Rating: 
Summary: Riveting, Shocking, Eye-Opening, and Credible
Review:
This book is anything but boring--calling this book boring strikes me as a desperate subterfuge by someone who want to keep its explosive contents from fuller circulation. This book is *fascinating* and explosive, not least because of the very well documented coverage it provides of how Israel's intelligence service, the Mossad, used Robert Maxwell to penetrate not just the U.S. government, including the Department of Justice, the military, and the national laboratories, but many foreign governments including the Chinese, Canadians, Australians, and many others, with substantial penetration of their intelligence service databases, all through his sale of a software called PROMIS that had a back door enabling the Mossad to access everything it touched (in simplistic terms).
Also shocking, at least to me, was the extensive detail in this book about how the Israeli intelligence service is able to mobilize Jews everywhere as "sayanim," volunteer helpers who carry out operational (that is to say, clandestine) support tasks to include spying on their government and business employers, stealing documents, operating safehouses, making pretext calls, and so on. I am a simple person: if you are a Jew and a US citizen, and you do this for the Israeli intelligence service, then you are a traitor, plain and simple. This practice is evidently world-wide, but especially strong in the US and the UK. The book draws heavily on just a couple of former Israeli intelligence specialists to address Israeli use of assassination as a normal technique (and implicitly raises the possibility that it was used against Senator John Tower, who died in small airplane crash and was the primary "agent" for Maxwell and Israel in getting PROMIS installed for millions of dollars in fees all over the US Government). Finally, the book has a great deal of detail about the interplay between governments, crime families, Goldman Sachs and other major investors, and independent operators like Robert Maxwell who play fast and loose with their employee pension funds. This book is not boring. Far from it. It is shocking, and if it is only half-right and half-accurate, that is more than enough to warrant its being read by every American, whatever their faith.
Rating:
Summary: Riveting, Shocking, Eye-Opening, and Credible
Review:
This book is anything but boring--calling this book boring strikes me as a desperate subterfuge by someone who want to keep its explosive contents from fuller circulation. This book is *fascinating* and explosive, not least because of the very well documented coverage it provides of how Israel's intelligence service, the Mossad, used Robert Maxwell to penetrate not just the U.S. government, including the Department of Justice, the military, and the national laboratories, but many foreign governments including the Chinese, Canadians, Australians, and many others, with substantial penetration of their intelligence service databases, all through his sale of a software called PROMIS that had a back door enabling the Mossad to access everything it touched (in simplistic terms).
Also shocking, at least to me, was the extensive detail in this book about how the Israeli intelligence service is able to mobilize Jews everywhere as "sayanim," volunteer helpers who carry out operational (that is to say, clandestine) support tasks to include spying on their government and business employers, stealing documents, operating safehouses, making pretext calls, and so on. I am a simple person: if you are a Jew and a US citizen, and you do this for the Israeli intelligence service, then you are a traitor, plain and simple. This practice is evidently world-wide, but especially strong in the US and the UK. The book draws heavily on just a couple of former Israeli intelligence specialists to address Israeli use of assassination as a normal technique (and implicitly raises the possibility that it was used against Senator John Tower, who died in small airplane crash and was the primary "agent" for Maxwell and Israel in getting PROMIS installed for millions of dollars in fees all over the US Government). Finally, the book has a great deal of detail about the interplay between governments, crime families, Goldman Sachs and other major investors, and independent operators like Robert Maxwell who play fast and loose with their employee pension funds. This book is not boring. Far from it. It is shocking, and if it is only half-right and half-accurate, that is more than enough to warrant its being read by every American, whatever their faith.
Rating: 
Summary: Not a scholarly book but somewhat entertaining.
Review: Authors continue to use material from by ostrovky, an agent who worked for the mossad and then wrote an unking book about them, inorder to portray the mossad. Including one of his most lurid claims about how This is a very slanted view. Shows 0 scholoraship. It includes some of the more fantastic claimes by ostrovksy.If I was interested in ostrovsky view, which is that of a traitor to the mossad, then I could read ostrovsky, but to continue to use ostrvosky material here to describe the mossad is ludicrous.This includes Ostrovsky statement that everyone in the mossad uses sex to advance. Aside from this I wonder how the author got all the info about how the mossad operated with Maxwell, including the details of meetings etc.. How can they know this information, without making up stuff. At no point do I get the feeling of scholarship in this work. This is somewhat of a pot boiler. You might enjoy this work of fiction or (non fiction) any way.
Rating: 
Summary: Shoddy research, muckraking, and likely Dead Wrong
Review: I doubt if I will ever read another book about Robert Maxwell. This book has more information than a lot of people, presuming the innocence of just about everything, would want to cope with. Among the people listed as interviewees in the front of this book are Efraim ---, six other former members of Mossad, William Casey, and William Colby. The death of William Casey was famously reported in VEIL by Bob Woodward, published in 1987, after Casey had a craniotomy and had been taken to Mayknoll to die. "He contracted pneumonia and was hospitalized on Long Island. There, the morning of May 6, the day after Congress began its public hearings on the Iran-contra affair, Casey died." Woodward interpreted Casey's death as a kind of silence which fell in line with the question: What hurts, sir? "What you don't know," he said. (Veil, pp. 506-507). This book, ROBERT MAXWELL, ISRAEL'S SUPERSPY/ THE LIFE AND MURDER OF A MEDIA MOGUL, (2002), was written in the spirit of William Casey's final interview. If the factual basis for some of its assertions seem a bit ghostly, you might blame all the Bills, or other outrageous bills, or the authors, Gordon Thomas and Martin Dillon, or anyone who seems to know more than any trap-door possessing Prosecutor's Management Information Systems software salesman with investments in newspapers, scientific journals, and an account in the Bank of Bulgaria could keep track of, at the age of sixty-eight, or after November, 1991, when Robert Maxwell, also, was dead. A society which employs Certified Public Accountants presupposes that people will be able to keep track of certain things, certainly money, for sure, and who people are, though this book finds a certain glory in how easy it is to fool official guardians of the identity assumptions with simple tricks. Obviously, this works best at places like Numec, a company specializing in reprocessing nuclear waste, in Apollo, Pennsylvania. Anybody ought to be able to figure out how likely it is that the following events, prior to December 1982, but reported as background information, might have actually occurred: His two companions were described on their cards as scientists from `The Department of Electronics, University of Tel Aviv, Israel'.
There was no such department.
The men were LAKAM security officers whose task would be to see the best way of stealing fissionable waste from Numec. All three spent four days in Apollo, passing many hours touring the Numec plant, sitting for more hours in Shapiro's office. What they spoke about would remain a secret. On the fifth day Eitan and his companions left Apollo as unobstrusively as they had arrived.
A month later the first of nine shipments of containers of nuclear waste left Numec. Each container would bear the words: `Property of the State of Israel: Ministry of Agriculture'. The containers would carry a stencil stating they had full diplomatic clearance and so were exempt from customs checks before they were stowed on board El Al cargo freighters to Tel Aviv.
The containers were destined for Dimona, Israel's nuclear facility in the Negev Desert. (pp. 55-56) One way to be a Mogul, buying companies close to bankruptcy and investing enough to turn them into successes, is described in this book as just the starting point for how "Robert Maxwell was the Barnum and Bailey of the financial world, the great stock market ringmaster able to introduce with consummate speed and a crack of his whip some new and even more startling financial act. But increasingly his high-wire actions had become more dangerous - and long ago he had abandoned any idea of a safety net." (p. 34). Maxwell's arrangements with Vladimir Kryuchkov, head of the Soviet KGB, who had been involved in the August plot to oust Mikhail Gorbachev from office, made certain bankers insecure enough to want Maxwell to pay some of their loans. Maxwell thought 400 million pounds might be enough "to stave off his more pressing creditors. He asked Mossad to use its influence with Israel's banker's to arrange a loan. He was told to try to do what his fellow tycoon, Rupert Murdoch, had done when he had faced a similar situation. Murdoch had confessed his plight to his bankers and then renegotiated his debts, which were almost twice what Maxwell owed." (pp. 13-14). Actually, Maxwell must have owed far more than he told the Mossad. A Daily Mirror headline in the photographs section, after the "Maxwell Dies at Sea" picture, reported, "Maxwell: 536m pounds is missing from his firms/ The increasingly desperate actions of a desperate man." Assuming that much, the rest of the book is written around questions raised by Efraim. `If the truth about Robert Maxwell surfaces and he is destroyed in the process, who else will be compromised? How great will the damage be to Israel?' (p. 15). Americans might be interested in this book for judging the current chances for success of American policies that seem to parallel the desperation of Robert Maxwell, but might cause Bill Casey even greater pain, if he were still in charge.
Rating:
Summary: This, maybe, is more than the truth
Review: I doubt if I will ever read another book about Robert Maxwell. This book has more information than a lot of people, presuming the innocence of just about everything, would want to cope with. Among the people listed as interviewees in the front of this book are Efraim ---, six other former members of Mossad, William Casey, and William Colby. The death of William Casey was famously reported in VEIL by Bob Woodward, published in 1987, after Casey had a craniotomy and had been taken to Mayknoll to die. "He contracted pneumonia and was hospitalized on Long Island. There, the morning of May 6, the day after Congress began its public hearings on the Iran-contra affair, Casey died." Woodward interpreted Casey's death as a kind of silence which fell in line with the question: What hurts, sir? "What you don't know," he said. (Veil, pp. 506-507). This book, ROBERT MAXWELL, ISRAEL'S SUPERSPY/ THE LIFE AND MURDER OF A MEDIA MOGUL, (2002), was written in the spirit of William Casey's final interview. If the factual basis for some of its assertions seem a bit ghostly, you might blame all the Bills, or other outrageous bills, or the authors, Gordon Thomas and Martin Dillon, or anyone who seems to know more than any trap-door possessing Prosecutor's Management Information Systems software salesman with investments in newspapers, scientific journals, and an account in the Bank of Bulgaria could keep track of, at the age of sixty-eight, or after November, 1991, when Robert Maxwell, also, was dead. A society which employs Certified Public Accountants presupposes that people will be able to keep track of certain things, certainly money, for sure, and who people are, though this book finds a certain glory in how easy it is to fool official guardians of the identity assumptions with simple tricks. Obviously, this works best at places like Numec, a company specializing in reprocessing nuclear waste, in Apollo, Pennsylvania. Anybody ought to be able to figure out how likely it is that the following events, prior to December 1982, but reported as background information, might have actually occurred: His two companions were described on their cards as scientists from `The Department of Electronics, University of Tel Aviv, Israel'.
There was no such department.
The men were LAKAM security officers whose task would be to see the best way of stealing fissionable waste from Numec. All three spent four days in Apollo, passing many hours touring the Numec plant, sitting for more hours in Shapiro's office. What they spoke about would remain a secret. On the fifth day Eitan and his companions left Apollo as unobstrusively as they had arrived.
A month later the first of nine shipments of containers of nuclear waste left Numec. Each container would bear the words: `Property of the State of Israel: Ministry of Agriculture'. The containers would carry a stencil stating they had full diplomatic clearance and so were exempt from customs checks before they were stowed on board El Al cargo freighters to Tel Aviv.
The containers were destined for Dimona, Israel's nuclear facility in the Negev Desert. (pp. 55-56) One way to be a Mogul, buying companies close to bankruptcy and investing enough to turn them into successes, is described in this book as just the starting point for how "Robert Maxwell was the Barnum and Bailey of the financial world, the great stock market ringmaster able to introduce with consummate speed and a crack of his whip some new and even more startling financial act. But increasingly his high-wire actions had become more dangerous - and long ago he had abandoned any idea of a safety net." (p. 34). Maxwell's arrangements with Vladimir Kryuchkov, head of the Soviet KGB, who had been involved in the August plot to oust Mikhail Gorbachev from office, made certain bankers insecure enough to want Maxwell to pay some of their loans. Maxwell thought 400 million pounds might be enough "to stave off his more pressing creditors. He asked Mossad to use its influence with Israel's banker's to arrange a loan. He was told to try to do what his fellow tycoon, Rupert Murdoch, had done when he had faced a similar situation. Murdoch had confessed his plight to his bankers and then renegotiated his debts, which were almost twice what Maxwell owed." (pp. 13-14). Actually, Maxwell must have owed far more than he told the Mossad. A Daily Mirror headline in the photographs section, after the "Maxwell Dies at Sea" picture, reported, "Maxwell: 536m pounds is missing from his firms/ The increasingly desperate actions of a desperate man." Assuming that much, the rest of the book is written around questions raised by Efraim. `If the truth about Robert Maxwell surfaces and he is destroyed in the process, who else will be compromised? How great will the damage be to Israel?' (p. 15). Americans might be interested in this book for judging the current chances for success of American policies that seem to parallel the desperation of Robert Maxwell, but might cause Bill Casey even greater pain, if he were still in charge.
Rating:
Summary: Quite Explosive
Review: Really quite a shocking story of a media giant, whose true passion was international geo-political manipulation and personal greed. A must read for anyone who is concerned about the concentrations and misuse of power.
Rating:
Summary: Shoddy research, muckraking, and likely Dead Wrong
Review: Robert Maxwell was surely one of the 20th century's most interesting rogues, and both his life and death contain many mysteries. But the single most shocking revelation in the Dillon/ Thomas (not to be confused with Dylan Thomas) book is that the authors have managed to be wholly uncredible as they tell their tale. The obvious, open source, information is frequently wrong and shows that the authors never visited most of the places they describe. A single example will suffice: They that Sandia National Laboratory is part of the "Los Alamos complex". It isn't; they are separate and have been since the mid 1940s. Albuquerque, NM is said to be in a bowl ringed by mountains with cool air coming from Los Alamos; sorry. No. ABQ is not in a bowl and Los Alamos is 90 miles, as the road twists, away. Bill Casey and Bill Colby are cited as prime interviewees for the book, which sounds plausible until you realize that by the time the authors started work Messrs Casey and Colby were dead. A good interview trick if you can do it. Of course the authors never reference a "fact" to a specific source except to quote the ubiquitous Ari Ben-Menashe who shows up in almost every anti-Israel book on the market. There is an undertone and an overtone of real anti-semitism or at least anti-Israel feeling throughout the book, off putting of course. But it also undermines what little credibility the authors have left after you realize that nearly every page contains at least one obvious error of historical or geographic fact. Don't buy it. If I could have rated it zero stars, I would have.
Rating:
Summary: A waste of time
Review: This book reputes itself to tell the secret history of British media baron Mr. Maxwell. A better account and although a work of fiction a more plausible account can be found in Mr. Archers `The fourth of Estate'. Maxwell had connections with Israels Mossad and he did have many high level contacts in Israel and he was involved in dubious behavior with the Russians but this book goes one step to far and simply creates relationships that did not exist. Beyond Muckraking this book is mostly fantasy and conjectured accusations that for the Maxwell hator or for the uninformed may well seem accurate but the truth is far more likely to have nothing to do with Maxwell being murdered by the Mossad. In fact Maxwell simply failed in business and probably committed suicide. This is an interesting account but should be read with an eye of suspicion.
Rating:
Summary: A waste of time
Review: This book reputes itself to tell the secret history of British media baron Mr. Maxwell. A better account and although a work of fiction a more plausible account can be found in Mr. Archers 'The fourth of Estate'. Maxwell had connections with Israels Mossad and he did have many high level contacts in Israel and he was involved in dubious behavior with the Russians but this book goes one step to far and simply creates relationships that did not exist. Beyond Muckraking this book is mostly fantasy and conjectured accusations that for the Maxwell hator or for the uninformed may well seem accurate but the truth is far more likely to have nothing to do with Maxwell being murdered by the Mossad. In fact Maxwell simply failed in business and probably committed suicide. This is an interesting account but should be read with an eye of suspicion.
Rating:
Summary: The Hottest Book On The Market!
Review: This is an E-Ticket Ride; in other words, a read with a roller-coaster effect obsorbing the reader's full attention. The revelations of Maxwell's high treason against the United Kingdom is alarming. Yet, what is more alarmimg is the complicity of the U.S. Justice Department and U.S. Senator Tower's treasonous activity against the U.S. Government and his apparent blackmailing of the White House... all orchestrated by Israels' Mossad via their willing agent, Maxwell. At the literal risk of their lifes, Dillon and Thomas have metciulously recorded the breathtaking facts we seldom, if ever, see in American media. This super-page-turner is THE hottest book on the market.
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