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| title | aliases | created | updated | tags | category | summary | start | location | ||||||
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| Lockheed bribe scandal |
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2026-05-17 | 2026-10-12 |
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Intelligence Scandal | 1976 scandal over Lockheed Aircraft Company payments to international figures, including Ari Ben-Menashe's account of a bribe to Israeli Defense Minister Shimon Peres. | 1976-01-01 | Israel |
The Lockheed bribe scandal refers to a series of bribery incidents involving the Lockheed Aircraft Company. In his 1992 book, Ari Ben-Menashe described a specific instance in Israel that he said came to light in 1976 through an intercepted telegram.1
In his 1992 book, Ben-Menashe wrote that, while serving as a duty officer in Unit 8200, he intercepted a telegram from the Iran Embassy in Ramat Gan to Tehran. He wrote that the telegram detailed a meeting between a Lockheed representative in Israel and Shimon Peres, then Defense Minister, revealing a bribe of $3.5 million deposited into one of Peres's brother's business accounts in Europe.1
He wrote that the information was covered up by Israeli military intelligence superiors, including Yoel Ben-Porat and Sasson Yishaek, that the original telegram, its translation, and related logs were ordered to be erased, and that the young woman working with him was transferred to another unit. He wrote that no public disclosure or inquiry was ever made regarding Israel's involvement in the scandal.1
Footnotes
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Ben-Menashe, Ari. Profits of War: Inside the Secret U.S.-Israeli Arms Network. Sheridan Square Press, 1992 (TrineDay reprint, 2015). ↩︎