The "Submarine Affair" – situation report: after two months of investigations and a parade of investigated persona from the top political and defense echelons, this affair has taken a new direction: from submarines to surface vessels and from the Prime Minister's Office to the IDF Navy.

In a world where rapid technological changes dictate the business reality, the advantage is on the side of the court of the start-up companies. On the other hand, major technology corporations that consolidated their status in the previous decades mainly on the basis of IT solutions find it difficult to catch up and close the gaps. The main reason for this difficulty is a massive and bureaucratic organizational structure that is incompatible with the rapid technological changes today's clients demand.

Some 1,600 Telex messages intercepted by Western intelligence agencies between 1988 and 1994 opened a Pandora's Box on Iran's nuclear program. These intercepts led to vigorous intelligence gathering and analysis efforts on the part of the Western intelligence community, which revealed the existence of a secret Iranian program for the development of nuclear arms. The secret program had run parallel to the activities of the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran (AEOI) which the Iranian regime attempted to present as legitimate activities "for peaceful purposes".

Five unicorns in the cybersecurity realm have been created in Israel: Checkpoint – the mother of all Israeli cybersecurity firms; NDS – acquired by Cisco for $5B, one of the country’s largest exits ever; Imperva and CyberArk – both publicly traded companies; and ForeScout.

With just a handful of such cyber giants worldwide, that is quite an impressive figure, attesting to Israel’s global prowess in the field. 

Elbit Systems of America announced today that it was awarded an Indefinite Delivery Indefinite Quantity (ID/IQ) contract to provide and field mortar fire control systems for the US Army. The contract was awarded by the Army Contracting Command, Picatinny Arsenal, New Jersey. If fully ordered, the maximum value of the contract is $102 million. The contract completion date is December 2021. 

The IAF’s Air Operations Division’s Central Control Unit is called “The IAF’s beating heart." The unit’s personnel observe every IAF operation from IAF HQ, in routine and combat. They operate from the IAF’s control stations, from which the IAF’s real-time operational activity is managed and observed, and are responsible for planned and unplanned missions. The unit is manned 24 hours a day, all year long.

Cooperation Agreement with DTL on Mini-UAVs

Israel Aerospace Industries (IAI) and Dynamatic Technologies Ltd (DTL) have announced today their cooperation to jointly address the needs of the Indian UAV market. This announcement followed a significant milestone with both companies signing a cooperation agreement regarding the production, assembly, and support of mini-UAVs in India, at the Aero India exhibition currently underway in Bangalore.

A Russian spy ship was spotted patrolling off the East Coast of the United States on Tuesday morning, the first such instance during the Trump administration, reports Fox News. This comes on the same day it was learned the Kremlin had secretly deployed cruise missiles inside Russia and flew within 200 yards of a US Navy destroyer, according to the report

Less than a month into the job, White House national security adviser Michael Flynn resigned Monday night, according to CNN.

His departure came just after reports surfaced that the Justice Department warned the Trump administration last month that Flynn misled administration officials regarding his communications with the Russian ambassador to the United States and was potentially vulnerable to blackmail by the Russians.

In the coming year, the countries of Europe will face a series of tests, the results of which are liable to destabilize the European frameworks, especially the European Union (EU) and NATO, upon which they relied since recovering from two destructive World Wars, the Cold War with the Soviet Union, and the consequences of the latter’s disintegration in the late twentieth century.