Strategic Security Intelligence

Cyber War in the Middle East

So far, dispite attempts by both sides to escalate the cyber war, we have seen no indications of fundamental shifts in strategy by either side. Limited innovation has been seen in the form of:

• Minor midifications of existing attack tools.
• Increased flexibility in tools to improve adaption tempo.
• Spreading of the target base by the Palestinians to US corporate interests.

In all cases, attacks have been isolated in their nature, of little or no strategic value, uncoordinated with respect to other aspects of the ongoing conflict, of extremely limited effect, and directed in such a manner as to be aimed primarily at innocents or so as to cause innocents to be impacted by side effects of attacks.

Tools, techniques, and tactics follow the same patterns demonstrated by the leadership of cyber attacks supporting the Mexican Zapistas and the Animal Liberation Front in the late 1990s.

Participants in the cyber portion of the conflict have broadenned to include Pakistanis and particpants from other nations. This appears to reflect solidarity between pre-existing partners and long-time participants in the conflict rather than a widening of the participants involved in these actions.

Calls to reduce conflict in order to facilitate peace negotiations have apparently been ignored by all parties in the cyber conflict, indicating that either:

• (1) the cyber attackers are not under the control of their respective governments,
• (2) the respective governments do not consider these attacks to be of consequence adequate to warrant control, or
• (3) the governments have decided to support or condone these activities.

The Palestinian authority has previously approved of and supported this activity by their supporters.

The Israeli government, while not supporting the activity by its supporters, has not acted to put a halt to it.