Turkish pro-government newspaper publishes interview with alleged Mossad spy
October 25, 2021 Leave a comment
A POPULAR TURKISH NEWSPAPER has published an interview with a member of a network of spies who were allegedly recruited by the Israeli agency Mossad to spy on Palestinian students living in Turkey. As intelNews reported last week, Turkish intelligence announced the arrests of 15 members of an alleged spy ring for the Mossad. Turkish media said that the 15 individuals were arrested on October 7 during simultaneous raids that took place across four different provinces. The counterintelligence operation to arrest the alleged spies took nearly a year and involved more than 200 officers of Turkey’s National Intelligence Organization (MİT).
Last Friday, Turkey’s Sabah newspaper published a lengthy interview with one of the 15 alleged spies. The paper, which is politically aligned with the government of President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, referred to the alleged spy using the initials “M.A.S.”, and claimed he is a Turkish citizen who was recruited by the Mossad. The alleged spy told the paper that he was first contacted in December 2018 by “an agent called A.Z.” through the WhatsApp phone application. After providing this individual with information about Turkish universities, he was sent funds via Western Union wire transfers. Other times he was paid by a man he met in a market in Istanbul, after showing him his identity card, along with a receipt that had been sent to him by A.Z.
Eventually, M.A.S. said he was instructed to travel to Switzerland, having first secured a visa for his trip through a company called European Student Guidance Center. Sabah claims the M.A.S.’ trip to Switzerland was paid for by the Mossad. While in there, M.A.S. met his alleged handlers, who taught him how to use strong encryption for sending documents and other information via secure email applications. However, even at that point he did not realize he was working for a foreign government, having been told by his handlers that they were employees of an “intelligence-like organization” in the private sector. According to Sabah, other members of the alleged spy ring met with their handlers, abroad, mostly in Switzerland and Croatia. Most were paid with cryptocurrency, conventional international money transfers, or sometimes in gold jewelry or foreign currency.
Importantly, Sabah did not say how its reporters were able to gain access to M.A.S. after his arrest by the Turkish authorities. The Turkish government has made no official statement about these arrests. Also on Friday, a number of Israeli public figures, including Ram Ben-Barak (pictured), former deputy director of the Mossad and current chairman of the Knesset’s Committee on Foreign Affairs and Defense, said that “none of the published names [in Turkey] were [of] Israeli spies”. Ben-Barak also cast doubt on the professionalism and capabilities of Turkish counterintelligence.
► Author: Joseph Fitsanakis | Date: 25 October 2021 | Permalink
TURKISH SPIES ALLEGEDLY KIDNAPPED a nephew of dissident cleric Fethullah Gülen in Kenya and forcibly transported him to Turkey, according to reports in Turkish media. Citing “government sources”, Turkey’s state-owned news agency, Anadolu, said this week that Selahaddin Gülen had been “forcibly repatriated” to Turkey from abroad by officers of the National Intelligence Organization, known as MİT. But it did not specify when or where the alleged operation took place.
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A German retiree living in Greece, who admitted in court that he was part of a network of German and other Western European residents of Greece recruited as spies by Turkish intelligence, has been jailed for 14 years. The 65-year-old man, who has not been named, was arrested two years ago in the southeastern Aegean island of Kos. He was born in Cold-War-era East Germany and worked as a locksmith before serving for 15 years in the East German National People’s Army. From 2009 to 2012, he lived in Turkey before moving permanently to Greece.
The Turkish intelligence service currently employs more operatives in Germany than the East German spy agency did at the height of the Cold War, according to a German expert on espionage. The comment was made following the disclosure that Turkey maintains close to 6,000 informants and other intelligence operatives in Germany. An unnamed German security official told German newspaper Die Welt on Monday that the informants are operational throughout Germany and are handled by Turkey’s National Intelligence Organization, known as MİT.
The Turkish government has sent an official request to German intelligence for assistance in cracking down on the members of the so-called Gülen movement, which Ankara claims is behind July’s failed coup plot. The movement consists of supporters of Muslim cleric Fethullah Gülen, who runs a global network of schools, charities and businesses from his home in the United States. The government of Turkey has designated Gülen’s group a terrorist organization and claims it has stealthily infiltrated state institutions since the 1980s. The administration of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan accuses Gülen’s supporters of orchestrating the July 15 coup that included an armed attack on the country’s parliament and the murder of over 200 people across Turkey.
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Turkey claims it uncovered Israeli spy cell that targeted Iran
May 24, 2023 by Joseph Fitsanakis 1 Comment
The arrests reportedly came as a result of an investigation into a threatening package sent that was sent in the mail by one of the spy suspects. The investigation was initiated by the Istanbul branch of the General Directorate of Security (Turkish police), which later revealed a connection with a separate 18-month long counterintelligence investigation by the MİT. It eventually led to the arrest of Selçuk Küçükkaya, a Turkish national, who is accused of operating as the head of the alleged spy ring.
On Monday, Istanbul police arrested 11 associates of Küçükkaya, who the MİT believes to be members of the alleged spy cell. Some reports indicate that Turkish authorities are still searching for two additional suspects who are believed to be part of the alleged spy ring. The MİT states that the spy ring had established a front company through which its members conducted business activities in Iran, with the assistance of intermediaries operating abroad.
The Istanbul Chief Public Prosecutor’s office alleges that Küçükkaya made contact with Israeli intelligence through a member of the so-called Gülen movement. The Gülen movement consists of supporters of Muslim cleric Fethullah Gülen, who runs a global network of schools, charities and businesses from his home-in-exile in the United States. The Turkish government has designated Gülen’s group a terrorist organization and claims it was behind the failed 2016 coup against Turkey’s President, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan.
Küçükkaya is further-accused of having had several in-person meetings with Mossad officers in various locations around Europe. During those meetings, Küçükkaya allegedly received assignments designed to test his intelligence-gathering abilities. It is alleged that Küçükkaya was eventually hired as a spy by the Mossad, who also provided him with instructions on how to use a clandestine communication system to contact his Israeli handlers.
The claim by the Turkish government that it has busted a Mossad spy cell operating in its territory is not unprecedented. In October 2021, the MİT disclosed the arrests of 15 members of an alleged Mossad spy ring following a series of raids across four Turkish provinces. Last December, Turkish media reported that 44 individuals had been detained and interrogated for allegedly spying on Palestinian exiles living in Turkey on behalf of the Mossad. What is new about this latest claim is the alleged connection between the Mossad and the Gülen movement, which the administration of Turkish President Erdoğan views as an existential domestic security threat.
► Author: Joseph Fitsanakis | Date: 24 May 2023 | Permalink
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