spying on puppets

"The United States instructed its Middle East diplomats in 2008 to gather data on encrypted Israeli communications and build financial and "biometric" profiles of Palestinian leaders, a leaked embassy cable shows.  The secret memorandum, signed by then Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and published by Wikileaks, suggests the Bush administration fretted about lacking intelligence despite warm ties to Israel and the West Bank-based Palestinian Authority (PA).  Citing the needs of U.S. analysts, the October 31, 2008 cable presented envoys in Tel Aviv, Jerusalem and several Arab states with an exhaustive and prioritized list of data regarding the "Palestinian Issues" being brokered by Washington."