DOHA: As the news of UAE’s use of Israeli spyware company to spy on neighbouring Arab countries’ leaders is being carried by global media outlets, UAE’s act of committing cyber-espionage is being widely condemned by people who have termed it as an ‘exposure of clandestine UAE-Israeli cooperation’.
The United Arab Emirates (UAE) asked an Israeli spyware company to hack into the phones of the Qatari Amir and a Saudi prince among other political and regional rivals, emails obtained by the New York Times appear to show.
According to a report published on Friday (August 31), leaked emails submitted in two lawsuits against the Israel-based NSO Group suggested involvement in illegal spying for clients, Al Jazeera said.
Faleh Al Hajri wrote on his twitter account: “Now the UAE particularly Abu Dhabi has reached the point where it is cooperating with Israel against its brothers.”
Al Jazeera reports that the two lawsuits were filed in Israel and Cyprus by a Qatari citizen and Mexican journalists and activists who were targeted by the company’s spyware programme, Pegasus. Emails submitted in the lawsuits showed that the UAE signed a contract to license the company’s surveillance software “as early as August 2013”.
The Emiratis sought to intercept the phone calls of Amir H H Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani in 2014, as well as Saudi Prince Mutaib bin Abdullah — seen as a contender for the throne at the time - and Saad Hariri, Lebanon’s current prime minister.
Another person, Abdullah Ahmed, tweeted that the scandals of Abu Dhabi were frequently appearing from using dirty money for paying bribes to now involving in espionage.
Jaber Al Harmi, prominent Qatari journalist wrote on his twitter account that those people who were involved in spying on one GCC country would not hesitate to espionage on others using all means.
Another twitter user wrote: “Spying on Arab officials is not new and Abu Dhabi had the role in hacking QNA and this news has revealed the size of cooperation between the UAE and Israel.”
Khalifa, another user said: “UAE is a country whose priority is corruption and distraction and espionage on neighbouring countries. They are also involved in buying loyalties (of poets and journalists) through bribes.”
As the details of UAE’s act of spying on neighbouring countries are coming to surface after the New York Times report, QNA has reported that an official source at the Ministry of the Foreign Affairs of the State of Qatar has stressed that the Ministry is following with great concern media reports that talked about the use of Israeli companies and their technologies by high-level government bodies and personalities in the United Arab Emirates to spy on states and personalities, including Qatari government figures by hacking their mobile phones.
