The Israeli Secret Services and the Struggle Against Terrorism

by Ami Pedahzur

  Other factors included the growing public pressure to avenge those responsible for the suicide attacks as well as the GSS desire to initiate a high-profile operation that would shift the attention of the public and policymakers alike from one of its biggest fiascos, Rabin’s assassination by a Jewish Israeli citizen two months before Ayash’s death. The elimination of Ayash would not be the end of Israeli attempts to strike at Hamas leaders.15

  KHALED MASHAL

  In the morning hours of September 25, 1997, residents of Amman, the capital of Jordan, could not imagine that their city would soon be transformed into the center of a world-gripping drama in which the Israeli Mossad, the Palestinian Hamas, the government of Jordan, Canadian authorities, and the president of the United States would all be involved. At 10:15 a.m., Khaled Mashal, head of the Hamas Political Bureau, arrived with two bodyguards at his office in the Hila el-Ali neighborhood. At the same time, in Tel Aviv, the head of Mossad, Dani Yatom, and other members of the organization’s operations division awaited news from Amman. This was a moment that concluded a two-month effort. On July 30, a Hamas suicide bomber had attacked the Machane Yehuda Market in Jerusalem. The number of casualties was high: 16 dead and 169 wounded. Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu summoned Yatom to his office and demanded an immediate response in the form of an assassination. Yatom’s problem was that most of the Hamas leaders operated from the West Bank, which was under the responsibility of the GSS. This fact did not discourage him. Backed by the head of the Caesarea operational wing, who was eager to act, Yatom instructed his officers to come up with a list of targets. Given that Mossad was focusing on Europe, all they came up with were a few marginal figures in the organization. Yatom asked for a revised list. This time he asked to expand the search and include Jordan. Among the names that popped up, two seemed especially interesting: Mussa Abu Marzuk, the former head of the Hamas Political Bureau, and Khaled Mashal, his successor. Another suicide attack in Jerusalem on September 4 expedited the preparations. Netanyahu wanted an immediate and proper retaliation. Mossad narrowed the list down to Mashal, the most accessible target.

  The two Western-looking men who stood at the entrance to the building appeared to one of Mashal’s bodyguards as slightly out of context. During the brief seconds in which the bodyguard hesitated, debating how to react to the presence of the foreigners, they left their place and hastened toward Mashal. One of them opened a soda can and the other sprayed liquid on Mashal’s neck. The whole operation took two seconds. Mashal felt as though an insect had bitten on him. One of his bodyguards hit one of the attackers with a newspaper that he held, and both started to pursue the two attackers, who were already making their escape. The two Westerners were just able to reach and climb into a Hyundai car waiting nearby. However, Mashal’s guards did not give up. They wrote down the number of the license plate and they chased the car. To their surprise, the car circled around and ended up at the same spot from which it had departed, probably as a result of an error in navigating through the streets of Amman. The bodyguards pounced on the attackers and began struggling with them until a Jordanian police officer who had witnessed the affair called for reinforcements. Together with the police, the bodyguards were able to overpower the two foreigners. The car, which held three more Westerners who viewed the incident from afar, darted off and was quickly swallowed up in the heavy traffic.

  At this stage, Mashal was barely able to remain conscious. His stomach began to heave, and he lost his balance. The doctors who admitted him to the emergency room of the medical compound named for King Hussein were not immediately able to establish the source of these symptoms. Several days later, the Jordanian daily Al-Ra’i reported that an extensive medical analysis had confirmed that the lethal poison ricin had been injected into Mashal’s body.

  The first impression of the investigators who received the detainees at the police station was that the two—who were carrying Canadian passports identifying them as Barry Biton and Sean Kendall—had become involved in a chance brawl with Mashal and his people. The police offered them the services of a local lawyer to help them contend with the Jordanian legal system, but, to their surprise, the detainees declined this offer. The police quickly summoned Steve Bennett, the general attaché to the Canadian embassy in Jordan, to the police station in order to discuss the matter with the detainees and make it clear to them that the situation was serious. At the same time, in Tel Aviv, it was already evident to the Mossad chief that the attempt on Mashal’s life had indeed failed and that the Jordanian authorities would soon realize that the “Canadian” citizens in Amman were Mossad agents. He contacted Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu and reported the developments to him.

  In the heated consultations that took place in Jerusalem during the following hours, the prime minister and his advisors decided that their immediate objective was to bring about the release of the detainees and to minimize as much as possible the potential political ramifications of the whole episode. In an urgent phone conversation, Netanyahu spoke with Hussein, the king of Jordan, and asked him to receive the Mossad chief at his palace without delay. Hussein demanded more information from Netanyahu. When he became aware of the development of events, he reacted with great rage and refused to engage in any type of direct dialogue with Netanyahu or his emissaries. In a phone conversation with the president of the United States, Bill Clinton, Hussein raised his concerns regarding the incident. He explained how the Israeli assassination attempt on a Palestinian in the kingdom—where the majority of residents are indeed Palestinians—might lead to a wave of riots that could undermine the stability of the rule of the Hashemite Kingdom. The following hours were nerve-wracking for the highest authorities in both Amman and Jerusalem. Meanwhile, Mashal’s condition continued to deteriorate. The troubled king relaxed his attitude somewhat. He agreed to renew contact with the Israelis, but only on condition that Israel provide Mashal with immediate medical attention in order to save his life. Prime Minister Netanyahu was left with no alternative. An Israeli doctor was rushed to the hospital in Amman and injected Mashal with an antidote. Mashal’s condition improved to some extent, but the state of crisis between the two countries did not.

  King Hussein, who had lost faith in Netanyahu, feared that after the serum had worn off, Mashal’s condition would again deteriorate. He demanded that Israel send him the exact formula of the poison injected into Mashal’s body. The only Israeli who succeeded in penetrating the wall of hostility surrounding the Jordanian king was his close friend, the former deputy chief of Mossad, Ephraim Halevy, who was at that time Israeli ambassador to the European Union. Two days after the assassination attempt, at a very late hour, Halevy arrived at the royal palace in Amman. He brought with him the formula for the poison and said that Israel was prepared to engage in further confidence-building steps. During this conversation, Hussein agreed to allow the Mossad agents who had fled in their car to the Israeli embassy to leave Jordan. However, Halevy was not able to placate him enough to raise the matter of the release of the two detained agents. At this stage, in Jerusalem it was clear that in the absence of a dramatic Israeli gesture, the chances of their release were very small.

  On that very night, Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu, Defense Minister Yitzhak Mordechai, and their aides arrived in Amman. They engaged in intensive negotiations with Crown Prince Hassan and with the head of the Jordanian security services General Battikhi. After ten days of global negotiations, and principally due to Clinton’s intense intermediary efforts, an agreement was reached by both parties stipulating that Israel would free Hamas leader Sheikh Ahmad Yassin in exchange for the release of the detained Mossad agents in Amman. While for Israel the release of Yassin was a most difficult step because of his senior status, for King Hussein, this was indeed a first-class payoff that helped relieve the existing tensions between the Jordanian monarchy and Islamic movements in his country.

  In the upcoming months, a special committee was set up in Israel to investigate the reasons for t
he operation’s failure. The committee’s conclusions found the higher ranks of Mossad responsible, leading, eventually, to Yatom’s resignation. At the same time, officials from the prime minister’s office and from the Foreign Ministry worked hard to restore relations with Jordan and rebuild trust with the Canadian Foreign Ministry, which had recalled the Canadian ambassador in Israel to Ottawa for consultations.16

  THE SECOND MAGNA CARTA

  The gradual collapse of the Oslo process in the late 1990s and the emergence of an unfamiliar type of terrorism reignited the turf wars among the intelligence organizations. At first the struggle was latent, and the first Magna Carta agreement was honored. However, in January 1999, the tension seemed to have compromised the operations of the organizations, and thus the second Magna Carta was signed. This time the document focused on the separation of powers in the counterterrorism realm. If the first agreement gave the GSS a broader territorial deployment than its competitors, this time Aman received priority; it was established that military intelligence assessments would be given preference over those of other agencies. The GSS was forced to make do with relatively reduced responsibilities for gathering thwarting intelligence in the Palestinian arena. Both bodies promised to cooperate fully. The second Magna Carta, however, also failed to bring an end to the dissension. When Ehud Barak was elected prime minister in May 1999, the first signs of conflict were reappearing, this time between the GSS and Mossad. The issue was now who had responsibility for thwarting terrorist attacks that took place inside Israel but were carried out by operatives from outside the country. The disagreement was solved only after a special team appointed by Ehud Barak ruled that such thwarting actions would be the sole responsibility of the GSS.

  In addition to the territorial struggles, Prime Minister Barak was forced to deal with a very critical report issued by the state comptroller, which analyzed intelligence community interrelations over the years. The comptroller came to the conclusion that despite the existence of agreements that were to have clearly set out the geographic and functional limits of the various intelligence agencies, no meaningful changes actually occurred. The report warned of several main problems, including the absence of an agreement between the various agencies regarding the training of potential intelligence agents, the unwillingness to share raw intelligence, and duplication in assessment units leading political leaders to receive contradictory assessments. Barak was not in a rush to implement the recommendations of the report. As a former chief of staff, Aman head, and commander of Sayeret Matkal, he had a resolute worldview of intelligence. He attached primary importance to Aman and the GSS while almost completely ruling out the other bodies, particularly the Center for Political Research of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.17

  The short-lived hope for peace following the Oslo Accords was shattered with the appearance of suicide-bomber attacks carried out by the Palestinian Islamic opposition movement. The frustration of the policymakers in Israel was deep. Not only had the hope for peace vanished, but the struggle against the terrorists had also become more complicated than ever. The desire to reassure the public led to increasing pressures on the intelligence organizations and the military to offer novel solutions. Yet the security establishment was still adapting to the new political reality, and its various arms were still fighting over their territory. The outcome was the reintroduction of the assassinations policy that later became the trademark of the Israeli counterterrorism effort. However, even as early as the mid-1990s, no proof could be given that the assassinations had any effect on the desire and capabilities of the terrorists to attain their goals.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  A WAR AGAINST AN ELUSIVE ENEMY

  DESPITE THE SIGNING OF the second Magna Carta during the preparations for Ehud Barak’s participation in the Camp David Summit in the summer of 2000, competition between Aman and the GSS once again broke out. Called upon to submit assessments to the prime minister about Arafat’s intentions, the agency heads sent contradictory signals and passionately defended their respective positions. In the end, Barak left for the summit not knowing which agency had supplied the most reliable assessment.1

  THE AL-AQSA INTIFADA

  Not even the collapse of the talks and the outbreak of the Al-Aqsa intifada in early October 2000 could bring an end to the conflict between the two agencies, and they continued to advocate opposing views. General Amos Gilad, representative of Aman and former head of its research division, as well as coordinator of government operations in the occupied territories, believed that Arafat and the Palestinian Authority had planned the intifada. In contrast, the GSS claimed that the reality on the streets had dragged the Palestinian Authority into the violence. Naturally, this dispute compromised the ability of the Israeli leadership to formulate policies toward the Palestinian Authority during this most sensitive period of relations between the two entities. When Ariel Sharon became prime minister, he clearly tipped the scales in favor of the GSS. Sharon developed close ties with the head of the agency, Avi Dichter, who a few years later joined him when he established a new political party, Kadima. Aman representatives were concerned that they would be asked for their assessments only as a matter of protocol.

  Aman field officers also felt that the GSS had the upper hand. Because of the way in which officers are promoted in the military, intelligence officers serving in the regional commands are usually young and do not have the chance to spend much time in any one position. Consequently, they are far less familiar with local conditions than GSS handlers, who know them down to the last detail. In addition, intelligence-officer training is naturally predisposed to military intelligence, sometimes at the expense of other types of intelligence. Most of these officers are unfamiliar with the handling of human-intelligence operations, and their knowledge of Arabic is limited. In comparison with GSS personnel, they have less experience in formulating full intelligence assessments on the basis of intelligence items and indications that come their way. These conditions, together with the fact that GSS handlers and IDF division commanders share common backgrounds and belong to the same age group, contributed to the preference of the commanders in charge of foiling terrorist operations for GSS information and assessments. During the course of the intifada, GSS handlers joined military units and became those unit intelligence officers during special operations in Palestinian territories. The role of the regional intelligence officer became almost marginal.2

  The close collaboration between the GSS and the special forces can be explained by other factors as well. Military special units have different areas of responsibility from those of the GSS, eliminating grounds for competition. The most conspicuous collaboration in recent years was between the GSS and the Israeli Air Force (IAF). During the intifada, IAF attack helicopters and unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) in effect became the operational arm of the GSS in thwarting operations. Among other assignments, these squadrons carried out strikes on rocket launchers, bombed machine shops and explosives laboratories, and effected targeted assassinations from the air. Police elite units, especially Yamam, also became close allies of the GSS. The window of opportunity for cooperation between these two opened in the first days of the intifada.

  During this period, the army avoided intensive operations in the territories controlled by the Palestinian Authority for fear of escalating the situation. When the GSS required a skilled unit to carry out special operations, it came to Yamam. In contrast to the IDF, the police-force chain of command is short, and unit commanders enjoy a relatively free hand in deciding what operational steps to take. The Yamam chief commander during this period was Hagai Peleg, who had previously commanded Egoz, an elite IDF unit. He realized that the GSS could finally provide Yamam with operational opportunities, after many years of standing in the shadow of IDF elite units. The intensifying pace of the incidents, however, required the participation of additional forces. At a meeting that took place in March 2001 in the office of the prime minister, Sharon demanded that the chief of staff and hi
s deputy put counterterrorism high on the IDF list of priorities. To this end, he ordered each IDF elite unit to appoint an outstanding officer as a contact person with the GSS. In the wake of this meeting, the GSS and the operational units that collaborated with it received all the financial resources and weapons they requested.3

  SPECIAL FORCES AND COUNTERTERRORISM MISSIONS

  Even bureaucratic obstacles, which in the past had precluded direct ties between the regional desks of the GSS and the IDF special unit headquarters, were surmounted. These units consisted of Sayeret Matkal, Shayetet 13, Sayeret Shaldag, Egoz, Sayeret Maglan, Duvedevan, and Sayarot (reconnaissance units) of the four main infantry brigades, Golani, Givati, Paratroopers, and Nahal. Counter-terrorism became the most important issue in the eyes of policymakers, and the government was willing to allocate whatever means necessary to units that were successful in such missions; and this created fierce competition among the units as their commanders practically demanded to receive more and more opportunities to prove the superiority of their particular unit. This sometimes led to extreme scenarios such as the events of April 15, 2002, when Duvedevan and Sayeret Matkal soldiers were called upon to carry out a high-profile operation that included the capture of Marwan Barghouti, head of the Tanzim forces in the West Bank. In order to ensure that they would be the unit chosen for the operation, Duvedevan soldiers hid the truck that was supposed to transfer the Sayeret Matkal soldiers to the scene.4