Israel

Inside Mossad master spies of 'preventive intelligence'

John Laffin

The espionage business was becoming rather dull until the Israelis became the undisputed world masters of the art and the spy scoops • they pull off are more exciting than any of James Bond's. In fact, as an Israeli Intelligence chief told me, -Bond wouldn't get a job with us: He's not professional enough."

What the Israelis mean by professional was well illustrated recently when a good-looking, well-dressed young man of European appearance walked into a ministry in an Arab capital and said, "I'm from International Air. Safety Institution and we need a map showing all your military installations so that we can advise foreign aircraft which areas to avoid."

He showed his credentials parchment documents with red, showy seals and bold signatures. The Arabs gave him a whole sheaf of maps, marked with airfields, army training areas and other vital information. Yes, he would return the maps quite soon. But all his documents were forged and only one of his statements was true. He really did represent an

institution. He was an agent from Israel's, principal secret service, Mossad and Mossad

is a Hebrew word meaning 'the institution'. And he really did return the maps but of course he photographed them first.

The agent's coup is typical of Mossad's feats of finesse and effrontery which have given it

the reputation of the world's best intelligent service. "I don't know how the Israelis do it," says a senior agent of Britain's MI5. "In thirty years they have become even better than us and we've had 400 years' practice."

Even more startling is that Mossad has a regular staff of only 1,000 and spends a mere £50

million annually. The CIA and the other eight major US intelligence agencies employ 100,000 and spend £2 billion.

And Mossad operations are so precise and economical. For instance, one evening a Palestine terrorist leader at Biddawi training camp, North Lebanon, received a telephone message from Beirut. The caller, identifying himself as a Lebanese army officer, said that.

army helicopters would be operating in the area that night and should be disregarded. The helicopters came but they were Israeli.

commandos went straight to every supply dump and armoury and blew them up. It was a

Mossad job. During the raid an Israeli officer 'accidentally' dropped an aerial photograph of the camp on which the targets were ringed; it was a broad Mossad hint that the terrorists could not escape Israeli surveillance.

When the Israelis probed the mistakes of the Yom Kippur War of 1973, Mossad was the one

organisation which came out clean though the separate military intelligence bureau was criticised. Mossad agents gave the Israeli leadership plenty of notice that the Egyptians and Syrians would attack; they even speculated about the exact day.

The Israeli secret service is young but the Jewish instinct for clandestine activities is ageless. As one agent puts it, "As an oppressed minority, we Jews have learnt that information is life. We've had to survive against all odds for many centuries and our earlier immigrants brought with them to Israel a tradition of secret operations in Easten Europe."

This expertise was put to work during the British Mandate period, 1918-1948, when the Jews of Palestine built up an underground army, Hagannh. Its Intelligence section, Shai, operated against the British, ferreted out Arab countries' secrets and knocked out rival Jewish groups which planned a totalitarian state. Shai worked from Jabotinski Street, Tel Aviv, only 200 yards from a major British headquarters and often broadcast the contents of confidential British reports before they reached their addressees. The frustrated British never did plug the security leak.

Israel was to be declared a State on May 14, 1948 and the Jewish leaders desperately needed to know if Jordan would send its famous Arab Legion against them. Shai's best Arab agent, Hassan el Batir, was sent to Amman, the Jordanian capital, to find out and quickly. Batir worked his way through the Arab lines, several times saved his life by fast talking and posing as a filthy cripple saw the Legion preparing to march. "My return journey was toughest of all," he said later. "I had to dodge Israeli bullets everywhere I turned."

From Batir's information, Haganah moved elite units to key points and defeated the Legion. 'Preventive intelligence' has been the guideline of Israel's secret service ever since.

With their Arab neighbours threatening endless conflict, the Israeli leaders, in 1949, replaced Shai with four district departments, three of them undercover. They are Aman, the Bureau of Military Intelligence; Shin-Bet, the Department of Internal Security and the Foreign Ministry's Political Department, later to become known as Mossad. The fourth unit; the Research Division of the Foreign Ministry, is engaged in 'legitimate espionage' information supplied by attaches and culled from newspapers and magazines.

Right from the start Israel's intelligence community had special advantages. In particular, it can draw agents from a population whose members come from different countries with various languages and cultures. A Mossad chief might call his personnel supervisor and say, "I have a mission for a middle-aged bachelor with a Welsh accent he must be able to read German and know the back streets of Vienna." He would have his man in an hour.

Some Oriental Jews, now Mossad agents, grew up with Israel's self-declared enemies, the Arabs, so they know intimately their habits and mentality. Many Oriental Jews can easily pose as Arabs.

Israel has more than its share of clever, dedicated people. One of them even induced fanatical Nazis to help Mossad. During 1949-50 many of these men were recruited by an SS colonel who sold them the idea that by serving Western intelligence they would save the West from Communism. He smuggled them out of

• Europe to Cairo where they set up a complex network that was never broken but simply died of old age. For ten years these ex-Nazis kept up a flow of information about the Egyptian Army and Intelligence Service and about other countries' military secrets gleaned in Cairo.The 'SS Colonel' was a brilliant Israeli code-name Jeruvam Ben Nevat and the information from his Nazi spies finished up in Tel Aviv.

Because she was then weak and threatened by many enemies Israel was forced to spy. Towards the end of 1952 Prime Minister Ben Gurion realised that Mossad needed an exceptional leader to handle its increasing work. He chose Iser Hare!, an old Shai divisional leader and later chief of Shin-Bet. And Harel, born in Latvia in 1912, made Mossad what it is today. Short and plump, balding and shy, Harel had razor-sharp perception, shrewdness and unshakeable nerve. He could get angry, too; in Mandate days he broke a chair over the head of

Spectator

March 22,1975

a British officer who had made an insulting comment about the Jews. Harel wanted a brand-new type of secret service. He said, in effect, "CIA is staffed by exhibitionists, MI5 by bureaucrats and the. KGB with robots. I want a new type of professional." More precisely, he wanted men and women of integrity and he fired those whose morality and honesty were suspect. Mossad recruits, he said, must have a sense of humour "to keep a sense of reality." He sent many women on dangerous missions but told them, "Don't use sex to achieve success; it will debase you." But he. was prepared to use prostitutes for certain work to compromise a foreign diplomat, for example. Harel's first major task was tough and touchy. Two Israeli underground organisation, Irgun Zvai Leumi and the Stern Gang, had helped make possible the founding of Israel by fighting first the British and then the Arabs but now they wanted to take over from the legitimate government. The two groups were strong and well-armed and the Stern Gang had murdered the UN Swedish mediator, Count: Folke Bernadotte. Ben Gurion told Harel to smash them.

At the time Harel was operating from a secret headquarters in a refrigeration plant "a good place for keeping information on ice," he said. He broke lrgun by raiding its caches of weapons and wiping out its resources. But he needed a military assistant to tackle the tougher Stern Gang, so he sent' for a young lieutenant-colonel. "I have a tough job, Moshe," he said. "And I need your help."

"Right," the officer said. "What is it?"

"We're going to break the Stern gang. How quickly can we do it?

"Two weeks."

"Leaving out the sabbath," Harel said, "that's twelve working days." In fact, with sudden arrests and lighting raids these two dynamic men did the job in ten days. The lieutenant colonel did well; he later became the Defence Minister, General Moshe Dyan.

But the Defence Minister of 1954, Pinhas Lavon, caused an Intelligence disaster. Pressure from the Egyptian government and much bloody anti-British terrorism made

Winston Churchill decide to abandon the Suez Canal and withdraw British troops from Egypt. The Israelis believed rightly as it turned out that without the British presence in Egypt the precarious Middle East peace would collapse.'

So Pinhas Lavon and Colonel Gibli, head of Military Intelligence (Aman) dreamed up 'Operation Egypt.' Without reference to Ben Gurion or to Harel they ordered Israeli agents in Egypt to explode bombs in British and American institutions in the hope that the Egyptians would get the blame. This, Lavon reasoned, would induce the British to stay on the canal. In June and, July 1954 the agents caused several fires and explosions. Then, on July 23, a detonator went off in the pocket of Philip Nathanson, outside Cairo's Rio Movie Theatre, and police at once grabbed the unharmed Israeli. The whole network exploded with that detonator. The Egyptians hanged tWo agents; two committed suicide in prison and sot were given long sentences. The release of the last of these prisoners was negotiated in 1972. Harel built safeguards into the Intelligence system so that such gross errors of judgement could not recur and by 1956 his agents were pulling off astonishing feats. A spy planted In the Kremlin found discarded notes to a wastepaper basket and from them learnt .the substance of Nikita Khrushchev's'de-Stalinisation' speech to be delivered to the 20th Soviet Party Conference. American spy chiefs, wbb had vainly tried to learn in advance about the. speech, now looked at Mossad with marken respect. Then it was the turn of the French. While engaged on other work, Mossad men disco: vered that senior officers of the rebelliousp"S the secret spy army which opposed Presiden! de Gaulle's intention to make Algeria indepen

dent — planned to assassinate him. At top level, de Gaulle was warned of his danger and the Plotters were trapped. In the 1960s no Israeli agent was more colourful than Wolfgang Lotz, who posed as a rich German horse-breeder in Egypt. Very quickly he won the friendship of a Police General, Youssef Ghorab, and through him was received into Cairo society. Lotz, joined in Cairo by his wife, understood Arabic perfectly but his Egyptian friends didn't know this. When they spoke in Arabic about military and political affairs Lotz picked up priceless information and sent it back to Tel Aviv on the radio hidden in his bathroom scales.

With Ghorab and the Governor of the sensitive Canal Zone, Lotz visited many army installations, but he badly wanted information on rockets. How to get into the rocket base? Supposedly on a fishing trip, Lotz told his wife to drive past a sentry post on a desert road and then stall the car in loose sand. As he expected, they were arrested and taken to the base headquarters. The CO was suspicious but Lotz said cheerfully, "We lost our way. If you would Just telephone General Ghorab or General Osman or Colonel Sabri of the security section His information was on the air to Tel Aviv that night. Lotz lived a gay, intense life — this later gave him the nickname of the 'Champagne Spy' — and the pace could not last. Tipped off by either Russian or German agents, the Egyptians arrested Lotz in February 1965. But, incredibly, he managed to maintain his cover that he was a German, not an Israeli, He was sentenced to twenty-five years, but six months after the Six-Day War of 1967 he was one of ten foreign prisoners exchanged for 4,400 Egyptian prisoners of war. Lotz was good but Mossad says that its 'greatest spy — apart from some now operating — was Elie Cohen. Cohen was a Tel Aviv clerk When Mossad recruited him in 1960 and sent .him to Jerusalem, then partly Jordanian, to get experience. Mossad asked Shin-Bet to pick him I-IP as an 'Egyptian spy' and treat him roughly. This was to see if he could take the torture he would certainly get if the Arabs caught him. Shin-Bet interrogated him for long periods and Immersed him in ice-cold water, an ordeal to Which real Egyptian spies are not subjected. Cohen never once mentioned Mossad, whose leaders then knew they had the man they wanted. They gave him the cover name of }Carnet Amin Tabet and sent him to Argentina as a rich Syrian merchant. His orders: "Learn to sPeak Spanish and get yourself a reputation as a

patriot in th Aires." e Syrian community of Buenos Succeeding in this, Cohen moved on to Damascus where he was received into the elite. i

e was so personable and plausible that he was s°01-1 on embracing terms with the nation's president, General El-Hafez. With the president's permission, Cohen was the only civilian allowed to visit top secret installations on the strategic Golan Heights — an audacious feat. „ tTo bring the Israelis to helpless surrender, _rie Syrians were working on a diversion of the Jordan River to cut off Israel's main water !LIPPIY. Cohen found out and passed on this Information in his daily broadcast to Tel Aviv. twsraeli aircraft blasted the Syrian engineering

orks to pieces. But the Syrians caught Cohen In the middle of a broadcast early in 1965 and hanged him in public on 'live' television. Mootshsad chiefs say that Cohen's information led e

the rapid defeat of Syria two years later in Six_Day war. _oliarel had by now gone into politics, leaving ssad a small service with a big reputation. tillritentSix-Dt. a_ War was perhaps its greatest Po, though in true secret service style Mossad is happy

receiv the for the fighting services to praise. What the wooden horse

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enemies. The Institution knew the location of all anti-aircraft guns. Even more important, agents knew where all Egyptian pilots would be at 6 a.m. on the morning of June 5, 1967. At breakfast. Simple information but difficult to get.

The Israeli Air Force destroyed the enemy planes on the ground and the Israeli armoured • columns crushed three enemy' armies and seized vast amounts of territory.

Since 1967 Mossad has not relaxed, and takes on the super-powers when necessary. Because the Russians have openly sided with the Arabs, Israel has several master spies in the Soviet — and the best of them is a woman. Code-named Shura,' she is a woman civil servant. Russian, not Jewish, Shura works for Mossad because Russian Jews saved the lives of her family during a Secret Police purge.' Shura's 'bag' is impressive — records of Kremlin conferences on the Middle East, lists of Soviet armaments supplied to Arab countries, names of Russian technicians working in these countries. Shura even has connections among KGB officers, but she lives a taut, tense life and once, when counter-espionage agents made a snap search at her minist'ry she avoided exposure by swallowing incriminating microfilm in its aluminium container.

Russian sensitivity about Mossad delights the staff in Tel Aviv, who for fun keep a special file on Russian press comment. "Israeli spies are real devils . . ." "Mossad is training CIA agents . . ." The CIA denies this but the Americans are as complimentary as the Russians. A deputy CIA director says, "The' Israelis are so marvellously efficient that we know even less about their operations than we do about the Russians."

But Arab intentions matter most. From bases in European cities, principally Paris and Brussels, Mossad directs a network of espionage in the Arab world. 'Spooks' — secret agents — from both sides are engaged in a deadly underground battle of 'wet stuff' — the espionage term for sabotage and assassination. The 'wet stuff is against secret gangs, such as Black September, organised by the Palestinians, Syrians, Egyptians, Libyans and Algerians. Since January 1971 the Israelis have killed at least nine Palestinian terrorists and have lost four of their own men. Some deaths have been bizarre. In a Nicosia hotel an Israeli agent put a bomb under the bed of a Black September operator and blew it up electronically while his enemy slept. In a Madrid street a 'top Mossad man, Baruch Cohen (code name Moshe Yshai), was shot dead by an Arab spy.

Mossad is ready for quick counter-action. In 1972 when the Palestinians sent letter-bombs to Jews abroad Mossad arranged for postal bombs to be posted to leading Palestinians. Several Palestinian Arabs living in Europe and known to be engaged in anti-Israel activities have read their own obituaries in the morning papers. Others receive anonymous letters containing intimate details of their private lives. They all get the message — "Mossad is watching you.' Mossad is better than Interpol in spotting suspicious air passengers. Many of the arrests at European airports of passengers carrying arms and explosives have come from Mossad tip-offs. Algerian and Libyan diplomats found with explosives, though immune because of diplomatic status, have refused to stay in Europe. They are afraid of Mossad. The work many Mossad agents like best is spreading 'disinformation' to confuse the Arabs. The Syrian Foreign Minister and deputy premier, Abdul Khaddam, told me, when we travelled together in an Arab aircraft, "Those damn Jews get on my nerves with their tricks." Getting on Arab nerves is an Israeli speciality, but Mr Khaddam doesn't know the half of it. For instance, the Israeli Army was exasperated by numerous false claims of terrorist 'victories' so the generals called in Mossad and said, "Do something. You have to prove to foreign journalists that the terrorists are lying."

Mossad asked Israel Radio to broadcast news of three Arab wins over the Israelis — but these 'victories' were thought up in Mossad offices. Journalists were taken to the places 'under attack' and on the spot heard the terrorist radio stations, who had picked up the Israeli broadcast, claim credit for the incidents.

Some operations are already espionage classics. In February 1973 Egyptian radar picked up four Israeli helicopters crossing the Suez Canal into Egypt. Fighters were ordered to scramble but before they could get airborne the four blips were seen heading back to Israel. "They got frightened and are running for home," said the Egyptian Air Force chief as he relaxed.

But the Israelis had fooled him. Eight helicopters had crossed, flying in tight pairs; now four aircraft, painted with Egyptian markings, remained behind. Israeli commandos captured several Egyptian staff officers and took them to Tel Aviv for interrogation. The operation was possible only because Mossad agents had pinpointed the position of the officers.

• For a journalist. Mossad is the toughest Intelligence organisation in the world to pin down, Everybody knows that CIA's headquarters is a vast, monumental building in Langley, Virginia. Almost anybody in .Paris can direct to the French Deuxieme Bureau and MI5's Main office is not much more difficult to find. Locating the KGB's Moscow offices is easy — just tail the man who is tailing you. But Mossad, the giant-killer, is so dispersed it has no address — though for ten years, until recently, the Institution maintained an 'open' office just to keep foreign spies happy. The real work goes on in several places and it's no use tailing an agent to find them. An Institution man can throw off a follower very quickly. Mossad offices abroad are also well hidden; they are not in embassies for Israeli spies ,make no contact with their embassies. Nor contrary to some Arab opinion, do they have links with American embassies.

Mossad is choosy about its spooks. Masterspies of the quality of Germany's Otto John or the Soviet's Colonel Abel would not qualify. "They are neither anonymous nor professional enough," a senior ex-Mossad officer told me. "Many secret services see intelligence work as a game for the game's sake. Our work is not romantic and our hero is a non-hero. We're interested only in results — that means truth and accuracy. The consistent false reporting of Arab Intelligence gives us a.great advantage."

Mossad's information is so accurate because Iser Harel brought scholarship to secret service work. He recruited university professors and research specialists — some of the world's best orientalists, forensic scientists, psychologists and chemists.

The orientalists and psychologists can pluck vital information straight from Arab leaders. Amin Huweidi, Egypt's Intelligence chief, gave a Cairo television interview and Mossad specialists were watching. They produced a detailed report, which reads in part: "Huweidi is an intelligent man ... but he lacks the capacity to form a genuine concept of reality . . He sticks to stereotyped views which are generally accepted in his circle . . . He makes indiscriminate use-of uncomfirmed reports, false information anchforged documents. . . We can take advantage of this by ..."

While Mossad desk workers may be any age, most field agents are under forty, and their three-year training gives them a good life expectancy. It covers methods of disguise, radio transmission, codes and ciphers, explosives, photography and much else, including 'slats.' A slik is a hiding place for people, equipment and secrets; Jews have had to grow 'up knowing about silks. Dozens of techniques have been perfected, including the simple surveillance method of watching a person not from behind a newspaper across the street but from right next to him.

The Institution's hardware is breathtakingly sophisticated. It includes a small telescopic

device able to photograph a typewritten page at a distance of 100 metres. I have seen an agent insert a needle-thin 'flashlight' into a sealed envelope for quick reading by a trained operator. Infra-red energy can be passed through envelopes to take pictures which can then be unscrambled by skilled analysts.

Arab leaders frequently say that Israeli mastery in the Middle East is due to such 'secret weapons.' I asked a veteran Mossad agent for the secret of the Institution's success. He quoted a passage from the Talmud, the Jewish law. "Ein heberha metsuya ela badaver nasumuy min haayin" — "There is no blessing except in that which is not apparent to the eye."

Many Mossad operations are certainly not apparent to the Arab eye. One striking example is that while the Arab summit meeting was going on in Algiers the Israelis were getting progress reports of the discussions. Another is that Mossad has placed an Israeli of oriental Jewish origin as the permanent administrative head of a ministry in a certain Arab government..

Most secret service chiefs dream about bring off such a coup. Mossad has no dreamers.

John Laffin's latest book, The Arab Mind, is being published later this month by Cassell.