Sky spooksVulture arrested in Lebanon for spying for Israel
A transmitter-equipped vulture from an Israeli nature reserve has been captured and detained in Lebanon after flying across the border. The Lebanese authorities arrested the vulture on suspicion of spying for Israel. The Lebanese security services ordered the release of the bird after an investigation found that it did not pose a threat.
Arrested for suspicious activity // Source: nps.gov
A transmitter-equipped vulture from an Israeli nature reserve has been captured and detained in Lebanon after flying across the border. The Lebanese authorities arrested the vulture on suspicion of spying for Israel. CNN reports that several Israelis called the country’ Nature and Parks Authority, alerting the agency to Facebook postings and pictures showing residents of the south Lebanese town of Bint Jbeil holding a vulture with an Israeli identification ring and location transmitter.
“Reports passed to us show the vulture tied with a rope by local people who write that they suspect Israeli espionage apparently because of the transmitter attached to him,” the Israeli authority said.
“In the twenty-first century, we expect people to understand that wild animals are not harmful,” it added. “We hope that the Lebanese will release him.”
The Nature and Park Authority’s experts had been aware for some days that one of the park’s vultures had flown about 2.5 miles into Lebanon. “But we did not know he’d been captured,” an authority’s spokeswoman said.
Later posts on Faebook said the Lebanese security services ordered the release of the bird after an investigation found that it did not pose a threat.
The Middle East is a hotbed of conspiracy theories – some involving animals. Last summer, Palestinian media reported that a Hamas security unit in the Gaza Strip had apprehended a dolphin loitering off Gaza’s Mediterranean coastline. Hamas said the dolphin was equipped with video cameras for an Israeli intelligence gathering mission.
In September 2013, police in Egypt’s Qena governorate, some 280 miles southeast of Cairo, captured what they described as a “suspicious bird” carrying a small electronic device attached to one of its legs. Veterinary experts consulted by the police discovered the device was a wildlife tracker used by French scientists to follow the movement of migrating birds.
In 2011, Saudi media reported that a vulture carrying a GPS transmitter and an identification ring from Tel Aviv University had been captured and detained by Saudi security forces, who suspected the bird was being used for espionage.
In 2010, after several German tourists were killed and injured by shark attacks in Red Sea resorts, Egypt’s tourism minister accused Israel’s Mossad of training the sharks to attack European tourists visiting Egypt in order to hurt the Egyptian economy.
