or maybe a third nation that was trying to lean in to this campaign,” he said. “I don’t understand what the president doesn’t get about the law that says if you have a foreign nation interfere with an American election, it is illegal.”
Warner refused to be drawn on whether he believed Russia was assisted by Trump aides. “That is the end-point question,” he said. “But we do know that the Trump campaign welcomed dirt on Clinton.”
[Trump will ask justice department to look into campaign surveillance
Read more](https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2018/may/20/donald-trump-justice-department-fbi-campaign-surveillance)
Trump Jr was the central figure in another meeting at Trump Tower, in June 2016 with Russians including a Kremlin-linked lawyer, Natalia Veselnitskaya. Told the Russians had incriminating information about Clinton, Trump Jr responded: “If it’s what you say, I love it.” Steve Bannon, formerly Donald Trump’s chief strategist, told the author Michael Wolff the meeting was “treasonous”.
Warner said Mueller was “a year in, 14 indictments, including the president’s campaign manager [Paul Manafort], and five guilty pleas and a lot of questions still need to be answered”.
On NBC’s Meet The Press, former Trump adviser Roger Stone said he was “prepared” to be charged, as it was not “inconceivable” that investigators “may seek to conjure up some extraneous crime, pertaining to my business, or maybe not even pertaining to the 2016 election”.
Several media outlets, meanwhile, named an FBI source who allegedly informed on the Trump campaign. Trump duly tweeted: “I hereby demand, and will do so officially tomorrow, that the Department of Justice look into whether or not the FBI/DOJ infiltrated or surveilled the Trump Campaign for Political Purposes – and if any such demands or requests were made by people within the Obama Administration!”
Explore more on these topics
- Trump-Russia investigation
- Donald Trump
- Russia
- Donald Trump Jr
- US politics
- New York Times
- US press and publishing
- news
GUK
---
-=-=
TOI
Israel ducks blame for firm with ex-intel officers that bid to ‘shape’ US vote
Defense Ministry tries to shrug off responsibility as Senate report reveals activities of Psy-Group; Israeli law prohibits unlicensed export of defense tech, knowledge, services
By Simona WeinglassFollow
25 August 2020,
A week after the US Senate issued a report accusing an Israeli company, Psy-Group, of attempting to meddle in US elections and, separately, of working on behalf of a Russian agent, Israel’s Defense Ministry said it is not aware of the company’s activities and has never considered itself responsible for regulating them.
Several of Psy-Group’s employees were graduates of Israeli intelligence units, including a former senior IDF intelligence officer, however, and Israel’s own export control legislation bars private firms from exporting intelligence knowledge and services without a license.
On August 18, the US Senate Select Committee on Intelligence released the fifth volume of its Russia investigation, which examines Russia’s attempts to meddle in US politics during the 2016 elections. An entire section of the report is devoted to the Israeli cyber-intelligence company, Psy-Group, which the report concludes pitched, but may not have carried out, covert influence services on behalf of the Trump presidential election campaign. “Psy Group representatives engaged with Trump Campaign senior officials in 2016 for a contract to perform work on behalf of the Campaign,” it states. “These engagements… purportedly never materialized into any Campaign work.”
The report also says that Psy-Group on separate occasions worked for at least two Russian oligarchs, including Oleg Deripaska, whom the report describes as “a proxy for the Russian state and intelligence services.”
Israel’s Defense Export Control Law strictly prohibits Israeli companies from exporting defense equipment, knowledge, technology, or services, including intelligence knowledge and services, without a license from the Ministry of Defense.
(Above and main image) Psy-Group marketing material
But when The Times of Israel contacted the Defense Ministry to ask whether Psy-Group had obtained a license to carry out covert influence campaigns in the United States or to work on behalf of Russian state actors, a spokeswoman replied, “Psy-Group does not appear on any of our lists. What this means is that they do not have a defense product that requires regulation. They are not on our list and it is not our responsibility to oversee them.”
‘The people in the Defense Export Control Agency… should have checked if Psy-Group was using knowledge or technology it acquired in the military. Who is making sure that these intelligence secrets don’t leak out of Israel?’ — Avner Barnea, former senior Shin Bet official
An Israeli expert consulted by The Times of Israel strongly contested this Defense Ministry assertion.
Dr. Avner Barnea, research fellow at the National Security Studies Center of the University of Haifa and a former senior official with the Israel Security Agency (Shin Bet), said, after reading the Senate Intelligence report, that the Ministry of Defense should have been regulating Psy-Group and preventing it from doing business with anyone connected to Russia or other foreign intelligence agencies.
Dr. Avner Barnea. (LinkedIn)
“The people in the Defense Export Control Agency are not serious, unfortunately,” he told The Times of Israel. “They’re bureaucrats who lack technological understanding. They should have checked if Psy-Group was using knowledge or technology it acquired in the military. Who is making sure that these intelligence secrets don’t leak out of Israel?”
According to the Senate committee report, Psy-Group was one of three influence companies with foreign ties that the committee investigated because it initially suspected that the company may have “played a role in shaping the outcome of the 2016 US presidential election.” The other two companies were Cambridge Analytica and Colt Ventures. Psy-Group was the brand name used by Invop Ltd., an Israeli company that went into liquidation in April 2018.
Psy-Group director Royi Burstien (Facebook)
Royi Burstien, the CEO of Psy-Group at the time of the activities described in the Senate report, is a lieutenant colonel (res.) in Israeli military intelligence.
The Senate Committee’s description of Psy-Group reveals its concerns that the company may have used or offered to use methods that the firm’s employees honed in Israeli intelligence.
“The Committee examined these specific companies and their activities related to the 2016 US election to better understand how foreign influence, including the use of techniques and methodologies honed by foreign governments and intelligence services, may have been exerted in 2016,” the report stated.
According to the Senate report, “[Psy-Group founder Joel] Zamel described Burstien’s background as including work in the intelligence field, conducting influence operations. The precise nature of Burstien’s work in the intelligence field is not known to the Committee.”
The committee also cited Psy-Group’s own literature and its emphasis on intelligence capabilities.
“The Committee reviewed several documents that described the suite of services offered by Psy Group. One corporate overview, entitled ‘Shaping Reality through Intelligence and Influence,’ sent from Psy Group to American international political consultant George Birnbaum in May 2016, highlighted Psy Group’s capabilities in ‘influence’ and ‘intelligence.’”
‘These guys came out of the [Israeli] military intelligence army unit,’ Birnbaum told the committee, ‘and it’s like coming out with a triple Ph.D. from MIT.’
The committee quoted another section of Psy-Group’s marketing material that said “Psy Group’s ‘intelligence offering’ included a ‘multi-level approach to intelligence collection’ that combined open source research, cyber operations including social engineering and ‘honeypots…to extract required information from the right sources,’ and ‘covert techniques and capabilities in the physical world.’”
Political adviser George Birnbaum during an interview with CNN in 2014. (YouTube/ GuariscoGroup)
The committee also interviewed Birnbaum, an international political consultant who helped put Psy-Group in touch with the Trump campaign. He told the committee that Psy-Group’s capabilities were unique, as a result of their military pedigree.
“These guys came out of the [Israeli] military intelligence army unit,” Birnbaum told the committee, “and it’s like coming out with a triple Ph.D. from MIT. The amount of knowledge these guys have in terms of cybersecurity, cyber-intelligence . . . they come out of a unit in which their minds in terms of understanding cybersecurity — the algorithms that they can create — it’s just so beyond what you could get [with] a normal education that it’s just unique…there are hundreds and hundreds of Israeli start-up companies that the founders are guys who came out of this unit.”
Familiar names
The intelligence committee report cites many names that may be familiar to consumers of Israel-related news.
According to the report, Psy-Group initially got in touch with the Trump campaign in March 2016, when Kory Bardash, the head of Republicans in Israel, emailed Birnbaum, as well as Eitan Charnoff, a project manager at Psy-Group.
iVote Israel website (Screenshot)
Eitan Charnoff served as the director of the widely publicized organization iVote Israel, a purportedly non-partisan group that encourages Americans in Israel to vote in US elections, but that was accused by some voters of flubbing their absentee ballot requests. He ran iVote Israel in 2016, while he was employed at Psy-Group.
Eitan Charnoff (Courtesy)
According to the Senate report, Bardash sent an email to Birnbaum and Charnoff saying “I have spoken to both of you about the other. Hopefully, you can have a mutually beneficial chat.”
Later that spring and summer, according to the intelligence committee, Psy-Group pitched two influence and intelligence projects to the Trump campaign. These included offers to do opposition research on Hillary Clinton, offers to use fake social media profiles to covertly influence Republican National Convention delegates, and offers to target minority communities, suburban female voters, and undecided voters with covert messaging.
In internal company emails, employees also discussed the use of “hundreds of avatars driving negative messaging,” and “physical world ops like counter protests, hecklers, etc.”
According to Zamel, none of these campaigns were ever carried out: “Not a tweet, not a character, nothing,” Zamel told the committee. However, the committee noted that Zamel was paid over $1 million by George Nader, an adviser to the United Arab Emirates, with high-level Russian ties.
A screen capture from a Psy-Group proposal, reportedly for the Trump campaign, obtained by the New York Times.
The Senate report mentions the names of other Psy-Group employees who were included in emails discussing possible influence campaigns on behalf of Trump. One of these is Paul Vesely, an Australian-Israeli, who, in November 2017, posted an interview he gave on his LinkedIn profile concerning disinformation campaigns during the 2016 presidential election.
In the interview, Vesely discusses such campaigns in a knowledgeable way, although it is not clear whether he is referring to work that may have specifically been carried out by Psy-Group.
Paul Vesely. (Courtesy)
“The reason the techniques used on social media were so effective during the 2016 US presidential elections,” he is quoted as saying, “was because the messaging was segmented perfectly per target audience. This created both engaging and sometimes infuriating content tailored to appeal to specific segments of the US population. This simple yet effective marketing technique allowed millions of Americans to not just digest but crave the narrative these fake news accounts were spurting out. The second reason why the disinformation campaign was so successful was because it seemed to come from grassroots supporters even though it was being led by avatars. There is no greater power of influence than over people in a segmented group with similar interests one another’s outlook in an effective echo chamber. This echo chamber allowed real people to be involved with avatars and social group administrators who directed conversation and released information that varied in spectrum from being loosely based on truth all the way to being completely fictitious. No matter how distant the content was from the truth, when agreed upon and repeated in a group, it was extremely effective.”
The Senate Intelligence Committee said it could find no convincing evidence that Psy-Group carried out influence operations against the US on behalf of Russia. Nor did it draw a conclusion as to whether Psy-Group had carried out any influence campaigns against Americans at all.
“The Committee found no convincing evidence that Russia’s government or intelligence services worked with or through any of these companies in furtherance of Moscow’s 2016 US election interference. There are, however, limitations to the Committee’s understanding of this subject,” the report said.
The committee did, however, find that Psy-Group had worked for Russian oligarch Oleg Deripaska on another project involving a business dispute in Austria. Deripaska was introduced to Psy-Group by a man named Walter Soriano, according to the report.
“According to Burstien, Psy-Group undertook an “intelligence project” (codenamed “Project Starbucks”) in probably 2015 for Oleg·Deripaska involving a business dispute with a large Austrian company, possibly connected to real estate,” the report said.
Russia’s President Vladimir Putin, left, and Russian metals magnate Oleg Deripaska, right, walking to attend the APEC Business Advisory Council dialogue in Danang, Vietnam, on November 10, 2017. (Mikhail Klimentyev, Sputnik, Kremlin Pool Photo via AP/File)
The report discusses Deripaska at great length, describing him as a key Russian operative.
“Deripaska has managed and financed Kremlin-approved and -directed active measures campaigns, including information operations and election interference efforts. Deripaska has conducted these activities in an effort to install pro-Kremlin regimes, control local economies and politicians, and strengthen Kremlin-aligned power brokers across the globe,” the report says.
The Times of Israel reported in May that Psy-Group allegedly carried out an online harassment campaign against pro-democracy activists in Ukraine, a campaign that would have strongly aligned with Russian government interests.
-=-=
GGL 9 26
Joel Zamel
https://en.wikipedia.org › wiki › Joel_Zamel
Joel Zamel (born 1986) is an Australian-Israeli inventor and entrepreneur. He owns and operates several private intelligence and political analysis agencies ...Read more
Israeli Intelligence Company Formed Venture With Trump ...
https://www.wsj.com › articles › israeli-intelligence-com...
May 23, 2018 — Psy-Group is owned by entrepreneur Joel Zamel, who has been questioned by special-counsel investigators.
Israel ducks blame for firm with ex-intel officers that bid to ' ...
https://www.timesofisrael.com › israel-ducks-blame-for-...
Aug 25, 2020 — According to the Senate report, “[Psy-Group founder Joel] Zamel described Burstien's background as including work in the intelligence field, ...Read more
Rick Gates Sought Online Manipulation Plans From Israeli ...
https://www.nytimes.com › U.S. › Politics
Oct 8, 2018 — Psy-Group's owner, Joel Zamel, did meet in August 2016 with Donald Trump Jr., Mr. Trump's eldest son. Investigators working for Robert S.Read more
Missing: CYBER | Show results with: CYBER
"Antisemitic Influencers, Fake Journalists: Inside an Israeli ...
https://electionlawblog.org › antisemitic-influencers-fak...
Feb 19, 2023 — Psy Group, its founder Joel Zamel and CEO Burstien were investigated by the U.S. bureau on suspicion of offering their services to Donald Trump' ...Read more
Joel Zamel
https://en.wikipedia.org › wiki › Joel_Zamel
Joel Zamel (born 1986) is an Australian-Israeli inventor and entrepreneur. He owns and operates several private intelligence and political analysis agencies ...Read more
Joel Zamel
https://www.wikistrat.com › joel-zamel
Mr. Joel Zamel is a founder and investor in a series of private firms whose services span: crowdsourced intelligence analysis, expert wargaming, ...Read more
Israeli Intelligence Company Formed Venture With Trump ...
https://www.wsj.com › articles › israeli-intelligence-com...
May 23, 2018 — Psy-Group is owned by entrepreneur Joel Zamel, who has been questioned by special-counsel investigators.
Australian Joel Zamel linked to special counsel Robert ...
https://www.afr.com › world › australian-joel-zamel-lin...
May 22, 2018 — Mr Zamel also set up a private intelligence company, Psy Group, which employs experts with links to the Israeli intelligence community.Read more
Joel Zamel
https://nationalinterest.org › People
Aug 2, 2021 — Joel Zamel is a founder and investor in a series of private firms whose services span: crowdsourced intelligence analysis, expert wargaming, ...Read more
Missing: group | Show results with: group
Israeli firm partnered with Cambridge Analytica to win U.S. ...
https://www.marketwatch.com › story › israeli-firm-part...
May 22, 2018 — Israeli firm partnered with Cambridge Analytica to win U.S. government contracts. Entrepreneur Joel Zamel has drawn attention from Mueller probe.Read more
The future is Bitcoin: Why all countries should embrace ...
https://www.jpost.com › ... › B&I Opinion
Feb 5, 2025 — Joel Zamel is the founder of Wikistrat, and a leading advocate for leveraging innovative technologies like Bitcoin to enhance national ...Read more
Psy-Group
https://en.wikipedia.org › wiki › Psy-Group
Psy-Group is a former Israeli private intelligence agency. It closed after revelations that it was under investigation by Special Counsel Robert Mueller.Read more
Missing: investment | Show results with: investment
Israeli Company Investigated by Robert Mueller's Team Shuts ...
https://www.calcalistech.com › ... › AI
May 21, 2018 — Psy-Group, the company headed by the Israeli media specialist Joel Zamel, who is reportedly being investigated in connection with the ...Read more
Missing: investment | Show results with: investment
Mueller Could Have More Than Russia on His Mind
https://www.brennancenter.org › analysis-opinion › mu...
Feb 1, 2019 — The Daily Beast reports that Wikistrat founder Joel Zamel has “been questioned by Special Counsel Robert Mueller's team as they investigate ...Read more
Missing: investment | Show results with: investment
-=-=
9 26
https://nationalinterest.org/profile/joel-zamel
-=-=
[### US media barely touches Epstein links with Israeli ... The Electronic Intifada
https://electronicintifada.net › content › us-media-barely-...](https://electronicintifada.net/content/us-media-barely-touches-epstein-links-israeli-intelligence/50822)
Jul 25, 2025 — Connections between sex trafficker and spy agencies have been long teased. But few are covering them.
Missing: ZAMEL | Show results with: ZAMEL
[### Zamel - Epstein Graph
epsteingraph.com
https://epsteingraph.com › people › zamel](https://epsteingraph.com/people/zamel)
Zamel appears in 3 DOJ Epstein disclosure documents.
---
wendy s medium
In 2017 I published a Buzzfeed opinion piece entitled “I’m One Of The People Investigating Trump On Twitter. You Should Work With Us, Not Mock Us.” I described the value provided by many citizen researchers who used open source data and shared information for free and how mainstream media could leverage this phenomenon.
Several organizations such as ProPublica and Bellingcat are leaders in using open source data in their investigations and stories. And groups such as the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) and the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP) have provided the public with invaluable databases, resources and reporting.
.... Check out the Resources section which includes links to websites useful for researching corporate entities and financial networks in the U.S. and worldwide. Feedback is welcome through the Contact page.wendy@newstracs.com
I am available for paid research consulting projects through the Contact page or email wendy@newstracs.com.
Have a tip? Send it to: info@newstracs.com. And donate here to support maintenance of this site and ongoing research and publishing. Thank you!
Social Media and Influence Companies Related Trump Russia
...
Psy-Group
- Psy-Group is an Israeli-based company headquartered in Cyprus, that describes itself in a marketing brochure as “Leaders in Intelligence and Infuence” and “proprietary methods of intelligence collection form the cornerstone to all of our operational activities.” The firm is “managed by an elite group of high-ranking officers from one of the world’s most renowned intelligence agencies.”
- In August 2016 Erik Prince arranged a meeting to introduce Psy-Group founder Joel Zamel to Donald Trump Jr. at Trump Tower. George Nader, who had once worked for Prince at Blackwater, attended the meeting along with Stephen Miller. Nader told Don Jr that “the princes who led Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates were eager to help his father win election as president.” Joel Zamel presented a multimillion-dollar proposal for a social media manipulation effort to help Trump, and after the election a source said Nader paid Zamel up to $2 million.
- Psy-Group formed a partnership with Cambridge Analytica after the 2016 election to try to win business from the U.S. government and other clients. In February 2018 Special Counsel Mueller subpoenaed bank records for payments made to the Psy-Group’s Cyprus bank accounts. Shortly afterwards, Psy-Group informed employees that it was closing down.
- WhiteKnight: the New York Times reported that Joel Zamel was affiliated with an internet company based in the Philippines called WhiteKnight, whichGeorge Nader worked with to purchase a presentation that showed the impact of social media campaigns on Trump’s electoral victory.
Psy-Group and Black Cube
- Psy-Group and Black Cube are both defendants in a Canadian lawsuit that is exposing some of the tactics used by both firms. West Face Capital alleged that business rival Catalyst Capital Group hired Psy-Group and Black Cube to defame West Face using shady methods, including sting operations and online disinformation campaigns, after West Face won a 2014 bid for telecomm company Wind Mobile. Black Cube and Psy-Group were accused of targeting a judge who had ruled against Catalyst in a dispute with West Face. It is not clear if Black Cube and Psy-Group worked together or if they worked separately on behalf of Catalyst.
- On a side note, in the 2014 deal which triggered the lawsuit, Wind Mobile was sold to West Face by a subsidiary of VimpleCom, which was sued unsuccessfully by Catalyst for Canadian $1.3 billion. VimpleCom, renamed Veon, is owned by Mikhail Fridman, the co-founder of Alfa Bank in Russia.
Wikistrat
- The WSJ reported in April 2018 that Mueller’s team was investigating Wikistrat, a company founded in Israel in 2010 described as a “crowdsourced consulting firm,” and its co-founders Joel Zamel and Daniel Green. Wikistrat had been contracted by the UAE in 2015 to conduct war game scenarios on Islamist political movements in Yemen. According to a source Zamel had met with Mueller who asked about George Nader, a former employee of Erik Prince at Blackwater, and recently an adviser to UAE Crown Prince Mohammed bin Zayed.
- Attorney Marc Mukasey (a former partner of Giuliani)said that his clients Zamel and Green were not a focus of the probe. Mueller also asked Zamel “questions about his work, including for certain clients.” Per reporting on Psy-Group’s August 2016 meeting arranged by Erik Prince with Donald Trump Jr., one of Joel Zamel’s prospective clients was Donald Trump.
- According to a June 2018 *Daily Beas*t article, Joel Zamel “wanted former national security adviser Michael Flynnto be a member of the firm’s (Wikistrat’s) advisory board.” Adam Lovinger, a Pentagon strategist who had been named to the National Security Council by Flynn and wasreportedly associated with Flynn Intel Group, introduced Joel Zamel to various Pentagon officials. Per a source Zamel had been introduced to Flynn by Bijan Kian, Flynn Intel Group’s former vice chairman of its board of directors, however Zamel’s attorney Mukasey denied Zamel and Flynn met. It appeared in 2017 that Wikistrat had ceased operations.
Inspiration
- An article in Haaretz describes how Ben Carson personally presented Trump with a plan from Israeli-based company Inspiration, run by former IDF intelligence officers. The plan was for voter manipulation in swing states using information Inspiration collected from a Super PAC, “which it then used to compose strategies and slogans that would elevate Trump and ‘float all kinds of things’ about Hillary Clinton.”
- The original report from Walla describes Ronen Cohen, a former Central Command intelligence officer who founded Inspiration in 2012. The article says Inspiration was not directly hired by the Trump campaign but was introduced by Ben Carson and funded by a PAC and hired three months prior to the election. Inspiration received voter data from the PAC and analyzed the data with another unnamed Israeli company. The messaging created by Inspiration was then passed to an American counterpart for review, revision, or distribution.
WALL INSERT
..."Overflow of things" about Clinton
The company was not involved in distributing the messages. They were merely passed on to their American counterparts, who used them as they saw fit.
In the first phase, the company received huge amounts of information about voters from the "super PAC" people. The information was analyzed, apparently in collaboration with another Israeli company, to try to understand which voters were more or less likely to vote on Election Day. The company focused, naturally, on trying to predict the behavior of voters in internal segments in "swing states," those that, according to estimates, could ultimately vote for Trump or Democrat Hillary Clinton. Based on this assessment, various content was prepared that was intended for different types of voters, in a targeted manner.
"The strategic plan went both the vector of strengthening the candidate, and the vector of flooding all kinds of things about Clinton," a person involved in the activity told Walla! NEWS. "It went over all kinds of things on issues that are burning for citizens - the economy and immigration. Everything that actually concerns citizens. And all of that really came down to campaign details of certain content ideas." The company, contrary to its normal activity, did not distribute the messages. They were merely passed on to their American counterparts, who used them as they saw fit. Some of the messages were distributed according to Inspiration's plan, and others were modified.
Hillary Clinton / Reuters
The company's work is reminiscent of the scandal that erupted around the Trump campaign, and is currently being investigated in the United States and the United Kingdom. Last week, Christopher Wylie, a former employee of Cambridge Analytica, testified before the US Senate. Wylie exposed the affair that bears the company's name, and is currently being investigated in the United States and the United Kingdom. As part of the affair, it was revealed that Cambridge Analytica managed to collect and store the details of tens of millions of users from Facebook. Using this information, psychological profiles of them were built, and later, according to suspicion, they were used to direct messages that would most effectively affect the target audience, among other things, in the Trump campaign and the campaign for Brexit.
"Cambridge Analytica's Relationships with Former Members of Israel's Security Forces"
During the hearing, Wylie was asked by Democratic Senator Sheldon Whitehouse whether the company had any connection to Black Cube, a corporate espionage firm run by Israeli intelligence veterans that has been implicated in several scandals around the world. He replied in the negative. According to him, the company did not have a contract with Black Cube, but he said that he had learned of "relationships that Cambridge Analytica had with former members of the Israeli security forces." Wylie did not name any names, and a source at Inspiration told Walla! NEWS that the company did not work with Cambridge Analytica. However, he said that he did not know the source of the information that came from "the super-PAC" and served as the basis for the analysis.
Last weekend, the New York Times reported that as part of the FBI investigation into foreign interference in the US election, agents also arrived in Israel . According to the report, they collected materials and testified about employees at a company called Psy-Group, owned by Yoel Zemel. The company's profile is very similar to that of Inspiration: it employs Israelis with security and intelligence backgrounds, and focuses on campaigns to influence public opinion. As far as is known, the investigators have not contacted any of Inspiration's employees.
Russia Entities...
Michael Flynn-related entities
Michael Flynn has barely been in the news recently, especially since he pleaded guilty to making false statements to the FBI at the end of 2017. However, as one of the earliest members of Trump’s campaign, and one of the most senior members of Trump’s administration for a short time, Flynn was involved with many people and companies that did social media and influence work on behalf of Trump.
- In August 2017 Flynn amended his financial disclosure form to show he had agreed to work with SCL Group, the parent company of Cambridge Analytica, to help win new US government contracts. However, a source reported that Flynn did not receive compensation or perform any work.
- In the US, Cambridge Analytica hired Josh Weerasinghe, who had worked at defense companyBAESystems and had previously worked with Flynn at the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, to focus on winning US government contracts.
- In April 2018, Senator Bob Menendez on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee sent two letters to the State Department and SCL Group requesting information on the $490K State Department contract awarded to SCL “when Michael Flynn was serving as an advisor for the company and on President Trump’s transition team.” The letters requested a detailed description of the work that Michael Flynn performed as an advisor for SCL Group.
- As reported earlier, Flynn allegedly had interactions with Joel Zamel, the founder of Psy-Group and Wikistrat, who wanted Flynn to join the advisory board of Wikistrat.
Flynn Intel Group
- Flynn started his company, Flynn Intel Group, in 2014 and closed it at the end of 2016 before he joined the Trump administration. Flynn partnered with Bijan Kian and Philip Oakley,and according to company records, Flynn Intel Group was “a premier private intelligence and cybersecurity advisory firm.” Flynn received small payments from Russian firms Kaspersky Labsand Volga-Dnepr Airlines. And according to the *NYT* Flynn joined the advisory board of OSY Technologies, part of the NSO Group, a secretive cyberweapons dealer founded by former Israeli intelligence officials.
- Bijan Kian introduced Turkish businessman Ekim Alptekin to Flynn Intel Group to do PR and lobbying work against Fethullah Gulen, a Turkish cleric and someone Erdogan considered an enemy, who was living in Pennsylvania. Alptekin paid Flynn Intel Group $530K through his Netherlands-based company Inovo BV and Alptekin said funding also came from Ratio Oil Exploration, an Israeli natural gas company — although the firm denied any connection to Alptekin.
- FIG Cyber: Tim Newberry, who co-founded White Canvas and VizSense with Jon Iadonisis, listed on his LinkedIn profile that in August 2016 he was chief executive of FIG Cyber, a unit of Flynn Intel Group.
White Canvas and VizSense
- White Canvas was founded by Jon Iadonisi, a former Navy SEAL, and Tim Newberry, and is described as a technology company with expertise in cyber operations, digital influence, social media, and other areas. Iadonisi was close to Michael Flynn and had served with him in Iraq,and reportedly Flynn Intel Group had rented office space from White Canvas. White Canvas received $150,000 in 2016 from the Navy for “deep and dark web capability and gap analysis.”
- VizSense was created by Jon Iadonisi and Tim Newberry as a spinoff from White Canvas. Michael Flynn’s companies as well as those run by Iadonisi and Newberry overlap in many ways. For example, in Flynn’s contract with Inovo BV, it appeared that Tim Newberry worked for Flynn Intel group as the head of their “Special Operations Cyber Force.”
- In May 2017 the Washington Post reported that Flynn’s friend and business associate Jon Iadonisi was doing work to help Flynn on behalf of the Turkish government and Ioadonisi was also doing social media work on behalf of Trump. FEC filings showed that the Trump campaign paid $200,000 for “data management services” to Colt Ventures, which was an investor in Iadonisi’s social media company VizSense. The payment was for “a social-media project that involved video-content creation and “millennial engagement” in the campaign’s final month.”
Colt Ventures
- Colt Ventures was founded by Darren Blanton who served as an adviser to Trump’s transition. Blanton met frequently with Steve Bannon and reported to him on work done for the campaign, according to a source.
- A May 2018 *Bloomberg* story described efforts to win Black voters for Trump, and how a Breitbart writer, along with Steve Bannon, recruited Bruce Carter to target three areas, Florida, Philadelphia, and North Carolina. Bannon introduced Carter to Darren Blanton and Jon Iadonisi to help provide funding and social media support for Carter’s efforts, although it’s not clear if funding was provided. In October 2016, during the final presidential debate in Las Vegas,Blanton introduced Carter to Erik Prince and Michael Flynn, and then later to Rebekah Mercer.
- Based on the Bloomberg story, it appears that Darren Blanton, who ran Colt Ventures which was a part owner of Jon Iodonisi and Tim Newberry’s firm VizSense, also knew Erik Prince, Steve Bannon, and Rebekah Mercer. This raises a bigger question about whether or not the companies Flynn was indirectly connected to — VizSense, White Canvas, and Colt Ventures — had any business involvement with SCL or Cambridge Analytica?
Additional Entities Not Included in Chart
Data sources reportedly affiliated with campaign:
- RNC
- Palantir
- Experian
- Acxiom
- InfoGroup
Others:
---
A hospital-board election in central California wasn’t exactly what Burstien had in mind when he set out to establish Psy-Group in the U.S. election market. In early 2016, as the Presidential race was heating up, he and Zamel both tried to pitch much bigger players. Being hired by one of the main campaigns initially seemed like a long shot for an obscure new company whose services sounded risky, if not illegal. Lawyers at firms in New York and Washington expressed curiosity about Psy-Group, but most were too cautious to sign contracts with the company.
The Trump campaign, however, presented an opportunity. Early in 2016, a Republican consultant with ties to the Israeli government put Psy-Group in touch with Rick Gates, a senior Trump campaign official. Eager to secure a potentially lucrative project, Burstien drew up plans for an intelligence and influence campaign to promote Trump and undermine his rivals, first in the Republican primary and then in the general election. In the proposal, dubbed Project Rome, which was first reported on by the Times, last October, Psy-Group used code names for the candidates: Trump was Lion, and Hillary Clinton was Forest. Psy-Group also hired the Washington law firm Covington & Burling to conduct a legal review of its work. Former Psy-Group officials said that the resulting memo gave a green light to begin offering the company’s services in the U.S. (A spokesperson for Covington & Burling said that the firm could not discuss its advice to clients.)
Zamel often operated independently of Burstien, and it’s unclear how closely the two coördinated, but both saw the Trump campaign as a potential client. Trump’s vocal support for Israel and his hard-line views on Iran appealed to Zamel, and he reached out to Trump’s inner circle. In early May, 2016, Zamel sent an e-mail to Gingrich, saying that he could provide the Trump campaign with powerful tools that would use social media to advance Trump’s chances. Zamel suggested a meeting in Washington to discuss the matter further. Gingrich forwarded the e-mail to Jared Kushner and asked if the campaign would be interested. Kushner checked with others on the campaign, including Brad Parscale,who ran Web operations. According to a person familiar with the exchange, Parscale told Kushner that they didn’t need Zamel’s help. (A 2016 campaign official said, “We didn’t use their services.”)
Also that spring, Zamel was introduced to George Nader, a Lebanese-American with ties to the Emirati leader Mohammed bin Zayed and other powerful figures in the Gulf. Born in 1959, Nader was almost twice Zamel’s age. Both men preferred to operate behind the scenes, but were consummate networkers who touted their connections to high-level political figures. Some viewed Nader as an influence peddler; others said that he had been intimately involved in high-stakes negotiations in the Middle East for decades. Martin Indyk, an adviser to Presidents Clinton and Obama on Middle Eastern affairs and now a distinguished fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, said, “We used to joke that George was in the pay of at least three intelligence services—the Syrian, the Israeli, and the Iranian.”
In June, 2016, Nader was attending an international economic forum in St. Petersburg, Russia, when Zamel approached him and requested a meeting. According to a representative for Nader, Zamel told Nader that he was trying to raise money for a social-media campaign in support of Trump; he thought that Nader’s Gulf contacts might be interested in contributing financially. Nader listened to Zamel’s pitch but didn’t make any commitments, according to the Nader representative. (Zamel’s representatives denied that he spoke to Nader in St. Petersburg about trying to help Trump.)
Zamel had another opportunity to pitch his services in early August, 2016, when Erik Prince, the founder of the Blackwater security firm, helped arrange a meeting at Trump Tower among Zamel, Nader, and Donald Trump, Jr. (Prince, whose sister Betsy DeVos became Trump’s Education Secretary, was a major Trump donor and had access to members of his team.) In the meeting, Zamel told Trump, Jr., that he supported his father’s campaign, and talked about Psy-Group’s influence operations. (Zamel’s lawyer, Marc Mukasey, played down the encounter, insisting that Zamel made no formal proposals during the meeting.)
Burstien said that his talks with the Trump campaign went nowhere; a representative for Zamel denied that his client engaged in any activity having to do with the election. But, according to the Nader representative, shortly after the election Zamel bragged to Nader that he had conducted a secret campaign that had been influential in Trump’s victory. Zamel agreed to brief Nader on how the operation had worked. During that conversation, Zamel showed Nader several analytical reports, including one that described the role of avatars, bots, fake news, and unattributed Web sites in assisting Trump. Zamel told Nader, “Here’s the work that we did to help get Trump elected,” according to the Nader representative. Nader paid Zamel more than two million dollars, but never received copies of the reports, that person said.
A representative for Zamel denied that he told Nader that he or any of his operatives had intervened to help Trump during the 2016 election. If Nader came away with that impression, the representative said, he was mistaken. “Nader may have paid Zamel not knowing when, how, or why the report was created, but he wanted to use it to gain access and new business,” the representative said. “In fact, it used publicly available material to show how social media—in general—was used in connection with the campaign.”...nyer
==
---
ggl 3 26
[### Psy-Group
Wikipedia
https://en.wikipedia.org › wiki › Psy-Group](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psy-Group)
Psy-Group is a former Israeli private intelligence agency. It closed after revelations that it was under investigation by Special Counsel Robert Mueller.Read more
[### Private Mossad for Hire
The New Yorker
https://www.newyorker.com › Magazine › Israelis](https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2019/02/18/private-mossad-for-hire)
Feb 11, 2019 — Psy-Group was part of a new wave of private intelligence firms that recruited from the ranks of Israel's secret services—self-described “private ...Read more
Missing: headquartered | Show results with: headquartered
[### Mueller Asked About Money Flows to Israeli Social-Media ...
Bloomberg.com
https://www.bloomberg.com › politics › articles › muelle...](https://www.bloomberg.com/politics/articles/2018-05-22/mueller-targeted-flows-of-money-to-israeli-social-media-company)
May 22, 2018 — Though PSY Group is based in Israel, it's technically headquartered in Cyprus, the small Mediterranean island famous for its banking secrecy.Read more
[### Psy-Group CEO Touted Company's Ability to “Change ...
CTech
https://www.calcalistech.com › ... › AI](https://www.calcalistech.com/ctech/articles/0,7340,L-3747246,00.html)
Oct 9, 2018 — Owned by a series of companies registered in Cyprus and the British Virgin Islands, Psy-Group laid off its employees in February, citing “two ...Read more
Missing: headquartered | Show results with: headquartered
[### Mueller probes PSY Group's money flow into Cyprus
Knews, Kathimerini
https://knews.kathimerini.com.cy › news › mueller-pro...](https://knews.kathimerini.com.cy/en/news/mueller-probes-psy-group-s-money-flow-into-cyprus)
May 23, 2018 — Mueller probes PSY Group's money flow into Cyprus. Israeli intelligence firm headquartered in Cyprus under scrutiny in US special investigation.Read more
[### Psy-Group CEO Touted Company's Ability to “Change ...
Calcalist
https://www.calcalist.co.il › דף הבית › CTech](https://www.calcalist.co.il/local/articles/0,7340,L-3747246,00.html)
Oct 9, 2018 — Owned by a series of companies registered in Cyprus and the British Virgin Islands, Psy-Group laid off its employees in February, citing “two ...Read more
Missing: headquartered | Show results with: headquartered
[### A New Age of Warfare: How Internet Mercenaries Do Battle ...
The New York Times
https://www.nytimes.com › U.S. › Politics](https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/21/us/politics/government-hackers-nso-darkmatter.html)
Mar 21, 2019 — Psy-Group, an Israeli company specializing in social media manipulation, worked for Russian oligarchs and in 2016 pitched the Trump campaign ...Read more
[### The Full Story behind the NSO Hack: The Israeli-Military ...
Arab Center Washington DC
https://arabcenterdc.org › resource › the-full-story-behi...](https://arabcenterdc.org/resource/the-full-story-behind-the-nso-hack-the-israeli-military-allied-surveillance-industry-and-transnational-repression/)
Jul 28, 2021 — Another company, Psy-Group, conducted social media influence and manipulation campaigns, elaborate false identities to manipulate targets ...Read more
Missing: headquartered | Show results with: headquartered
[### Israeli firm under FBI scrutiny in Trump probe allegedly ...
The Times of Israel
https://www.timesofisrael.com › israeli-firm-under-fbi-s...](https://www.timesofisrael.com/israeli-firm-under-fbi-scrutiny-in-trump-probe-allegedly-targeted-bds-activists/)
Jun 6, 2018 — Psy-Group, which operates in Israel under the name Invop Ltd, is a self-styled leader in “intelligence and influence” which boasts in its ...Read more
Psy-Group, a mysterious Israeli company that is reportedly being investigated by the FBI in connection with Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s probe into alleged illegal interference in the 2016 US presidential election, was also involved in covert anti-BDS efforts, according to a lawsuit against the company and multiple sources who spoke to The Times of Israel.
BDS is a campaign by some pro-Palestinian activists encouraging people to boycott, divest from and sanction Israel over what they call its ill-treatment of the Palestinians.
Psy-Group, which operates in Israel under the name Invop Ltd, is a self-styled leader in “intelligence and influence” which boasts in its marketing material of its covert techniques and capabilities. Its founder and co-owner Joel Zamel was reported by the New York Times last month to have met with Donald Trump Jr. three months before the November 2016 US presidential elections, offering to assist his father’s campaign, and the company was reported to have drawn up “a multimillion-dollar proposal for a social media manipulation effort to help elect Mr. Trump.”
While a lawyer for Zamel denied that he or any his companies had any involvement in the US election campaign, Bloomberg News has reported that Special Counsel Mueller’s team is investigating flows of money into Psy-Group’s Cyprus bank account, and also that Psy-Group formed an alliance with Cambridge Analytica, a (now collapsed) company that the Trump campaign consulted on social media issues, following Trump’s election.
Psy-Group’s marketing materials highlight its “professionalism, legality and discretion,” and little is publicly known of its activities, but a Canadian legal battle has shed some light on its practices, including its alleged work to counter anti-Israel BDS activities.
The outlawbds.com website
Canadian hedge fund West Face Capital Inc. is currently involved in a legal dispute with rival Canadian investment fund Catalyst Capital Group Inc. West Face alleges that Catalyst hired Psy-Group and a second private intelligence company, Black Cube, to conduct a sting operation and defamation campaign against it. West Face is suing the two Israeli companies and their operatives for $500 million in damages. Catalyst, for its part, accuses West Face of foul play.
In the course of its investigation into the tactics allegedly used by Black Cube and Psy-Group, West Face discovered that a Psy-Group operative registered the website outlawbds.com, West Face’s complaint alleges.
Outlawbds.com has disappeared from the internet, but some BDS proponents have claimed that the site contained a “blacklist” with photos and email addresses of individuals believed to support BDS.
Screenshot of a YouTube video posted by a user called OutlawBDS. (YouTube screenshot)
Other BDS supporters report having received an email in September 2017 from the email address admin@outlawbds.com warning them: “Be aware that you have been identified as a BDS promoter. According to new legislation in New York State, individuals or organizations that engage in or promote BDS activities with US allies will no longer receive public funding or support. Moreover, the state and its agencies will no longer engage in business or hire these organizations and individuals as they have been deemed problematic and anti-American. You have been marked. You have been identified. You have a limited window of opportunity to cease and desist or face the consequences of your actions in legal proceedings. In case you have ceased your past wrongdoing, please contact us at admin@outlawbds.com for your profile to be removed from the Blacklist.”
The Times of Israel was told by multiple sources that Psy-Group worked to counter BDS activists — and is one of several such firms, set up by or employing former Israeli intelligence operatives, that do so.
Such work, The Times of Israel was told, is known to the Israeli government, and specifically the Ministry of Strategic Affairs, but is not paid for by the government.
Psy-Group marketing material
The sources said that such companies engage in various undercover activities against BDS leaders and activists. This work includes highlighting the sources of funding for BDS activities if such funding is obtained from terrorist or other banned organizations, and making public instances where activists have expressed extremist and/or anti-Semitic views. The goal can be to deter the activists from continuing their activities, the sources explained.
In the case of Psy-Group, The Times of Israel was told but could not independently verify, its anti-BDS work was financed by private donors, and the firm did not engage in illegal activity, did not disseminate false information, and did not engage in hacking.
The West Face project
The complaint in the lawsuit filed by West Face devotes relatively little attention to Psy-Group’s alleged anti-BDS work.
It briefly asserts that the Psy-Group operative who registered the outlawbds website went on to hire one “Amin Razvi (‘Razvi’), an individual residing in India,” to carry out work related to outlawbds.com.
The main thrust of the document deals with the alleged “defamation campaign against West Face,” as carried out by Psy-Group and Black Cube. Razvi worked for Psy-Group on that campaign, the document claims, posting defamatory content about West Face online.
Psy-Group marketing material
Detailing the alleged activities of the two Israeli companies, the complaint claims that operatives from both Black Cube and Psy-Group “conspired to provide reporters, news agencies (including the National Post, Bloomberg News and the Associated Press), as well as others, with edited, distorted or otherwise falsified recordings and/or transcripts of meetings between operatives of Black Cube and its targets, including current and former employees.”
According to the complaint, Psy-Group — whose operatives in the Canadian project allegedly included former Israeli television journalist Emmanuel Rosen — worked in tandem with Black Cube, publishing defamatory articles and social media posts about West Face and using sophisticated masking techniques to hide their tracks.
Harvey Weinstein attends the ‘Reservoir Dogs’ 25th anniversary screening during the 2017 Tribeca Film Festival in New York, April 28, 2017. (Charles Sykes/Invision/AP)
West Face learned of Black Cube and Psy-Group’s activities when its employees recognized the image of Stella Penn Pechanac in news reports about rape and harassment accusations against Hollywood mogul Harvey Weinstein. Pechanac was a Black Cube employee who reportedly posed as a woman’s rights activist and who befriended actress Rose McGowan in a bid to gather intelligence on behalf of Weinstein. Employees of West Face recognized Pechanac as the same woman who had reached out to them.
Several affidavits by employees and former employees of West Face Capital allege that Stella Penn Pechanac approached them, using various aliases, offering unique and exciting employment opportunities and in some cases flying them to London for fake job interviews. Black Cube operatives then allegedly plied some of these employees with alcohol in an attempt to extract information that would benefit their client in its legal proceedings.
In one instance, a Black Cube operative is alleged to have tried to entrap a retired Canadian judge into making anti-Semitic comments. According to the plaintiffs, the hope was to discredit a verdict the judge had handed down against Black Cube’s client, Catalyst, whose managing partner is Jewish.
Black Cube logo
In response to a Times of Israel request for comment, Black Cube sent the following statement: “It is Black Cube’s policy to never discuss its clients with any third party, and to never confirm or deny any speculation made with regard to the company’s work. Referencing Black Cube has become an international sport during 2018. It is important to note that Black Cube always operates in full compliance of the law in every jurisdiction in which it conducts its work, following legal advice from the world’s leading law firms.”
In a separate matter, Black Cube was accused last month of working to slander Obama administration officials involved with the Iran nuclear deal as part of a covert effort to discredit the multinational accord. It denied the allegation.
Psy-Group closing down
Psy-Group is currently in bankruptcy proceedings in an Israeli court.
Thepublicly available bankruptcy filings, in which 29 of the Psy-Group’s employees have requested that the firm be liquidated, contain various hitherto unpublished details about Psy-Group, its activities and employees.
In Israel, Psy-Group operates under the name Invop Ltd., which according to Israel’s corporate registry was founded on December 22, 2014. Its chief executive officer is Royi Burstien, the former commander of an Israeli psychological warfare unit, according to Bloomberg. All of Invop’s shares are owned by a Cypriot company called IOCO Ltd., which in turn is owned by a British Virgin Islands company called Protexer Limited.
According to the petition by Psy-Group employees, dated February 28, 2018, employees were informed the previous week that they would not receive their February salaries because “two critical business developments had failed.” As a result, the company had fallen into a credit crunch and would be unable to pay its employees their February salaries, or, for that matter, continue to operate. The company’s director, Burstien, did not object to the bankruptcy proceedings initiated by employees and on May 21, the court appointed a special administrator for the company.
The majority of Psy-Group’s 29 employees listed in the petition appear to be young recent university graduates. A perusal of their LinkedIn pages reveals that many attended the Interdisciplinary Center in Herzliya, an elite private college near Tel Aviv, and many served in intelligence units in the Israel Defense Forces and other Israeli security services, although not necessarily in senior roles.
Despite her relative youth, at least one employee of Psy-Group earned a salary that is more than three times the Israeli average of NIS 10,300 a month: The petition includes the pay stub of an employee whose job title was “project manager” and whose gross salary was NIS 33,0363.
A few names on the list stand out. One of the petitioners is Emmanuel Rosen, a former Israeli journalist. Contacted by The Times of Israel, he had no comment on this article.
Also on the list of Psy-Group employees is Eitan Charnoff, who in 2016 was the director of iVote Israel, a controversial get-out-the-vote campaign for Americans in Israel. He directed iVote Israel at the same time that he worked at Psy-Group. “Eitan Charnoff is not currently involved with either independent organization so is not in a position to comment on anything related to either entity,” said his attorney Carrie H. Cohen of Morrison & Foerster LLP.
:{
iVoteIsrael volunteers sign up US citizens for absentee ballots at a mall in Jerusalem in June 2012 (photo credit: courtesy of iVoteIsrael.com)}:
Israeli-Australian Paul Vesely, who is not one of the petitioners, but who claimed in his LinkedIn page to have been one of the founders of Psy-Group, was previously the chief operating officer at Veribo, a company that provided online reputation management services to binary options companies. He had not replied to a request for comment at the time of publication.
In addition, four previous Psy-Group employees listed in Invop Ltd’s bankruptcy filings currently work for a company called Cyabra, whose stated mission is to help identify sockpuppets and fake Facebook profiles for organizations that have been targeted by fake comments. Cyabra had no comment on this article.
Psy-Group had not responded to a request for comment at the time of publication.
=-==
[### New Evidence on Israel-based PSY-Group's Possible ...
Just Security
https://www.justsecurity.org › russian-trolls-company-e...](https://www.justsecurity.org/57245/russian-trolls-company-evidence-israel-based-psy-groups-social-media-efforts-2016-election/)
May 31, 2018 — Following the New York Times story, Bloomberg reported that the special counsel is investigating flows of money into PSY-Group's Cyprus bank ...Read more
Missing: headquartered | Show results with: headquartered
[### Psy-Group
Wikipedia
https://en.wikipedia.org › wiki › Psy-Group](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psy-Group)
Psy-Group is a former Israeli private intelligence agency. It closed after revelations that it was under investigation by Special Counsel Robert Mueller.Read more
People also ask
Which major companies are Israeli?
What is the equivalent of the CIA in Israel?
Feedback
[### Private Mossad for Hire
The New Yorker
https://www.newyorker.com › Magazine › Israelis](https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2019/02/18/private-mossad-for-hire)
Feb 11, 2019 — Psy-Group was part of a new wave of private intelligence firms that recruited from the ranks of Israel's secret services—self-described “private ...Read more
Missing: headquartered | Show results with: headquartered
[### Mueller Asked About Money Flows to Israeli Social-Media ...
Bloomberg.com
https://www.bloomberg.com › politics › articles › muelle...](https://www.bloomberg.com/politics/articles/2018-05-22/mueller-targeted-flows-of-money-to-israeli-social-media-company)
May 22, 2018 — Though PSY Group is based in Israel, it's technically headquartered in Cyprus, the small Mediterranean island famous for its banking secrecy.Read more
[### Psy-Group CEO Touted Company's Ability to “Change ...
CTech
https://www.calcalistech.com › ... › AI](https://www.calcalistech.com/ctech/articles/0,7340,L-3747246,00.html)
Oct 9, 2018 — Owned by a series of companies registered in Cyprus and the British Virgin Islands, Psy-Group laid off its employees in February, citing “two ...Read more
Missing: headquartered | Show results with: headquartered
[### Mueller probes PSY Group's money flow into Cyprus
Knews, Kathimerini
https://knews.kathimerini.com.cy › news › mueller-pro...](https://knews.kathimerini.com.cy/en/news/mueller-probes-psy-group-s-money-flow-into-cyprus)
May 23, 2018 — Mueller probes PSY Group's money flow into Cyprus. Israeli intelligence firm headquartered in Cyprus under scrutiny in US special investigation.Read more
[### Psy-Group CEO Touted Company's Ability to “Change ...
Calcalist
https://www.calcalist.co.il › דף הבית › CTech](https://www.calcalist.co.il/local/articles/0,7340,L-3747246,00.html)
Oct 9, 2018 — Owned by a series of companies registered in Cyprus and the British Virgin Islands, Psy-Group laid off its employees in February, citing “two ...Read more
Missing: headquartered | Show results with: headquartered
[### A New Age of Warfare: How Internet Mercenaries Do Battle ...
The New York Times
https://www.nytimes.com › U.S. › Politics](https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/21/us/politics/government-hackers-nso-darkmatter.html)
Mar 21, 2019 — Psy-Group, an Israeli company specializing in social media manipulation, worked for Russian oligarchs and in 2016 pitched the Trump campaign ...Read more
[### The Full Story behind the NSO Hack: The Israeli-Military ...
Arab Center Washington DC
https://arabcenterdc.org › resource › the-full-story-behi...](https://arabcenterdc.org/resource/the-full-story-behind-the-nso-hack-the-israeli-military-allied-surveillance-industry-and-transnational-repression/)
Jul 28, 2021 — Another company, Psy-Group, conducted social media influence and manipulation campaigns, elaborate false identities to manipulate targets ...Read more
Missing: headquartered | Show results with: headquartered
[### Israeli firm under FBI scrutiny in Trump probe allegedly ...
The Times of Israel
https://www.timesofisrael.com › israeli-firm-under-fbi-s...](https://www.timesofisrael.com/israeli-firm-under-fbi-scrutiny-in-trump-probe-allegedly-targeted-bds-activists/)
Jun 6, 2018 — Psy-Group, which operates in Israel under the name Invop Ltd, is a self-styled leader in “intelligence and influence” which boasts in its ...Read more
Missing: based | Show results with: based
[### New Evidence on Israel-based PSY-Group's Possible ...
Just Security
https://www.justsecurity.org › russian-trolls-company-e...](https://www.justsecurity.org/57245/russian-trolls-company-evidence-israel-based-psy-groups-social-media-efforts-2016-election/)
May 31, 2018 — Following the New York Times story, Bloomberg reported that the special counsel is investigating flows of money into PSY-Group's Cyprus bank ...Read more
Missing: headquartered | Show results with: headquartered
==
==
January 30, 2019 10:44 am
There was something in the water going into the 2016 campaign.
A story today in the Daily Beast suggests that a company whose owner was interviewed by the special counsel simulated how a foreign power could use social media to covertly influence American politics before the 2016 presidential campaign began.
The company – Wikistrat – is owned by Israeli-Australian entrepreneur Joel Zamel, who was interviewed by special counsel prosecutors last year.
The wargaming effort yielded a report that included analysis from Wikistrat staffers on how successful such interference efforts – then speculative – might be. The Daily Beast story quotes an unnamed analyst in the report as writing that “foreign governments with a high stake in U.S. elections might be willing to hire cyber-mercenaries to influence election results.”
The concept of using mass-produced fake social media accounts to meddle in democratic processes was being discussed in many intelligence and political consulting firms at the time, the story says, calling it a “burgeoning market.”
Another, more secretive firm owned by Zamel – PsyGroup – later made a proposal to Trump deputy campaign manager Rick Gates on how to manipulate social media as part of the campaign’s efforts to beat Trump’s Republican primary opponents and Hillary Clinton, the New York Times reported in October.
Zamel himself appears to have cultivated connections with high-ranking Trump campaign officials during the campaign. He attended a meeting in August 2016 in Trump Tower with Donald Trump Jr., Blackwater founder Erik Prince, and Middle East-U.S. relations fixer George Nader.
Prince and Nader would later meet with Russian Direct Investment Fund chief Kirill Dmitriev and an Emirati prince at a summit in the Seychelles nine days before Trump was sworn into office.
After the election, Nader reportedly paid Zamel a significant, but undisclosed sum of money. It’s unclear why the payment was made.
---
https://www.thedailybeast.com/mueller-witness-team-gamed-out-russian-meddling-in-2015
no lnx
Mueller Witness’ Team Gamed Out Russian Meddling … in 2015
One former analyst at the Wikistrat consulting firm called it ‘disturbing.’
Betsy Woodruff,
Erin Banco
01.30.19 5:05 AM ET
EXCLUSIVE
Days after Donald Trump rode down an escalator at Trump Tower and announced he’d run for president, a little-known consulting firm with links to Israeli intelligence started gaming out how a foreign government could meddle in the U.S. political process. Internal communications, which The Daily Beast reviewed, show that the firm conducted an analysis of how illicit efforts might shape American politics. Months later, the Trump campaign reviewed a pitch from a company owned by that firm’s founder—a pitch to carry out similar efforts.
The founder of the firm, called Wikistrat, has been questioned by Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s team as they investigate efforts by foreign governments to shape American politics during the 2016 presidential campaign. Joel Zamel, a low-profile Israeli-Australian who started the firm, has deep contacts in Middle Eastern intelligence circles. There are no known publicly available pictures of him. But he met people in the upper echelons of the Trump campaign.
In April 2016, senior Trump campaign official Rick Gates reviewed a pitch produced by a company called Psy Group, which Zamel reportedly owns. The pitch laid out a three-pronged election influence campaign that included creating thousands of fake social media accounts to support then-candidate Trump and disparage his opponents, according to The New York Times.
After Trump became the party’s official nominee, Zamel met with Donald Trump Jr. and discussed the plan, which echoed both the real election interference already underway by the Kremlin and the scenario Wikistrat gamed out the year before.
Zamel took part in at least two meetings in Washington in 2016 and 2017. And his staff at Psy Group made several connections about their social media manipulation plan with individuals who represented themselves as close to the Trump team.
It’s unclear if the Psy Group plans ever went forward. Some former employees of the firm who previously spoke to The Daily Beast said Gates never pursued the campaign. Others said part of the plan was carried out.
To be clear, Wikistrat’s manipulation sim was just one of hundreds the firm has conducted. And at the time, many firms in the private intelligence sector were looking for ways to explore the ramifications of the growing threat of online propaganda and political interference.
RELATED IN POLITICS
Gates Tells Mueller About Dealings With Israeli Intel Firm
Fight Over Avenatti’s Former Firm and Finances Turns Ugly
Michael Cohen: I Rigged Online Polls for Trump
Marc Mukasey, a lawyer for Zamel and Wikistrat, said the firm’s predictions were the result of good work.
“Wikistrat has conducted hundreds of simulations with thousands of scenarios of the past few years,” he told The Daily Beast. “They deal with a wide variety of topics related to technology, cybersecurity, national security, economic issues. Wikistrat and Psy Group are completely separate companies. Anything Wikistrat successfully predicted was purely a credit to the firm’s crowdsourced prediction capabilities and completely unrelated to the nonsense reports or events to occur years later.”
But Peter Marino, one of the Wikistrat analysts who helped create the report in 2015, told The Daily Beast that, looking back, he finds the firm’s prescience quite strange.
“At the time we were discussing the subject of cyber interference in democratic processes, it felt like just another idle intellectual exercise. But retrospectively, it feels a bit too on-the-nose not to be disturbing.”
— Former Wikistrat analyst Peter Marino
“At the time we were discussing the subject of cyber-interference in democratic processes, it seemed and felt like just another idle intellectual exercise and scenario planning project for political scientists,” said Marino, who is currently pursuing a PhD in Chinese politics and history. “But retrospectively, it feels a bit too on-the-nose not to be disturbing.”
Wikistrat is essentially a think tank for rent. The firm, which only has a few full-time employees, contracts with foreign policy and national security experts to produce reports for corporate and government clients about specific geopolitical issues. The firm’s analysts also sometimes produce reports that aren’t for clients, according to people close to the firm; the firm then displays those reports on its website to demonstrate the quality of its work, or markets them to potential buyers.
The report The Daily Beast reviewed includes several different conversation threads, like a high-end version of Reddit. It was titled “The Rise of the Cyber Mercenary.”
In a discussion of how a hostile foreign government could weaponize social media against an adversary, one Wikistrat analyst put it this way:
“Cyber-mercenaries are mainly hired by governments as online counter-information and counter-counter-information officers. Disguised as ordinary citizens, these cyber-mercenaries are experts at sensationalizing and distorting political issues in a manner that appeals to common sense. Their objectives are not to convince explicitly, but rather subconsciously, by inserting a seed of doubt that leads to confusion and encourages fact-skepticism. Their ultimate targets are foreign governments, but their attacks are launched on proxy targets, ordinary citizens, chiefly ignorant, vulnerable, and uneducated populaces of a particular nation-state.”
The analyst then noted that entities like “Russia’s ‘Internet Research Group’”—likely a misnomer for the country’s Internet Research Agency, which Mueller indicted in Feb. 2018—already weaponize social media to shape their countries’ domestic politics.
“As a foreign policy tool, misinformation can be used to spread fear, uncertainty and doubt among the population of antagonist countries, therefore furthering the instigator’s own agenda,” the analyst added. “Instead of direct government involvement, using cyber-mercenaries to enact these operations would create a degree of indirection and a veneer of plausible deniability that would make it harder to clearly separate propaganda from facts.”
Another analyst then sounded off on what makes trolling effective.
“[T]hese ‘cyber-trolls’ are trained controversialists: they openly engage in public controversy…People are drawn to the excitement of controversy and these cyber-trolls are experts in sensationalizing a political issue. The objective of cyber-trolls is not to convince explicitly, but rather subconsciously, by inserting a seed of doubt that leads to confusion and encourages fact-skepticism. They are not afraid to use provocative and confrontational language, as it is to their advantage if it leads to an emotional rise in the reader because the reader is then more likely to engage in debate, which in-turn, creates more buzz and attracts a greater audience, increasing the potential number of people exposed to this misinformation campaign.”
The analysis was written after the St. Petersburg-based Internet Research Agency had begun its U.S. election interference campaign, but well before the American public knew about it. In the end the troll factory controlled thousands of fake organizations and personas on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram, which it used to push out divisive rhetoric and fake news—overwhelmingly in support of Donald Trump’s candidacy.
In another discussion thread that was part of the Cyber Mercenaries project, analysts scrutinized the possibility of a hostile foreign government targeting the U.S. elections.
“The targets for these attacks are either the Democrats or the Republicans,” an analyst theorized. “The countries which sense that their [sic] is a divergence in their strategic objectives or foreign policy and therefore harbor a preference for one party or the other.”
“Foreign governments with a high stake in U.S. elections might be willing to hire cyber-mercenaries to influence election results,” the analyst added.
:{:{}:
}:
One analyst then chimed in, pointing out that “Ukraine and Russia already have the situation.”
:{:{}:
}:
Another then replied, “I feel this has the potential to be developed into a more standardised operational procedure.”
One former senior employee of Psy Group said the language in the simulations echoed that of materials the intelligence firm drafted in a similar time period. At the time, Psy Group, Wikistrat, and dozens of other intelligence companies were looking to capitalize on election-related cybersecurity concerns. It was a burgeoning market, the employee said.
“All jargon across all materials is more or less the same,” the employee said about Wikistrat and Psy Group’s reports.
The employee spoke to The Daily Beast anonymously because he was not authorized to speak publicly about Psy Group work, even though the company is now defunct. The FBI has questioned employees of Psy Group about its work during the 2016 election. Zamel, the owner of the firm, has been questioned by the Special Counsel’s Office.
The Wikistrat simulations, according to the former Psy Group employee, mirror material in a presentation that Rick Gates sought from Psy Group in 2016. The presentation, detailed by The New York Times, shows how the firm would have used avatars to obtain intelligence on American voters.
The Wikistrat “Cyber Mercenary” project lasted for more than a week and touched on multiple scenarios including hacking groups targeting American polling stations, Russian trolls, sources of revenue for cyber-mercenaries, and hacked corporate records, according to five current and former employees who spoke to The Daily Beast on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak publicly about internal data. Four worked on the simulations.
CROSSOVER EVENT
Khashoggi ‘Killer’ Huddled With Team Trump on Toppling Iran
Erin Banco,
Betsy Woodruff
It’s unclear if the Wikistrat simulations were conducted for a particular client. Analysts who spoke to The Daily Beast said most of the projects they worked on were for governments or private companies, though they didn’t learn their identities. That information was held by a few full-time staff at the top of Wikistrat, they said.
“We never heard from anyone at the top,” one former employee said. “Sometimes we would get pump-up emails from Joel but that is about it.”
Employees said Wikistrat was looking to expand its expert and analyst base in 2015 but has since scaled back its operations. Several former top analysts have been laid off.
A source who worked at Wikistrat while the simulation was being conducted told The Daily Beast that, in retrospect, it’s worrisome. He pointed to Zamel’s reported work with George Nader, a Lebanese-American emissary for the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia, who is cooperating with Mueller’s investigation of the 2016 election. Nader attended the Seychelles meeting where American billionaire Erik Prince and the head of a Russian sovereign wealth fund reportedly discussed setting up a back-channel between their two governments.
“The problem is when you combine that with the fact of all the other allegations against Mr. Zamel, including the allegations that he received payment from George Nader, that Psy Group was allegedly involved with a social media manipulation campaign first during the primary and then during the general—you combine all of that with the fact that at another company he owns, Wikistrat, his analysts came up with a scenario that’s eerily similar to what wound up happening,” that person said. “It’s circumstantial, certainly, but it is very concerning.”
--with additional reporting by Kevin Poulsen
Betsy Woodruff
@woodruffbets
betsy.woodruff@thedailybeast.com
Erin Banco
Erin.Banco@thedailybeast.com
Got a tip? Send it to The Daily Beast here.
---
AN 119
A consulting firm with ties to Israeli intelligence pitched a plan to the Trump campaign to use social media and foreign assistance to interfere with the 2016 election that turned out to be eerily similar to Russian meddling.
Wikistrat started gaming out a foreign influence campaign just days after Donald Trump entered the race, and an associated firm pitched senior campaign official Rick Gates on the plan in April 2016, reported The Daily Beast.
The pitch by Psy Group, which is reportedly owned by Wikistrat founder Joel Zamel, laid out an election influence campaign that involved creating thousands of fake social media accounts to support Trump, and Zamel himself took part in at least two meetings in Washington in 2016 and 2017.
His staff at Psy Group continued making connections about their social media manipulation scheme with individuals who represented themselves as close to the Trump campaign.
Zamel met with Donald Trump Jr. after his father became the Republican presidential nominee to discuss the plan, which resembled the election interference already underway by Russia and the scenario described by Wikistrat the year before.
Special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigators have already questioned Zamel, who is so low-profile that no public photos of him are known, and Gates has agreed to cooperate as part of a plea agreement.
It’s not clear whether the Psy Group plans were ever implemented, but some former employees said at least parts of them were carried out.
An attorney for Wikistrat pointed out the firm had conducted hundreds of simulations on a variety of scenarios, and many in the cybersecurity world were concerned about foreign election interference when Psy Group conducted the sim.
But one former employee who helped create the 2015 report said the accuracy of their predictions are spooky in retrospect.
“At the time we were discussing the subject of cyber-interference in democratic processes, it seemed and felt like just another idle intellectual exercise and scenario planning project for political scientists,” said Peter Marino, a former Wikistrat analyst. “But retrospectively, it feels a bit too on-the-nose not to be disturbing.”
https://www.alternet.org/2019/01/israeli-firm-pitched-don-jr-on-election-meddling-scenario-in-2016-and-it-sounds-exactly-like-the-russia-scheme/
---
at least three members of Donald Trump’s campaign staff contacted a social media manipulation firm with ties to Israeli intelligence — and special counsel Robert Mueller wants to know why.
Rick Gates, the president’s deputy campaign chairman who has accepted a cooperation agreement with Mueller, reportedly reached out to the intelligence-gathering data firm Psy Group for help during the 2016 presidential campaign, reported The Daily Beast.
But the website has learned that at least two other campaign associates who claimed to be part of Trump’s inner circle also contacted the firm.
Former employees were reluctant to name those campaign associates in fear of retribution from their colleagues and scrutiny from Mueller, who has interviewed numerous Psy Group employees in his widening probe of foreign election interference.
The firm is owned by Joel Zamel, an Australian national who also owns the private intelligence group Wikistrat — and who was interviewed several months ago by Mueller’s office.
Zamel maintained contacts with Trump associates — including Erik Prince, Donald Trump Jr. and George Nader — during the campaign and after the election.
Investigators arealso interested in interactions between John Hannah, who served as a Cheney adviser and worked on Trump’s State Department transition team, and Zamel and the Lebanese-American businessman Nader.
Hannah, Nader and Zamel reportedly met with a top Saudi general shortly before Trump was inaugurated to discuss plans to overthrow the government of Iran.
Current and former Psy Group employees told The Daily Beast they do not know whether Zamel developed his own operation related to the Trump campaign.
Related Topics ------------------------------------------
2016 President Election Donald Trump Donald Trump Associates Israeli Intelligence Raw Story Robert Mueller Russia Probe Social Media Manipulator
---
https://www.alternet.org/former-cia-acting-director-reveals-mueller-might-be-opening-another-front-investigating-ex-aide-dick
former top national security aide to Dick Cheney has fallen under scrutiny by special counsel Robert Mueller.
Two sources with knowledge of the probe say Mueller is examining possibly suspicious contacts by John Hannah, who served as a Cheney adviser and worked on Trump’s State Department transition team, reported The Daily Beast.
“Mueller might be opening another front here,” said John McLaughlin, former acting director of the CIA. “His mandate is to examine Russian collusion, but there’s the clause in his mandate that’s very open-ended—to the effect of ‘and any associated matters.’ It could be a separate line of inquiry about efforts to influence the election by foreigners.”
Hannah has not been accused of any wrongdoing, but investigators are interested in his interactions with Lebanese-American businessman George Nader, who arranged meetings between Trump associates and foreign dignitaries, and Joel Zamel, a social media expert with deep ties to Israeli intelligence.
Hannah, Nader and Zamel reportedly met with a top Saudi general shortly before President Donald Trump was inaugurated to discuss plans to overthrow the government of Iran.
Nader worked with Hannah onIraq policyduring the Bush administration, and Hannah is listed as an advisory council for Zamel’s tech firm Wikistrat.
Hannah now serves as a senior counselor for the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, a pro-Israel think tank highly critical of Iran.
Nader and Zamel have each been questioned by Mueller’s team and are reportedly cooperating with the Russia investigation.
==
==
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/05/19/us/politics/trump-jr-saudi-uae-nader-prince-zamel.html
Trump Jr. and Other Aides Met With Gulf Emissary Offering Help to Win Election
Donald Trump Jr. met in Trump Tower in the summer of 2016 with a representative of two wealthy Arab princes who said they were eager to help his father win election.CreditHiroko Masuike/The New York Times
By Mark Mazzetti, Ronen Bergman and David D. Kirkpatrick
May 19, 2018
WASHINGTON — Three months before the 2016 election, a small group gathered at Trump Tower to meet with Donald Trump Jr., the president’s eldest son. One was an Israeli specialist in social media manipulation. Another was an emissary for two wealthy Arab princes. The third was a Republican donor with a controversial past in the Middle East as a private security contractor.
The meeting was convened primarily to offer help to the Trump team, and it forged relationships between the men and Trump insiders that would develop over the coming months — past the election and well into President Trump’s first year in office, according to several people with knowledge of their encounters.
Erik Prince, the private security contractor and the former head of Blackwater, arranged the meeting,which took place on Aug. 3, 2016. The emissary, George Nader, told Donald Trump Jr. that the princes who led Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates were eager to help his father win election as president. The social media specialist, Joel Zamel, extolled his company’s ability to give an edge to a political campaign; by that time, the firm had already drawn up a multimillion-dollar proposal for a social media manipulation effort to help elect Mr. Trump.
The company, which employed several Israeli former intelligence officers, specialized in collecting information and shaping opinion through social media.
Image
Donald Trump Jr. was said to respond approvingly to a proposal for a social media manipulation effort to help elect his father as president.CreditDamon Winter/The New York Times
It is unclear whether such a proposal was executed, and the details of who commissioned it remain in dispute. But Donald Trump Jr. responded approvingly, according to a person with knowledge of the meeting, and after those initial offers of help, Mr. Nader was quickly embraced as a close ally by Trump campaign advisers — meeting frequently with Jared Kushner, Mr. Trump’s son-in-law, and Michael T. Flynn, who became the president’s first national security adviser. At the time, Mr. Nader was also promoting a secret plan to use private contractors to destabilize Iran, the regional nemesis of Saudi Arabia and the Emirates.
After Mr. Trump was elected, Mr. Nader paid Mr. Zamel a large sum of money, described by one associate as up to $2 million. There are conflicting accounts of the reason for the payment, but among other things, a company linked to Mr. Zamel provided Mr. Nader with an elaborate presentation about the significance of social media campaigning to Mr. Trump’s victory.
The meetings, which have not been reported previously, are the first indication that countries other than Russia may have offered assistance to the Trump campaign in the months before the presidential election. The interactions are a focus of the investigation by Robert S. Mueller III, the special counsel, who was originally tasked with examining possible Trump campaign coordination with Russia in the election.
Mr. Nader is cooperating with the inquiry, and investigators have questioned numerous witnesses in Washington, New York, Atlanta, Tel Aviv and elsewhere about what foreign help may have been pledged or accepted, and about whether any such assistance was coordinated with Russia, according to witnesses and others with knowledge of the interviews.
Image
Erik D. Prince, the founder of Blackwater, arranged the meeting with Donald Trump Jr., George Nader and Joel Zamel.CreditAndrew Harrer/Bloomberg News
The interviews, some in recent weeks, are further evidence that special counsel’s investigation remains in an intense phase even as Mr. Trump’s lawyers are publicly calling for Mr. Mueller to bring it to a close.
It is illegal for foreign governments or individuals to be involved in American elections, and it is unclear what — if any — direct assistance Saudi Arabia and the Emirates may have provided. But two people familiar with the meetings said that Trump campaign officials did not appear bothered by the idea of cooperation with foreigners.
A lawyer for Donald Trump Jr., Alan Futerfas, said in a statement that “prior to the 2016 election, Donald Trump Jr. recalls a meeting with Erik Prince, George Nader and another individual who may be Joel Zamel. They pitched Mr. Trump Jr. on a social media platform or marketing strategy. He was not interested and that was the end of it.”
The August 2016 meeting has echoes of another Trump Tower meeting two months earlier, also under scrutiny by the special counsel, when Donald Trump Jr. and other top campaign aides met with a Russian lawyer after being promised damaging information about Hillary Clinton. No evidence has emerged suggesting that the August meeting was set up with a similar premise.
Image
Stephen Miller, a senior aide to President Trump, was in Donald Trump Jr.’s office when the others arrived for the meeting.CreditShawn Thew/EPA, via Shutterstock
The revelations about the meetings come in the midst of new scrutiny about ties between Mr. Trump’s advisers and at least three wealthy Persian Gulf states. Besides his interest in Saudi Arabia and the Emirates, Mr. Mueller has also been asking witnesses about meetings between White House advisers and representatives of Qatar, Saudi Arabia’s bitter rival.
A lawyer for Mr. Zamel denied that his client had carried out any campaign on Mr. Trump’s behalf. “Neither Joel Zamel, nor any of his related entities, had any involvement whatsoever in the U.S. election campaign,” said the lawyer, Marc L. Mukasey.
“The D.O.J. clarified from Day 1 that Joel and his companies have never been a target of the investigation. My client provided full cooperation to the government to assist with their investigation,” he said.
Kathryn Ruemmler, a lawyer for Mr. Nader, said, “Mr. Nader has fully cooperated with the special counsel’s investigation and will continue to do so.” A senior official in Saudi Arabia said it had never employed Mr. Nader in any capacity or authorized him to speak for the crown prince.
Image
Mr. Trump has allied himself with the Emirati crown prince, Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed al-Nahyan, endorsing his strong support for Saudi Arabia and confrontational approaches toward Iran and Qatar.CreditAl Drago for The New York Times
Mr. Prince, through a spokesman, declined to comment. The White House did not respond to a request for comment.
Advisers to the Court
Crown Prince Mohammed bin Zayed al-Nahyan of Abu Dhabi, the de facto ruler of the United Arab Emirates, and Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman of Saudi Arabia, the king’s main adviser, had long opposed many of the Obama administration’s policies toward the Middle East. They resented President Barack Obama’s agreement with Iran over its nuclear program, his statements of support for the Arab Spring uprisings and his hands-off approach to the Syrian civil war.
News outlets linked to Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates fiercely criticized Mrs. Clinton, Mr. Trump’s Democratic opponent, when she was secretary of state, and diplomats familiar with their thinking say both princes hoped for a president who would take a stronger hand in the region against both Iran and groups like the Muslim Brotherhood.
Mr. Nader had worked for years as a close adviser to Crown Prince Mohammed of Abu Dhabi, and Mr. Zamel had worked for the Emirati royal court as a consultant as well. When Mr. Trump locked up the Republican presidential nomination in early 2016, Mr. Nader began making inquiries on behalf of the Emirati prince about possible ways to directly support Mr. Trump, according to three people with whom Mr. Nader discussed his efforts.
Image
One of Mr. Zamel’s firms did work for Oleg V. Deripaska,an aluminum magnate, who has been linked to President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia.CreditSergei Karpukhin/Reuters
Mr. Nader also visited Moscow at least twice during the presidential campaign as a confidential emissary from Crown Prince Mohammed of Abu Dhabi, according to people familiar with his travels. After the election, he worked with the crown prince to arrange a meeting in the Seychelles between Mr. Prince and a financier close to President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia.
Companies connected to Mr. Zamel also have ties to Russia. One of his firms had previously worked for oligarchs linked to Mr. Putin, including Oleg V. Deripaska and Dmitry Rybolovlev, who hired the firm for online campaigns against their business rivals.
Mr. Deripaska, an aluminum magnate, was once in business with the former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort, who has pleaded not guilty in the special counsel investigation to charges of financial crimes and failing to disclose the lobbying work he did on behalf of a former president of Ukraine, an ally of Mr. Putin. Mr. Rybolovlev once purchased a Florida mansion from Mr. Trump.
Mr. Nader’s visits to Russia and the work Mr. Zamel’s companies did for the Russians have both been a subject of interest to the special counsel’s investigators, according to people familiar with witness interviews.
Image
Mr. Prince has known Mr. Nader since he worked for Blackwater in Iraq.CreditZach Gibson for The New York Times
ADVERTISEMENT
A String of Meetings
Mr. Zamel and Mr. Nader were together at a Midtown Manhattan hotel at about 4 p.m. on the afternoon of Aug. 3 when Mr. Nader received a call from Mr. Prince summoning them to Trump Tower. When they arrived, Stephen Miller, a top campaign aide who is now a White House adviser, was in Donald Trump Jr.’s office as well, according to the people familiar with the meeting.
Mr. Prince is a longtime Republican donor and the brother of Betsy DeVos, the education secretary, and Mr. Prince and Mr. Nader had known each other since Mr. Nader had worked for Blackwater as a business agent in Iraq in the years after the American invasion. Mr. Prince has longstanding ties to the Emirates, and has frequently done business with Crown Prince Mohammed.
Mr. Prince opened the meeting by telling Donald Trump Jr. that “we are working hard for your father,” in reference to his family and other donors, according to a person familiar with the meeting. He then introduced Mr. Nader as an old friend with deep ties to Arab leaders.
Mr. Nader repeatedly referred to the Saudi and Emirati princes as “my friends,” according to one person with knowledge of the conversation. To underscore the point, he would open his mobile phone to show off pictures of him posing with them, some of which The New York Times obtained.
Image
George Nader in 1999. He is an adviser to the Emiratis who is cooperating in the special counsel investigation.CreditRon Sachs/Picture-Alliance, via Associated Press
Mr. Nader explained to Donald Trump Jr. that the two princes saw the elder Mr. Trump as a strong leader who would fill the power vacuum that they believed Mr. Obama had left in the Middle East, and Mr. Nader went on to say that he and his friends would be glad to support Mr. Trump as much as they could, according to the person with knowledge of the conversation.
Mr. Zamel, for his part, laid out the capabilities of his online media company, although it is unclear whether he referred to the proposals his company had already prepared. One person familiar with the meeting said that Mr. Nader invited Donald Trump Jr. to meet with a Saudi prince — an invitation the younger Mr. Trump declined. After about half an hour, everyone exchanged business cards.
ADVERTISEMENT
“There was a brief meeting, nothing concrete was offered or pitched to anyone and nothing came of it,” said Mr. Mukasey, the lawyer for Mr. Zamel.
By then, a company connected to Mr. Zamel had been working on a proposal for a covert multimillion-dollar online manipulation campaign to help elect Mr. Trump, according to three people involved and a fourth briefed on the effort. The plan involved using thousands of fake social media accounts to promote Mr. Trump’s candidacy on platforms like Facebook.
Image
Mr. Nader and Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman of Saudi Arabia in a photograph obtained by The New York Times.Credit.
There were concerns inside the company, Psy-Group, about the plan’s legality, according to one person familiar with the effort. The company, whose motto is “shape reality,” consulted an American law firm, and was told that it would be illegal if any non-Americans were involved in the effort.
Mr. Zamel, the founder of Psy-Group and one of its owners, has been questioned about the August 2016 meeting by investigators for the special counsel, and at least two F.B.I. agents working on the inquiry have traveled to Israel to interview employees of the company who worked on the proposal. According to one person, the special counsel’s team has worked with the Israeli police to seize the computers of one of Mr. Zamel’s companies, which is currently in liquidation.
In the hectic final weeks of the campaign and during the presidential transition, several of Mr. Trump’s advisers drew Mr. Nader close. He met often with Mr. Kushner, Mr. Flynn and Stephen K. Bannon, who took over as campaign chairman after Mr. Manafort resigned amid revelations about his work in Ukraine.
In December 2016, Mr. Nader turned again to an internet company linked to Mr. Zamel — WhiteKnight, based in the Philippines — to purchase a presentation demonstrating the impact of social media campaigns on Mr. Trump’s electoral victory. Asked about the purchase, a representative of WhiteKnight said: “WhiteKnight delivers premium research and high-end business development services for prestigious clients around the world. WhiteKnight does not talk about any of its clients.”
ADVERTISEMENT
After the inauguration, both Mr. Zamel and Mr. Nader visited the White House, meeting with Mr. Kushner and Mr. Bannon.
At that time, Mr. Nader was promoting a plan to use private contractors to carry out economic sabotage against Iran that, he hoped, might coerce it to permanently abandon its nuclear program. The plan included efforts to deter Western companies from investing in Iran, and operations to sow mistrust among Iranian officials. He advocated the project, which he estimated would cost about $300 million, to American, Emirati and Saudi officials.
Last spring, Mr. Nader traveled to Riyadh for meetings with senior Saudi military and intelligence officials to pitch his Iran sabotage plan. He was convinced, according to several people familiar with his plan, that economic warfare was the key to the overthrow of the government in Tehran. One person briefed on Mr. Nader’s activities said he tried to persuade Mr. Kushner to endorse the plan to Crown Prince Mohammed in person on a trip to Riyadh, although it was unclear whether the message was delivered.
Asked about Mr. Nader’s plans to attack Iran, the senior Saudi official said Mr. Nader had a habit of pitching proposals that went nowhere.
Mr. Nader was also in discussions with Mr. Prince, the former head of Blackwater, about a plan to get the Saudis to pay $2 billion to set up a private army to combat Iranian proxy forces in Yemen.
Since entering the White House, Mr. Trump has allied himself closely with Saudi Arabia and the Emirates. His first overseas trip was to Riyadh. He strongly backed Saudi and Emirati efforts to isolate their neighbor Qatar, another American ally, even over apparent disagreement from the State and Defense Departments.
This month, Mr. Trump also withdrew from an Obama administration nuclear deal with Iran that both Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates had campaigned against for years, delivering them their biggest victory yet from his administration.
Mark Mazzetti reported from Washington, Ronen Bergman from Tel Aviv and David D. Kirkpatrick from London. Maggie Haberman contributed reporting.
A version of this article appears in print on May 19, 2018
---
Mueller Witness' Team Gamed Out Russian Meddling … in 2015
https://www.thedailybeast.com/mueller-witness-team-gamed-out-russian-meddling-in-...
1.
Team Trump Had Many Ties to Israeli Intel Firm in Mueller's Crosshairs
https://www.thedailybeast.com/team-trump-had-many-ties-to-israeli-intel-firm-in-muel...
1.
Report: Mueller Eyed Foreign Firm That Wargamed Election Meddling ...
https://talkingpointsmemo.com/.../wikistrat-psy-group-joel-zamel-rick-gates-trump-ca...
1.
Understanding the New Trump Campaign Collusion Story
nymag.com/intelligencer/.../understanding-the-new-trump-campaign-collusion-story.ht...
May 20, 2018 - Another company in Zamel's portfolio, Wikistrat, “uses a network of ... According toNader, the crown princes thought Trump would be a .... (Manafort and Gates have both been indicted by Mueller, and Gates has been flipped.).
Why did at least three members of Donald Trump's campaign contact a ...
https://www.salon.com/.../three-different-trump-campaign-associates-sought-help-fro...
1.
Who is Joel Zamel, the Australian-Israeli linked to Mueller's Trump ...
https://www.haaretz.com › Israel News
1.
Missing: gates | Must include: gates
Trump Jr. and Other Aides Met With Gulf Emissary Offering Help to Win ...
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/05/19/us/.../trump-jr-saudi-uae-nader-prince-zamel.html
May 19, 2018 - After Mr. Trump was elected, Mr. Nader paid Mr. Zamel a large sum of money, described by one associate as up to $2 million. There are ...
Missing: wikistrat gates
Israeli Intelligence Firm's Election-Meddling Analysis Comes Under ...
https://www.wsj.com/.../israeli-intelligence-firms-election-meddling-analysis-comes-unde...
May 25, 2018 - Psy-Group presentation outlines ways Trump campaign was helped by fake social media accounts .... Zamel and Nader had pitched his client on “a social media platform or ... One of his companies, Wikistrat, did war games and analysis for the U.A.E. in ... Bill Gates on the Best Investment He Ever Made.
Mueller Probe Expands to Israeli Entrepreneur With U.A.E. Ties - WSJ
https://www.wsj.com › Politics › National Security
May 19, 2018 - Mr. Zamel met with Donald Trump Jr., Mr. Trump's eldest son, at Trump Tower in the ... Mr. Nader is also cooperating with the investigation; his lawyer didn't ... The work of two of Mr.Zamel's companies—Wikistrat and the Psy Group—has .... Bill Gates on Where China Stands in a Trade War With the U.S ...
Did Israeli spy firm help Trump win presidency? | The Electronic Intifada
https://electronicintifada.net/blogs/ali.../did-israeli-spy-firm-help-trump-win-presidenc...
1.