LONDON (Reuters) - The U.S. National Security Agency routinely passes raw intelligence to Israel without first removing details about U.S. citizens, Britain's Guardian newspaper said on Thursday, citing documents obtained by former NSA contractor Edward Snowden.

Under a memorandum agreed in principle in March 2009, the NSA shares information with Israel that could include details of intercepted phone calls and emails from U.S. citizens with no legally binding restraint on the use of the data by the Israelis, the paper reported.

It said providing raw data to a foreign country contrasted with assurances given by U.S. President Barack Obama that the privacy of ordinary citizens would be protected.

The five-page memorandum stressed that the rights of Americans to privacy should be respected, but still allowed Israel to receive raw "Sigint", signal intelligence, which had not gone through a "minimisation" process to safeguard privacy.

"Raw Sigint includes, but is not limited to, unevaluated and unminimised transcripts, gists, facsimiles, telex, voice and Digital Network Intelligence metadata and content," the memorandum says, according to the Guardian.