Anonymous strikes!

These are also heroes of the hour!

Anonymous takes down over 550 Israeli sites, wipes databases, leaks email addresses and passwords

the nextweb,

17 November, 2012

When the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) this week began taking military action in the Gaza strip against Hamas (as the IDF announced on Twitter), Anonymous declared its own war as part of #OpIsrael. Among the casualties are thousands of email addresses and passwords, hundreds of Israeli web sites, government-owned as well as privately owned pages, as well as databases belonging to the Bank of Jerusalem and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

Israel Ministry of Foreign Affairs database has been deleted | mashav.mfa.gov.il | #OpIsrael

— Anonymous (@YourAnonNews) November 16, 2012

Bank of Jerusalem database has been deleted | bankjerusalem.co.il| #OpIsrael #Anonymous

— Anonymous (@YourAnonNews) November 16, 2012

While the hacktivist group doesn’t appear to be anywhere near satisfied yet, the YourAnonNews account, which has over 686,000 followers, did just send out this message:

Israel, all your base are belong to us.

— Anonymous (@YourAnonNews) November 16, 2012

If that’s not a declaration of success, I don’t know what is. There have so far been hundreds of takedowns of sites by Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attacks; one Pastebin trying to list them all includes 659 web sites.

Another AnonPaste includes 2,004 email addresses, the majority of which appear to have corresponding passwords, allegedly stolen from an MySQL database belonging to dirotmodiin.co.il, a site for finding real estate in Israel. Many of them are hosted on Israeli domains, but there are also the usual Gmail, Hotmail, and Yahoo accounts.

Yet as already mentioned, we’re talking about more than just DDoS attacks that are overloading web sites, such as tel-aviv.gov.il, the municipal site for the second most populous city in Israel (after Jerusalem). There are also plenty of defacements, and, as of a few minutes ago, databases have also been wiped.

While the Israeli government almost certainly has backups of their databases, these attacks as well as the defacements show Anonymous isn’t just doing its usual spree of overloading target sites. OpIsrael appears to have gotten multiple hackers involved who are interested in doing actual damage, or at least something that is slightly more permanent than just a 404.

Update at 8:20PM EST: The Twitter account is now claiming that over 9,000 sites have been taken down or defaced, but don’t be fooled: this is a meme reference.

Yes, over 9,000 websites are down or defaced right now for #OpIsrael. RT @shaved_llama: @youranonnews ITS OVER 9000!

— Anonymous (@YourAnonNews) November 17, 2012

A press release attempts to explain Anonymous’ motives behind the attacks:

Greetings World

For far too long, Anonymous has stood by with the rest of the world and watched in despair the barbaric, brutal and despicable treatment of the Palestinian people in the so called “Occupied Territories” by the Israel Defense Force. Like so many around the globe, we have felt helpless in the face of such implacable evil. And today’s insane attack and threatened invasion of Gaza was more of the same.

But when the government of Israel publicly threatened to sever all Internet and other telecommunications into and out of Gaza they crossed a line in the sand. As the former dictator of Egypt Mubarack learned the hard way – we are ANONYMOUS and NO ONE shuts down the Internet on our watch. To the IDF and government of Israel we issue you this warning only once. Do NOT shut down the Internet into the “Occupied Territories”, and cease and desist from your terror upon the innocent people of Palestine or you will know the full and unbridled wrath of Anonymous. And like all the other evil governments that have faced our rage, you will NOT survive it unscathed.

To the people of Gaza and the “Occupied Territories”, know that Anonymous stands with you in this fight. We will do everything in our power to hinder the evil forces of the IDF arrayed against you. We will use all our resources to make certain you stay connected to the Internet and remain able to transmit your experiences to the world. As a start, we have put together the Anonymous Gaza Care Package – http://bit.ly/XH87C5 – which contains instructions in Arabic and English that can aid you in the event the Israel government makes good on it’s threat to attempt to sever your Internet connection. It also contains useful information on evading IDF surveillance, and some basic first aid and other useful information. We will continue to expand and improve this document in the coming days, and we will transmit it to you by every means at our disposal. We encourage you to download this package, and to share it with your fellow Palestinians to the best of your ability.

We will be with you. No matter how dark it may seem, no matter how alone and abandoned you may feel – know that tens of thousands of us in Anonymous are with you and working tirelessly around the clock to bring you every aid and assistance that we can.

We Are Anonymous

We Are Everywhere

We Are Legion

We Do Not Forgive

We Do Not Forget

To the oppressors of the innocent Palestinian people, it is too late to EXPECT US

A second press release has even more to add.

#OpIsrael

Anonpaste,

t has come to our attention that conservative and pro-Israeli groups throughout the blogosphere have taken advantage of Operation Israel, attempting to solidify public opinion against Anonymous.

TheOtherMcCain.com posted an editorial this morning which stated the following: 

"If you ever doubted that Anonymous was a terrorist organization, they have now removed all reason for doubt." 

The article only contained 55 words of original content by the site itself, the other 90 percent of the article was selected quotations by mainstream media sources. 

Let us once again be perfectly clear: Anonymous does not in any way support the use of violence. Anonymous is a world wide collective of individuals whose means pursue human rights, justice, and universal equality for the citizens of every nation. 

Pro-Israeli groups throughout the world have grown from a foundation of Israeli/US propaganda and lies. 

They arbitrarily dismiss the apartheid system of racial segregation and oppression imposed by the Israeli government on the Palestinian people. The fact of the matter is, in the eyes of the media, only the United States and it's allies are capable of labeling another state or organization as a terrorists. 

Throughout our campaign, we've been inundated with one response in particular; references to Hamas hiding in school buildings or using women and children as human shields.

Selective memory seems to have given pro-Israeli organizations the ability to forget that in 2005 Israeli Defence Minister Shaul Mofaz appeared in court to defend the practice of using Palestinians as human shields in combat after a supreme court outlawed the practice, noting it violated International Law. The reasons for Anonymous intervention through #OpIsrael should be abundantly clear: What is happening in Palestine is oppression. They have no navy, no army, or air force. 

There is no war in Gaza. 

There is only the continuous application of military force by Israel in an attempt to push every last person out of the Palestinian state, despite international laws that make these efforts illegal. 

This illegal expansion of territory by Israel in to the Palestinian state has been ongoing since1948, making refugees of over 700,000 Palestinians. 

Today, Palestinians are not permitted to live in Israeli settlements, drive on Israeli roads or even travel is the “security” areas surrounding them. These Israeli only housing developments are being built on stolen land, even while being called illegal settlements by the International Court of Justice. 

The violence inflicted upon the civilian residents of Gaza is well documented, despite the fact that Israel has adamantly opposed intervention by human rights organizations and the IDF constantly blocks and harasses international journalists. 

Despite these facts, Anonymous has not used any anti-Semitic language during our campaign. Nor have we vocalized any support for Palestinian military operations or resistance groups. 

Our goal was to protect the rights of Palestinian people who are threatened with silence as Israel has made attempts to shut down cell phone and internet service throughout Gaza. 

We know what happens to victims of oppression when the lights go dark. It is also worthy to note, that as of yesterday, members of Anonymous participating in #OpIsrael were making attempts to augment our Gaza Care Package for civilians in Tel Aviv by translating the same documents in to Hebrew in the event that they lose access to internet service as well. 

We do not racially or geographically differentiate between victims of violence or oppression anywhere in the world. 

Both Palestinians and Israelis need to find common ground and end the violence that has already resulted in the deaths of innocent people, including children. Israel's advancement on Palestinian Territories and the racist oppression of Palestinian people needs to end. 

We are not terrorists. 

Governments that fund wars, practice deceit against their own citizens, condone corruption, and turn a blind eye to the deaths of innocent people are terrorists. 

The word terror does not belong to Israel or the United States. We will judge you by your actions. Peace and Freedom to all,

#OpIsrael #Anonymous Anonymous Gaza Care Package:

http://www.mediafire.com/?hpnne29xvx1ceuv

#OpIsrael Information and Tools: http://www.anonpaste.me/anonpaste2/index.php?052e585589d89b5d#V7ELmwHwFZ6gm+mv3/BH0M2bw035NxDE7qaf55tRIBY=