The book Mossad: The Greatest Missions of the Israeli Secret Service, written by the historian Michael Bar-Zohar in co-authorship with the famous TV presenter Nissim Mishal, reveals to us some moments from the outstanding operations of one of the most effective special services in the world - "Mossad".
A-bomb
The attempts to create or buy A-bomb, seems, were inherent for the countries of the Persian Gulf and the Middle East starting from the moment they gained its independence from the British or France Protectorate. Since all works in that case classify as "Top Secret" and "NOFORN" ("no foreign nationals") we know only a small piece of the information about them.
The book describes two such attempts: the Syrian regime of Bashar al-Assad, with the help of North Korean experts and with the financing of the Ayatollahs of Iran, tried to create a nuclear reactor in the desert, which was discovered and detonated in 2007, and Iran's ongoing attempts to create a nuclear bomb and an invisible war, conducted by Mossad agents as an attempt to prevent this, with the assassination of the leading physicists of this country who are directly involved and working on the creation of the bomb. This war "in the twilight" continues even today. Thus, in 2020, Mossad agents killed the famous professor of physics and the head of Iran's nuclear program, Mohsen Fakhrizadeh, using a remote device (in the photo, the place of the murder). And according to the New York Times a high-ranking official was recently executed in Iran, who since 2004 had been secret information about the country's nuclear program to the British intelligence services, which shared this data with their Israeli counterparts. On the other hand, everyone is almost one hundred percent sure that Israel has its own atomic bomb, although the country's top officials have never confirmed this. And that's why it was surprising to read that a person who never hid his leftist views, love for Arabs - members of the anti-Zionist party, and openly participated in their actions - was hired at the most guarded atomic facility in the country in Dimona. What came out of this blatant mistake of the security service, and how the spy was arrested and what role a pretty blonde played in this - read in the chapter "Honey Trap" for an atomic spy.
Iraq
Ten months before the Six-Day War in 1967, a MiG-21, one of the most advanced Soviet aircraft of the time, piloted by an Arab pilot, landed at Hatzor Air Base in Israel. "Massad" succeeded in what was considered impossible - to obtain for its country the newest Soviet fighter, which was considered the greatest threat to the air forces of the West.
A brilliant scientist and engineer, Dr. Gerald Bull, proposes to the dictator of Iraq, Saddam Hussein, to build the largest cannon that will be able to launch satellites into space and fire projectiles 1000 km. Fantasy, you say. No, all this happened in reality and even formed the basis of a brilliant story by Frederick Forsyth "Fist of God". The dictator accepted Bull's proposal and thus the "Babylon" project was born - a cannon 150 meters long, weighing 2100 tons, caliber 1 meter.
Nazis
On May 22, 1960, 15 years after the end of the Second World War, Ben-Gurion, one of the creators of the State of Israel and the head of the Israeli government, read from the rostrum of the Knesset a statement according to which Mossad agents captured and brought to the country Adolf Eichmann, one of the biggest criminals, who is responsible for the final solution of the Jewish question - the destruction of more than 6 million European Jews.
- We need your help. We know you are well connected in Egypt.
These words were spoken by one of two men who, in 1963, a year after Eichmann's execution, came to the office of a Madrid construction company and asked to see the owner, an Austrian named Otto Skorzeny. Thus began the cooperation of Skorzeny, in the past the most famous saboteur of the Third Reich, the kidnapper and rescuer of Benito Mussolini, and the coordinator and executor of the plan to overthrow the ruler of Hungary, Miklos Horty, and bring to power the pro-Nazi government, Ferenc SalΓ‘Ε‘.
Syria
On May 18, 1965, Eli Cohen, a prominent spy who worked for Israeli intelligence for more than 20 years and whose body Syria still refuses to return for burial in Israel, was publicly executed by hanging in a local market in Damascus.
Between September 1970 and April 1973, the Mossad and a secret unit of the Israeli Navy conducted more than two dozen secret operations to remove young Jews from Syria through the beaches of Tartus and the Lebanese coast. All actions were successful, and approximately 120 young people got to Israel. The operation, which was called "Blanket", was kept secret for more than 30 years.
Of course, everything you have read now is only a few episodes of the work of Mossad agents. You can read about them and other no less impressive operations in more detail on the pages of the book itself Rise and Kill First: The Secret History of Israel's Targeted Assassinations. About some of them we don't know anything anymore, about others some details will appear in time in the media or on the pages of other books.