Mossad deputy chief resigns amid internal strife

Meir Dagan

Meir Dagan

By IAN ALLEN | intelNews.org |
It emerged yesterday that the deputy director of the Mossad, Israel’s premier external intelligence agency, has stepped down. The official, known only as “T.”, appears to have resigned in protest over the Israeli government’s decision to extend the Mossad director’s tenure for an unprecedented eighth year. It has also emerged that  “T.” first warned the government two months ago that he would resign if the decision was made to retain Meir Dagan as Mossad director for yet another year. “T’s” resignation marks the fourth resignation of a Mossad deputy chief during Dagan’s directorship. There are rumors that Dagan refuses to leave his post until he agrees to a successor, which according to Israeli daily Ha’aretz, “will come neither from the ranks of the Israel Defense Forces nor Mossad”. Read more of this post

News you may have missed #0007

  • German counterintelligence chief accuses Russia of commercial spying. Burkhard Even, Germany’s director of counterintelligence at the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution, has told German newspaper Die Welt am Sonntag that Russian spies have intensified espionage operations on the German energy sector to help Russian firms gain commercial advantages. On May 26, intelNews reported on similar accusations by the German Association for Security in Industry and Commerce (ASW). Its director told Mitteldeutsche Zeitung that the targeting of German research and commercial enterprises by mainly Chinese and Russian agents is so extensive that it usually costs the German economy over €20 billion per year, and it may be costing as high as €50 billion per year since 2007.
  • Spanish intelligence agents kicked out of Cuba. Spanish newspaper ABC reports that the recently expelled officers of Spain’s National Intelligence Centre (CNI) were secretly recorded at Havana cocktail parties “making derogatory comments about the Castro brothers and other [Cuban] government officials”. 
  • Proposed US bill would boost congressional oversight of covert spy programs. Key lawmakers in Washington have endorsed a proposed bill that would force the president to make fuller disclosure of covert spy programs. The legislation, which has already been approved by the House Intelligence Committee, would force the president to disclose classified operations to all members of Congress’ intelligence oversight panels. 
  • Report claims CIA, Mossad scoring points against Hezbollah. A new report claims American and Israeli intelligence organizations have scored notable recent successes against Hezbollah, in places such as Azerbaijan, Egypt and Colombia.

News you may have missed #0005

  • Republican Senator’s extra-marital affair endangered national security. John Ensign is a member of the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, including its Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, giving him and his staff access to extremely sensitive national defense information. His extra-marital affair made him vulnerable to blackmail by hostile spy services or other interests eager to pry secrets from his position on sensitive national security committees, veteran counterintelligence officials say.
  • Thank goodness reformists didn’t win in Iran election, says Mossad. Israel spy chief Meir Dagan, told the Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defence Committee on June 17 that if reformist candidate Mir Hossein Mousavi had won the elections “Israel would have a more serious problem because it would need to explain to the world the danger of the Iranian threat”.
  • CIA still fighting full release of detainee report. According to two intelligence officials, the CIA is pushing the Obama administration to suppress passages describing in graphic detail how the agency handled its detainees, arguing that the material could damage ongoing counterterrorism operations by laying bare sensitive intelligence procedures and methods.
  • US electricity industry to scan grid for spies. The planned scan is part of a pilot initiative to see whether Chinese spies have infiltrated computer networks running the US power grid. IntelNews has been keeping an eye on revelations that foreign spies have penetrated the electronic infrastructure of America’s electrical supply grid.
  • US Supreme Court declines review of Cuban Five case. It and its supporters argue Cuban spies received a fair trial in heart of Miami Cuban-American community, but Cuban government says it will continue to campaign for their release.

Lebanese-Israeli spy war is intensifying

Mughniyah

Mughniyah

By JOSEPH FITSANAKIS| intelNews.org |
On February 19, intelNews reported on the arrest in Nabatiyeh of Kamal Faqih, a Lebanese citizen who was allegedly recruited by Israeli intelligence while living in France in the mid-1990s. Faqih, who was initially arrested by Hezbollah, the Shia Islamic political and paramilitary organization that controls large parts of Lebanon, was subsequently surrendered to the Lebanese authorities. However, late last week, Lebanese newspapers revealed that, several days before Faqih’s arrest, another Lebanese man suspected of espionage was detained in Beirut. That was Yussef Sader, a Middle East Airlines employee, who witnesses say was kidnapped in the morning of February 14, while on his way to Beirut’s Rafiq Hariri International Airport. Read more of this post

Israel’s covert war on Iranian nuclear program intensifies

Ahmedinejad

Ahmadinejad

By JOSEPH FITSANAKIS| intelNews.org |
Citing unnamed “US intelligence sources”, British newspaper The Daily Telegraph has revealed what it calls a covert “decapitation program” by Israeli intelligence, targeting Iran’s nuclear program. The program has also been confirmed by Reva Bhalla, a senior analyst with Stratfor. Israel’s program is part of an international intelligence effort to hamper Iran’s nuclear program. As intelNews has reported before, this effort includes an extensive CIA operation approved by President George W. Bush in early 2008 and “hand[ed] off to President […] Barack Obama”.  The Israeli program, however, appears to be much more extensive than America’s, and includes assassinations, bribing, “front companies and double agents”, according to The Daily Telegraph. The most aggressive part of the scheme centers on “the planned assassination of top figures involved in Iran’s atomic operations”, according to Ms. Bhalla. Read more of this post

Lebanese officials claim arrest of Israeli spy

By IAN ALLEN| intelNews.org |
Lebanese newspaper The Daily Star quotes unnamed official sources who report the arrest of an alleged Israeli spy in the southern Lebanese city of Nabatiyeh. The arrestee has been identified as Kamal Faqih, a Lebaneze citizen who lived for several years in France before returning to Lebanon to work in the oil retail industry. Lebanese security sources claim Faqih was recruited either by Israel’s Military Intelligence Directorate, or by Mossad, fifteen years ago while living in France. It is thought that Hezbollah, the Shia Islamic political and paramilitary organization that controls large parts of Lebanon, was initially alerted to Faqih’s “suspicious behavior” during the July 2006 Israel-Lebanon war. Read more of this post

South Africa pressed to cut diplomatic, intelligence ties with Israel

By JOSEPH FITSANAKIS | intelNews.org |
After Venezuela and Bolivia, which last week cut off diplomatic relations with Israel in protest of the Jewish state’s invasion of Gaza, the government of South Africa has come under pressure to do likewise. The powerful Congress of South African Trade Unions (COSATU) urged the governing African National Congress (ANC) to “cease all relations with Israel and close down the Israeli embassy in Pretoria”. The organization also called on the governing party to expel “Israeli security agencies and Mossad” operatives from the country. Although it is unclear whether COSATU’s call will influence South Africa’s official relations with Israel, it will be difficult for the ANC to ignore it completely, especially with Jacob Zuma now at its helm. Read more of this post

Comment: Israel Intensifies Information War

By IAN ALLEN | intelNews.org |
John Minto is well known in New Zealand’s political circles. In 2005, a documentary on the country’s most influential public figures positioned him firmly within the top 100. Earlier today, Minto accused Israeli military and security agencies of orchestrating cyber-attacks on New Zealand websites, including his own, that are critical of Israel’s ongoing incursion in Gaza. He also said that websites in Britain and elsewhere have had “similar experiences”, which he blamed on “a dedicated unit within the Israeli military which monitors and does its best to close down sites which are effective in organizing opposition to Israeli policies”. Read more of this post

Analysis: Pakistan’s former spy chief sees wider geopolitical games in region

Hamid Gul

Hamid Gul

Lieutenant General Hamid Gul, the controversial former Director General of Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), has expressed the view that Pakistan’s nuclear disarmament is the ultimate aim of the US-Indian alliance. Speaking to reporters in Islamabad, Gul said India’s insistence on charging the ISI with complicity in the 2008 Mumbai attack is “part of a greater conspiracy to discredit the body for being an extension of the Pakistan Army” and eventually questioning the latter’s role as guardian of the country’s nuclear arsenal. “Once the Army and the ISI are demolished [the US and India] will reach out to our nuclear capability saying it is not is safe hands”, said the retired Lieutenant General. In discussing the increasing military and political collaboration between the US and India, Gul noted that “the Americans and Israel [are] hell-bent that India should be given pre-eminence in the region”, acting as the dominant regional power. He described such a scenario as essentially positioning India to the role of overseer of “60 per cent of the world’s trade [which] passes through the Indian Ocean”, including transport routes of “Gulf oil, bound for China and Japan, [which] will be under the shadow of India’s sole nuclear power”. Read more of this post

New reports of nuclear spies arrested in Iran

CNN and UPI report that three more workers in Iran’s nuclear research program have been arrested by the Iranian government on spying charges. The reports originated from an Iranian government-controlled news agency tied to the Revolutionary Guards of the Islamic Republic of Iran. Read more of this post

Official history of Israeli spy services acknowledges US spying against Israel

American espionage conducted against Israel is hardly news. It is rare, however, that such operations –which are routine in nature– are acknowledged in official histories of intelligence institutions. Yet this is exactly what will happen this coming January, when a new official history of Israel’s intelligence services is published in Israel. Read more of this post