My Encounter with the Israeli "Art Students" Intel Op
and the post-9/11 narrative collapse
After the events of October 7, 2023 discussion of historical events involving Israel, shoved into the darkness a generation prior, began to reemerge into the mainstream. There is a recent and understandable misunderstanding held by younger people that less-than-glowing discussion of Israel had always been verboten outside of fringe websites, but that’s simply not so. While it’s debatable that real, official push-back against America’s relationship with Israel in the Congress had been “robust” since the end of the JFK administration, the old pundit debate format shows, from Face the Nation to Charlie Rose to C-SPAN, were pregnant with debate and criticism up until some point in early 2002 when America began to mobilize against the towelhead menace. Indeed, I first heard about the Project For a New American Century, a warmongering Zionist org populated by the usual suspects, and their push to overthrow Seven Countries In Seven Years on Charlie Rose - I believe - around 1998, and was able to dig up supporting documentation online. Yes, I was involved in that part of the Internet at the time.
From the summer of 1999 until summer 2000 I worked in a downtown office setting in a major American city. I was busy automating myself out of the fairly entry-level position, but also took care of a lot of random things around the office, and spent a chunk of my day working on projects for other departments. The business took up about 2/3 of a floor in a relatively squat 1970s era tower, perhaps four thousand square feet total, with a call center across the elevator lobby, as well as a small federal office of some type in the southeast corner. Our building was occupied by some state and federal offices, some technology firms, and several legal outfits, with the ubiquitous Starbucks on the ground floor. It was impossible to enter or leave the office, or visit two thirds of our operation, without passing the secretaries up front, so I spent a lot of time up there flirting with the rotation of gals helping the senior executive assistant or whatever grandiose title they gave to the long-suffering woman who had put up with the boss for about thirty years.
In what I remember to be early summer 2000 - it may have been the prior year, or in spring, but based on the weather outside this is my recollection - I was up front dealing with a networking issue when four or five almost exaggeratedly “youth-coded”-dressed women entered the lobby and began a somewhat incoherent pitch to sell their crappy paintings, which were all either copies of known works or original designs in various known styles, and what jumped out to me was that they had the vibe of a high-end print onto canvas that was then touched up slightly by an artist with a little paint here and there, then the signature. I was familiar with the process as I knew some artists and people who worked in galleries, and I knew about the operations in China which cranked this garbage out for the chain, but I allowed that it was entirely possible that Israeli schools’ art departments were equally lame to the Chinese.
What really jumped out, however, was their behavior. They were flashing the art pieces - which had ridiculous suggested prices - in a manner which suggested con artists distracting their marks, rather than showing the art. One or two of the women would be running this part of the op, while the others were alternately watching us or examining the room or hallways, indeed looking at where the walls and ceilings met, identifying cameras, etc. They really wanted to “go inside” to show the pieces to more people, but we wouldn’t let them. One finally asked if she could “borrow the key to the bathroom,” as there was a locked bathroom by the stairwell off the elevator lobby. Someone offered to escort her to the bathroom and unlock it - it was right around the corner - but she declined. After a few minutes they began asking questions about other businesses in the building, particularly the DOJ office in the space directly above us, which required a key fob to access the floor and the elevator lobby consisted of locked doors and no windows. “Ask via the first floor lobby, but I don’t think they’ll allow you there.”
When they left, we all discussed how they were pushy and the art was crap, particularly the ridiculously high prices - I seem to recall nothing being less than $300, but it was assumed that barter was part of the deal. I didn’t think much of it until the same crew showed up again minus one woman and with one man, maybe the next day, definitely in the same week, as I was still working on the remodel-driven cleanup. This time they asked to visit one of the principles in the company in his office - his surname was obviously Jewish - but he was out of the country at the time. Any time someone passed through a door into any side of the office, the male would adjust his position to see as much of the office beyond as possible. He had a very military bearing, and I would have chalked it up to conscription if he wasn’t obviously several years older than an “art student” should be, definitely later 20s. There were more questions about a government office, this time one floor below us, on the north side of the building, and how to speak with their secretaries. That set off our lead secretary, who told them that we couldn’t help them and cut off all discussion. They left, and she called building security, and the next day told us that she called the police, because she was confident that it was some sort of scam.
I left that company soon after - I’d automated my way out of a job and had smooched more than one of the gals who had worked in the office, which had rustled the jimmies of one busybody in particular - and not thought much of the encounter with the “art students” until early 2001 when I read about the phenomena on a “conspiracy” website, which reported that it was being investigated by local and federal law enforcement after some rather brazen attempts to access critical infrastructure. After the shock of September 11, 2001, it wasn’t long until the Israeli connection was all over the internet and being discussed quite openly on mainstream media, from the “dancing Israelis” of Urban Moving Systems to the “art students.” However, as soon as this arose, it began disappearing from the curated “conspiracy sites,” where you could discuss the most outlandish topics, including elements of this topic, but only if it was schizo-tier nonsense - anything else would result in a ban and thread deletion. Remember those days?
Recently, Gren1 of WRSA told me of his experience with an attempt by an “Israeli art student” to access a telecom facility at one of their major hubs in the SE. This led me to revisit this topic, to find it somewhat obfuscated by mainstream media sources; indeed, if you Google the topic, the top results will all be ADL and similar pedo murderer enjoyers - however, it is now a simple matter to find government reports on the results of the investigation into the obvious intel operation and its connections to 9/11.
Over 130 encounters were reported across more than 40 cities, raising alarms about an organized intelligence-gathering operation. Around 140 of these Israeli nationals were detained for visa violations before the attacks, with another 60 apprehended afterward. One of the bigger clusters of “art students” lived in Hollywood, Florida—on the same street where Mohammed Atta, the mastermind behind 9/11, lived with several of the other hijackers.
I’ve provided links to the most relevant content below, which prove that this was a real op, and illustrating the concerted effort to smother this memory in the crib during the peak of their power.
The official DEA report on Israeli art student operations around government facilities
An archive of the May 2002 Salon article on the Israeli art student operation - believe it or not, the best mainstream article on the subject, bar none!
The WikiLeaks article on similar Israeli intel operations around US military bases
Archive of the March 2002 WaPo article, by a dual Israeli-US citizen, dismissing the Israeli art students “conspiracy theory” - what a maroon!
KD out