Official Israeli websites back online after apparent cyber attack

Israeli government and military websites were back on-line a day after an apparent cyber attack.

The official Israeli websites, including government ministries, the Mossad and the military, crashed Sunday, two days after an international group of hackers known as Anonymous had threatened to attack Israeli government computers in response to the interception of Gaza-bound ships carrying a symbolic amount of medical aid. The threat was made in a video uploaded to YouTube.

Internal computer networks were not affected, security officials told Haaretz.

Israel’s e-Government, responsible for managing the state’s websites, told Haaretz Monday that the problem was caused by problems with an IBM component.

The Israel Defense Forces North American spokesman’s desk had told JTA that it was experiencing “server issues.”

Anonymous, which has brought down other country’s computer systems, threatened to launch repeated cyber attacks against Israeli computer systems until Israel ends its maritime blockade of the Gaza Strip.