Money Trail in Dubai Assassination Leads To Iowa U.S.A

By Michael Gillespie

A Meta Bank branch office in Des Moines, Iowa. (Photo M. Gillespie)

AN ONGOING investigation by the Dubai Police Force into the assassination there of a high-level Hamas official (see April 2010 Washington Report, p. 12) has revealed the contours of Israel's massive and ever-expanding operations in the United States.

The Jan. 19 murder of Mahmoud al-Mabhouh in his room at the Al Bustan Rotana, a 275-room five-star luxury hotel, has been widely perceived to be a Mossad operation involving, by the most recent count, 27 suspects traveling on fraudulently obtained and falsified European or Australian passports.

The plot thickened in late February and early March, when major U.S. news media outlet reports connected the crime and many of those involved in it to Israeli and U.S. corporations and revealed that, after leaving Dubai, some of the suspected assassins had entered the United States.

ABC News reported on Feb. 24 that Dubai police had identified 15 new suspects as part of the ring that killed al-Mabhouh, and that "Fourteen of the suspects purportedly used credit cards from MetaBank, a regional American bank, to pay for hotel rooms and travel arrangements…Dubai police linked MetaBank to a New York-based company called Payoneer, which provided prepaid MasterCard credit cards issued by MetaBank. According to its Web site, Payoneer has a research and development center in Tel Aviv."

This reporter contacted MetaBank's corporate headquarters in Storm Lake, Iowa to inquire why an Iowa bank would provide credit cards to 14 suspected members of a death squad. Lisa Binder, vice president for Investor Relations and Corporate Communications, responded via telephone and e-mail with a statement saying, in part, "The Meta cards in question were issued in conjunction with a Meta Payment Systems program, not at a retail bank location. Meta Payment Systems, which has issued more than 150 million prepaid cards, markets its payroll cards through various Program Managers—in this case, Payoneer—to offer reputable U.S. companies network branded payroll cards with which American companies can pay expatriates, employees and contractors of their company who live in the U.S. and in foreign countries. The cards in question were 'loaded' by the companies using direct deposit for payroll, disbursements, and other compensation."

Attempts to contact Payoneer offices at 410 Park Avenue in New York City revealed that the only phone answered at Payoneer headquarters was a customer support line for Payoneer's Birthright Israel customers.

According to Birthright Israel's Web site, <www.birthrightisrael.com>, the program sends "thousands of young Jewish adults from all over the world to Israel as a gift in order to diminish the growing division between Israel and Jewish communities around the world; to strengthen the sense of solidarity among world Jewry; and to strengthen participants' personal Jewish identity and connection to the Jewish people."

The Web site states that all Birthright Israel participants must pay their $250 refundable "security deposit" through Payoneer.

Payoneer's Birthright customer support center declined to provide contact information for Payoneer corporate communications personnel or for Payoneer founder and CEO Yuval Tal.

"Since the [Dubai[ assassination," noted Abbas Al Lawati, a staff reporter for Gulf News.com, on March 3, "Tal has been shielded by a wall of public relations representatives and does not respond to media requests for comments...Tal's public relations representatives in New York have refused to comment on his past and relations with Israel's intelligence agency Mossad."

Payoneer's Web site describes the company as "a registered MasterCard Merchant Service Provider (MSP), and partner with MetaBank or Choice Bank Limited to deliver our services. Privately held, our funding partners include Greylock Partners, Carmel Ventures, and Crossbar Capital."

All three of Payoneer's funding partners are venture capital firms that have offices in or strong connections to Israel, the Washington Report has learned.

Charlie Federman, managing partner of Crossbar Capital, previously co-founded BRM Capital in 1999, headed its New York office, and served as a managing director of the Israel- and New York-based fund until 2007. BRM Group, headquartered in Herzliya, was founded by Nir Barkat, mayor of occupied Jerusalem. Carmel Ventures also is headquartered Herzliya.

Greylock Partners, founded in 1965, "operates in a number of global centers of innovation, including Boston, China (Beijing), India (Bangalore), Israel (Herzliya) and Silicon Valley." Current Greylock portfolio companies include Digg, Facebook, and LinkedIn, according to Greylock's Web site.

Greylock's investment activities in Israel were launched in 2002 by partner Moshe Mor, who "served six years in the Israeli army as a Captain in the Military Intelligence branch," according to the Web site.

Despite the reported entry into the U.S. of at least two of the Dubai suspects using fraudulent, falsified passports, thus far there has been little to indicate that U.S. officials are seriously interested in investigating the funding of travel expenses and hotel accommodations of suspected Israeli assassins through U.S. corporations. The Departments of State, Justice and Homeland Security failed to respond to inquiries from this reporter.

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Suspected Mossad agent arrested over Dubai assassination

Haaretz

Mahmoud al-Mabhouh


Uri Brodsky arrested in Warsaw for allegedly obtaining forged German passport involved in Hamas strongman hit, AFP reports; Foreign ministry confirms Israeli citizen arrested in Poland.Polish authorities arrested an alleged Mossad agent suspected of attaining German passports involved in the assassination of Hamas strongman Mahmoud al-Mabhouh in Dubai in January, according to Der Spiegel cited by French news agency AFP on Saturday.

"He was arrested in Warsaw and is suspected of being involved in illegally obtaining a [German] passport," AFP cited a spokesman for German federal prosecution to German magazine Der Spiegel.

"It's now up to the Poles to decide if they are going to hand him over to Germany," the spokesman said.

The foreign ministry confirmed that an Israeli citizen was arrested earlier in June in Poland, and said that the Israeli consulate in Warsaw has been in contact with the man and has received continuous updates on his condition since the arrest.

The ministry added that the suspect has received consulate assistance like every Israel arrested abroad.

Mahmoud al-Mabhouh was killed in January when a team of assassins broke into his hotel room and killed him silently, leaving a 'do not disturb' sign on the door. The hotel security cameras caught images of the alleged killers sharing an elevator ride with Mabhouh prior to the assassination.

Since the killing, Dubai police have identified over 32 suspects, releasing photos of 27 people who were allegedly involved in the assassination based on alleged forged passports.

The Mossad has been implicated by the Dubai police as having masterminded the assassination, but Israel has said there is no proof tying Mossad to the incident.
The Der Spiegel article, which is expected to be published on Monday, said the Israeli suspect Uri Brodsky was arrested in early June on arrival at Warsaw's airport.

Brodsky is suspected by German authorities to have helped a member of the hit squad obtain a German passport in June 2009.

In February, German intelligence services investigating the assassination of Hamas commander Mahmoud al-Mabhouh in Dubai claimed one of the suspected members of the assassination team carried a genuine German passport, according to reports Saturday in German media outlets.

According to the findings of German federal investigators, in June 2009 an Israeli man named Michael Bodenheimer - who shares the name of an alleged member of the Dubai hit squad - came to immigration officials in Cologne with the pre-World War II address of his grandparents.

Bodenheimer acquired German citizenship on the basis of this data.


After his name was listed as one of the suspected members of the Dubai assassination squad, Bodenheimer, who lives in Bnei Brak and is of American origin, said that he did not know how his identity was stolen.

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Israeli Immigration Officials Copied British Passports Used by Hit Squad, Ministers Told

Israeli immigration officials at Tel Aviv airport secretly copied the British passports which were then used by the hit squad which assassinated a leading Hamas official, ministers have been told.

By Melissa Kite, Deputy Political EditorThe six British citizens whose identities were stolen and used by the killers all had their passports taken away from them briefly during routine checks at the airport, it has been claimed.

The revelation by diplomatic sources that the Foreign Office has been told that the passports were copied by Israeli officials is the first time Israel's involvement has been directly alleged.

It will put further pressure on the Israeli government which has been at the centre of a growing diplomatic storm over its possible involvement in the murder of Mahmoud al-Mabhouh in Dubai last month.

Diplomatic sources say ministers have been briefed that the passport fraud was committed by immigration officials who stopped the British nationals, who all now live in Israel, as they went through the airport during recent trips.

The passport numbers were taken, most likely by photocopy, and then used to create new documents which were used by the hit squad.

The identities of French, German and Irish citizens were also used.

The suspects used fake passports bearing their own pictures, but the names and numbers of the innocent Europeans.

All six British passports were not biometric, which means they did not have a computer chip embedded in them and so the fraud would have been relatively straightforward, experts believe.

The revelation will put further pressure on Israel to come clean about what it knows following widespread speculation about the involvement of Mossad, the Israeli intelligence agency, in the killing, although other organisations have not been ruled out.

Mabhouh was one of the founders of Hamas's military wing and has been wanted by Israel for his role in the 1989 kidnapping and killing of two Israeli soldiers on leave.

He was murdered in a Dubai hotel room in January after an elaborate plot involving at least 11 assassins, including at least one woman, posing as tourists, with some wearing wigs and false beards.

Six holders of British passports, three with Irish documents, one with a German passport and another with a French passport made up the hit team.

David Miliband, the Foreign Secretary, held talks with the Israeli ambassador to London, Ron Prosor, last week as the row threatened to escalate into a major diplomatic crisis.

He denied that the Government was merely "going through the motions" and described the use of fake British passports in the assassination as an "outrage".

But the Foreign Office said it was too early to speculate on who could have carried out the identity theft.

Michael Levi, a professor of criminology at Cardiff University and an expert on identity theft, said the passports would not have been difficult to tamper with.

He said: "The sort of organisation that can pull off a hit like that will be able to make those sort of changes to a passport."

The Conservative leader, David Cameron, said Israel must provide assurances that it would never sanction the use of UK papers in operations by its secret service.

He also called for answers from the Government about when it knew that falsified documents were used in the murder on January 20. Reports last week alleged that ministers may have had a prior tip-off.

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Dubai's Eleven: Death squad caught on CCTV hunting for Hamas leader

How many high class assassins does it take to kill one Hamas leader? Well, according to Dubai police, who released CCTV footage of the suspects, its not one, not two... but 11. The group of British, Irish, French and German suspected hit-men arrived in Dubai dressed as tourists and on separate flights. They were hunting for Mahmud al-Mabhuh who came to Dubai allegedly shopping for weapons. The next day he was found strangled in his hotel room and with traces of torture. It is not clear whether it was a lack of professionalism from the alleged hit squad or Dubai's passion for CCTV that helped the police, but they were able to identify their suspects within 24 hours.

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Did Britain know about Mossad hit? Israeli agent claims MI6 was tipped off

• Agent claims MI5 and Foreign Office were tipped off
• David Miliband vows to 'get to the bottom' of affair
  
• Gordon Brown promises an inquiry into identity theft
• Dubai police chief calls for arrest of Mossad head
• Hamas promises retaliation against Israel

MI6 was tipped off that Israeli agents were going to carry out an 'overseas operation' using fake British passports, it was claimed last night.

A member of Mossad, the Israeli intelligence service, said the Foreign Office was also told hours before a Hamas chief was assassinated in Dubai.

The tip-off did not say who the target would be or even where the hit squad would be in action.
But the claim from a credible source that the Government had some prior knowledge of the abuse of UK passports will strengthen calls for ministers to come clean about what they knew and when.
CONTINUED (AND PICS):
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/worldnews/article-1252034/Hamas-assassination-Did-Britain-know-Mossad-hit.html?printingPage=true

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Israeli embassy raises eyebrows with tennis tweet

Message boasts of Israeli player's 'hit on Dubai target' amid mounting row over Hamas chief's killing
Amid the mounting diplomatic row over Mossad's alleged assassination of a Hamas commander in Dubai, the Israeli embassy has turned to Twitter to comment.

A tweet issued by the embassy today read: "@israeluk You heard it here first: Israeli tennis player carries out hit on #Dubai target http://ow.ly/18A79". It links to a story about the Israeli tennis player Shahar Peer, who beat the top-ranked Caroline Wozniacki yesterday to reach the quarter-finals of the Dubai Championship.
But the tweet is open to interpretation. The Mossad hit squad accused of assassinating Mahmoud al-Mabhouh, a senior figure from the militant group Hamas, at the Al-Bustan Rotana hotel in Dubai were disguised as tennis players.

CCTV footage released by Dubai police shows the assassins dressed as tennis players following Mabhouh into the hotel lift as a member of staff showed him to his room.

Police said this was an attempt to note down his room number.

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Israel PM 'signed off' on Dubai hit

Hamas officials said al-Mabhouh may have created a "security breach" that led to his death [Reuters] Binyamin Netanyahu, Israel's prime minister, is alleged to have given the green light for last month's assassination of a senior Hamas figure, according to a British newspaper. The Sunday Times, citing "sources with knowledge of Mossad", reported on Sunday thatNetanyahu visited the Israeli intelligence headquarters in early January and, after being brief, authorised the killing of Mahmoud al-Mabhouh. A rehearsal of the operation, which reportedly involved at least 18 agents, was apparently carried out at a Tel Aviv hotel - without detection - prior to the briefing. While the identity of the killers remains unknown, Dubai police have identified 11 members of the alleged hit team through immigration records and CCTV tapes. They identified the passports the 11 suspects were using as coming from Britain, France, Germany and Ireland Dhahi Khalfan, Dubai's police chief, on Saturday said further investigation showed that some of those passports - bearing authentic holograms - had been used to track al-Mabhouh on earlier trips to the emirate. 'Security breach' Al-Mabhouh took off from Damascus, the Syrian capital, on a flight bound for Dubai on January 19. Israel apparently suspected he was on his way to Iran to arrange an arms shipment for Gaza. Around five hours after he checked in to the Al Bustan Rotana Hotel, he was murdered. in depth   The Mossad's secret wars   Dubai murder strains ties   Blog: Another CIA Milan debacle?   Video: Robert Fisk on the growing row   Opinion: 'With friends like these ...'   'To Israel I am stained with blood' - Al-Mabhouh speaks to Al Jazeera 10 months before his murder Hamas officials are now saying al-Mabhouh may have inadvertently made some security slip-ups by booking his flight online, and by calling his family. "Al-Mabhouh called his family by phone before he travelled to Dubai and told them of his plan to stay in a specific hotel, and he booked his travel through the internet," Salah Bardawil, a Hamas politician in Gaza, told reporters on Friday. "This undoubtedly created a security breach in the movements of al-Mabhouh." Bardawil also said some members of rival Palestinian faction Fatah may have had a role to play in the Hamas commander's death, but made no accusations against the group itself. "We hold the Mossad directly responsible for the assassination of Mahmoud al-Mabhouh on Arab territory and the Mossad should, and will, bear all the consequences for this crime sooner or later," he said. "We are not blaming Fatah or the Palestinian Authority. Until now, the investigations only point to collaborators or individuals who worked with Mossad. But this does not mean the PA of Fatah were behind the assassination." The Israeli government, and Mossad itself, have refused either to confirm or deny any role in the assassination - part a "policy of ambiguity", as Avigdor Lieberman, the Israeli foreign minister, described it. "Ultimately people here are quite satisifed by the outcome, whether it was in fact the Mossad or not, whether the faces of the operatives were shown on the CCTV cameras, whether or not there is a certain amount of diplomatic embarrassment," Al Jazeera's Jacky Rowland, reporting from Tel Aviv, said. "That this Hamas senior commander, who was believed to be involved in gaining finance for weapons for Hamas fighters, the fact that he was taken out is something that most Israelis would approve whole heartedly of. "There is nothing politically controversial here ... the question more is the rather messy loose ends that have been left here." Diplomatic tensions Tensions between Israel and its European allies have, however, mounted in the wake ofthe murder, with UK, Irish, German and French governments all summoning their respective Israeli ambassadors for answers regarding the use of their passports. On Saturday, Germany's Der Spiegel magazine reported that the German passport used was genuine(in German). The magazine said a man using the name of Michael Bodenheimer approached Cologne immigration officials in June 2008 with a request for citizenship, offering pre-World War II papers as proof of his German ancestry. The travel document was apparently issued in 2009. The passport was apparently obtained by stealing the identity ofan Israeli-American. UK authorities, meanwhile, said on Saturday that they believe the six British passports used in the operation must have been duplicates using numbers copied by Israeli immigration officials, according to a Telegraph report.  The British travel documents were not biometric, meaning they did not have computer chips embedded in them that would make it more difficult to duplicate.

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Possible Consequences for the Israeli Mossad

BY Kawther Salam
Now that the latest atrocity of Israel has badly blown back, with the
pictures of 11 death squad assassins published worldwide, 2 names of Palestinians connected to the PA published, 6 more suspects in Dubai, knowledge that the whole crime was coordinated from Austria, consequences are inevitable. These are not consequences under national or international law, but the kinds of consequences which are due when mafia thugs or secret agents are burnt, and which seldom come to the knowledge of the public.

• Will the mossad get rid of the elements of the death squad after the assassination of Mahmoud Mabhouh in Dubai?
• How will the mossad deal with their problems?
• What would they use to get rid of the elements which participated in the assassination of al-Mabhouh?
• Will it be a mass culling, will they be killed in a soft and merciful way, or will it be a messy butchery?
• Will the bodies of these people be disposed by them, dropping them from airplanes into the ocean, or will they become part of the fundaments of yet to be built bridges?

Whatever happens, the Dubai 11 and all other people who participated in any capacity in this botched assassination must count on being killed if they do not surrender to or are not captured by the security forces of another nation. Regardless of what intentions the mossad has towards these elements, they are finished, and, even if the manage to evade capture, their refuge in Israel will be only temporary at best, until the pertinent decisions are taken.

Interpol on Thursday issued arrest notices for 11 suspects – six listed with British passports, three Irish, one French and one German – wanted by Dubai for the killing.

Now that they have been put on the wanted list of Interpol, that their faces are known, and that Dubai has stated that their retina prints taken at Dubai airport and other details will be published, they represent a giant liability to the Zionist regime of Israel. They are publicly known carriers of secrets, presumably in the know of many terrorist deeds of the mossad around the world. Their disposal will become an inevitable consequence, even a priority, to protect the secrets of global terrorism practiced by the mossad.

Meanwhile, the Dubai Police continues revealing new information relating to the murder of Mabhouh. They stated that the British, French, German and Irish authorities expressed during contacts with Dubai officials their strong displeasure because of the fact that the passports of their nations were used to enter Dubai and perpetrate this crime. Experts of the Dubai Police said that “the technology of recording retina prints at the airport will help to identify the perpetrators of the crime in Dubai, as it is difficult to hide or falsify this imprint, even if the person has surgery to change their face”. The videotape distributed by the Dubai Police about the perpetrators of the al- Mabhouh murder shows that all of them passed through the airport, which uses records retina prints.


Palestinians elements supporting Mosssad


Why did the Dubai Police not show the photos of the two Palestinians who were arrested in the wake of the assassination of Mahmoud al-Mabhouh in Dubai?

Why did the police not publish the names of the Palestinian suspects?

Is it because they are elements connected to the Palestinian National Authority?

Last week, the Dubai police stated that had they had arrested two Palestinians among 18 suspects in the al-Mabhouh assassination, but they have not yet identified the two Palestinians or revealed their pictures.
Instead, the leader of Hamas, Mohammad Nazzal, announced the names of Palestinian detainees who were involved in the assassination of al-Mabhouh besides the Israeli death squad. He named them as Ahmed Hassanein, a former member of the Palestinian Intelligence Service, and Anwar Shuhaiber, a former officer in the Palestinian Preventive Security Forces. Both are former members of the PA security forces with links to Mohammed Dahlan of Fatah. Hamas claims that the senior Fatah official visited Dubai after these elements were arrested in order to try to persuade the Dubai authorities to release their operatives.

The Palestinian detainees are suspected of providing the mossad death squad with logistical aid, including renting cars and hotel rooms for them. According the Chief of the Dubai police, the Palestinians met the commander of the mossad death squad in a shopping center.

The spokesman of the Jordanian government, Nabil al-Sharif, revealed last Monday that Jordanian authorities handed these two Palestinians to the Dubai authorities. The detainees were caught by the airport security after their arrival at Amman airport.

Meanwhile, Mahmoud al-Zahar called on the West to forbid Israel from using their land to enter Arab countries and kill Palestinians. He said: “If the West allows the Zionist enemy to turn its land into land where Palestinian Muslims are murdered, or leave from it to Arab countries to assassinate our people, then we will confront them as God compels us too: ‘One evil for another’”, he said at a sermon in a Gaza mosque Friday.
While all the consequences and the scandal in the wake of this crime are still developing, it is noteworthy to mention that the Reut Institute, an extremist think tank which advises the Israeli regime, has recently released two the executive summaries of two reports (see here)  and (here) which deal with the increasing “deligitmization” which the zionist entity suffers (which of course can’t be explained). It is funny to note that among their “policy options” they write

“18 – Relationship-based diplomacy with elites and ‘influentials’ – An effective barrier against delegitimization is a network of personal relationships. Working within identified hubs, Israel should aspire to maintain thousands of personal relationships with political, financial, cultural, media, and security-related elites and influentials.”

Now that Israel is successfully in the process of affirming its image of an obnoxious cry-baby and leg-humping hyena, a liability to anybody who has anything to do with them, one can’t help but smirking while asking where these thousands of “personal relationships” are to come if not from among people who are ignorant of their own best interests.

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Time for Britain to hold Israel to account

UK, February 19, 2010 (Pal Telegraph; by Ramy Sab) - British Middle East policy in the human rights arena has long been suspect.

Evidence of this is plentiful: its complicity with the United States in misleading the public to go along with the war on Iraq, our support for ongoing drone attacks in Afghanistan and Pakistan, and Britain's obvious silence on Israel's collective punishment of nearly 1.5 million residents of the Gaza Strip.

This shameful performance reflects a long history of political games played at the expense of ordinary people. For instance, one of the UK's most disastrous acts in the Middle East was its Balfour Declaration in 1917, in which it officially supported creation of a national home for the Jewish people in historic Palestine. -- and paved the way for the abolition of the rights and dreams of the native Arabs. The Palestinians in Palestine have been condemned to a life of exile and dispossession ever since.

Britain's reputation has not improved over the years; instead, it seems to work hard to demonstrate that it is a player acting only in its own self-interest, getting involved only when it serves its own ends.

Today, the British government is once again facing a serious test of its credibility following the assassination of Mahmoud Al-Mabhouh, a leader in the Hamas Palestinian movement, in Dubai. It has been reported in recent days that six of the individuals implicated in the plot carried British passports. Whether legitimate (as some evidence now indicates) or forged, it is an urgent matter not only of conscience for Britain but of a legal expediency to respond quickly and decisively. The use of British identity by the Israeli Mossad to carry out a political execution in a foreign territory, thus infringing upon the sovereign rights of the UAE, is clearly illegal.

That the assassins flagrantly flouted both international and British law demonstrates an arrogance that presumes they will not be held accountable by either Britain or the international community. Further, exposing British citizens to risk through the theft of their identity and associating them with illegal acts demonstrates an immorality and a total disregard for a country that has stood staunchly by Israel regardless of its transgressions against the rights of others. If the British government had executed a similar clandestine political assassination, particularly on the sovereign territory of another nation, it surely would be subjected to much recrimination and investigation, at the very least by its own citizens.

The crux of the issue here is the legality and morality of Israel's flagrant disregard for Britain's welfare by entangling its government in a crime of international proportions, endangering its relations with allies and other foreign entities on which it relies, such as the oil-rich Emirates. Britain has clearly been used by Israel to promote a political agenda that had little to do with our own strategic interests -- and in fact, jeopardized them. It is time to reverse Britain's negligence and complacency with respect to Israel's continuous violations against humanity and international law, including war crimes against the Arabs of the Middle East.

Unfortunately, we are wont to expect and will no doubt bear witness to the continuing British policy of turning a blind eye to Israel's violations of basic human decency, as well as to our own self interests in the region. The Mamdouh assassination is an outright violation of international agreements; accountability must be enforced, lest any one nation believe it is above the law -- a more dangerous precedent than any other. It is imperative that the assassins be arrested and the body to which they report be identified and prosecuted. It would be a blatant slap in the face of David Milbrand, who responded to reports of the crime by begging: "I hope and expect Tel Aviv (to) co-operate fully with the investigation announced by Prime Minister Gordon Brown."

The British government is required by law to take rigorous procedures against the executers as well as their masters in Israel. If British passports were forged or stolen, the responsible parties must be prosecuted in court immediately. Otherwise, Britain will be known as a shelter for criminals. (It is worth remembering that the war against Afghanistan was launched because of the Taliban's protection of Al-Qaeda.) Every individual is measured by the same yardstick and Britain will be perceived in the eyes of the Middle East as no better than a safe haven for Israeli crimes, putting us all at risk -- but particularly our diplomats and soldiers. It is time to act swiftly and firmly to reassert our commitment to human rights and international law.

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5 Stars Hotel

some Holocaust-survivors ??..... perhaps ?? There is Terrorism and Terrorism some people kill others but others ,only, assassinate.... The Mossad for example , used 11 men and women to assassinate one man....only !! They all flew Business-class and stayed in 5 stars Hotels carrying first class European-passports. The Europeans considered it as scandalous that their European-Passports were used otherwise, they did not mind the assassination,itself. When will the Arab-Terrorist finally learn to fly Business-class , to use Euroepan-passports and to stay in 5 stars Hotels ?? (instead of riding in a cheap-regular-city-bus) Eng. Moustafa Roosenbloom anti-cheap-terror-methods

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Why are we surprised that Mossad used fake passports?

The aspect of the Al-Mabhouh assassination that is attracting most attention is the issue of forged passports. Today's Jewish Chronicle carries a short commentary on the tendency of Israeli security services to "borrow" passports, highlighting two methods by which this could have been done. The first is apparently innocuous, whereby as part of the normal migration procedures any "Oleh" wishing to make the "aliyah" (migration to Israel) parts willingly with his or her identification documents, which can and usually are circulated. The anonymous JC commentator suggests that a more surreptitious method was used for holders of foreign passports who would be approached directly by the security services. This approach is "widely known among new and old immigrants to Israel" according to one man who described how he was approached for his passport while spending a gap year in Israel 40 years ago:

"We were 18 and on a kibbutz. When your madrich (youth leader) says 'can I borrow your passport?' you do not ask any questions. Mine came back with a Romanian stamp on it. This happened to 30 people. As far as I know Israel was bribing the Romanian regime for olim [plural of Oleh] and people needed a non-Romanian passport to get out of the country."

The rather blasé commentary reveals that far from being astonished that their identities had been stolen - probably by Mossad - the British citizens with dual nationality living in Israel could have had a reasonable idea that their identities might have been taken for use in such a way. The fact that this practice is "widely known" has serious implications for governments such as ours and the protection of citizens' identities, as well as security concerns. Not only does this Israeli practice show contempt and disregard for other countries - including its supposed allies - it also endangers the security of its own nationals.

When Mossad attempted to assassinate Hamas leader Khalid Mishal in 1997, its operatives used Canadian passports. The two had to take refuge in the Israeli embassy in Amman. It transpired that two Canadian Jews living in Israel had been approached and asked if their passport details could be "borrowed" by one of Israel's security services, a process that has been described as "emotional blackmail" and a test of their "loyalty to Israel" by journalist Paul McGeough.¹

According to McGeough, the Canadian authorities were left highly embarrassed and "vulnerable" after the apparent collaboration between Canadian and Israeli security services was made public. A former Israeli ambassador to Canada said, "The Canadian authorities knew… that passports were being used by Mossad… it was known to people at the embassy and they essentially turned a blind eye to it."²

This begs the question whether or not the British government or British security services are themselves aware that Mossad agents have been using British passports and to what extent, if any, they have been involved in the whole Al-Mabhouh affair. Moreover, if it had been, for instance, a Pakistani passport that had been so easily passed around the ISI³ and then used for clandestine operations, would we be seeing the same rather limp response from the international community?


Meanwhile, two leading legal experts have commented on the affair to MEMO:

“We must draw distinctions between domestic and international law. On the domestic front- each state will have criminal penalties for the misuse of its passports. In the UK the Identity Cards Act 2006 specifies criminal penalties for the misuse of passports, forging passports etc. Someone who has 'allowed' their passports to be used in such a way, could be charged with aiding and abetting offences under the 2006 Act.

This is a very serious matter and the courts will look at the purpose of the use of the false documents in terms of measuring the seriousness. For example if the documents were used for seeking work, it would be seen as a much less serious case compared to fraud. In this case, we are looking at murder. The government could look at the steps Margaret Thatcher took following the apparent use of British passports where she closed down Mossad operations in the UK in the 1980s. This is much more serious given that Israel had given diplomatic assurances that this would not happen again and is certainly an aggravating factor that the government would have to take into account."

Paul Troop,
A prominent barrister specialising in human rights and civil liberties

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The legality of the use and abuse of foreign passports? The falsification of passports and identity theft are serious criminal offences under British law. No doubt they are too under Israeli law. Falsification of a British passport by a member of the Israeli intelligence services is therefore more than just a clear breach of diplomatic relations. Moreover, there would be serious implications were it to transpire that the British government was aware that falsified travel documents were being used by Mossad as has been suggested by one British security source.

What are the steps the governments of these foreign passport-holders should do in light of these revelations?

The respective governments should:

• Condemn the extra judicial killing of Mahmoud al-Mabhouh as a breach of international law;
• Unequivocally declare whether they were aware that falsified travel documents were being used by Mossad in relation to this operation and/or any other;
• Require the Israeli government to confirm whether its intelligence services were involved in the murder of Mahmoud al-Mabhouh;
• Require the Israeli government to confirm whether or not their intelligence services used falsified passports for this or any other operation or whether they have done since any assurance that they would not do so;
• Seek an assurance from the Israeli government that their intelligence operatives will never falsify passports for use in operations;
• Require the Israeli government to condemn the killing of Mahmoud al-Mabhouh as a breach of international law;
• Seek an assurance from the Israeli government that they will extradite any of those identified by the Dubai authorities as having been involved in the killing to Dubai to face trial for murder and to Ireland, Britain, France and/or Germany to face trial for offences arising out of the abuse of passports issued by those countries.

What steps should be taken to prevent this from happening in the future? If the Israeli government fails to comply with any of the requests made of them, the government could expel the Israeli ambassador from the country, break off diplomatic ties and/or impose sanctions which could deter future occurrences.

Sarah McSherry,
Human Rights Lawyer and Solicitor at Christian Khan

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¹Paul McGeough, 'Kill Khalid: The failed Mossad assassination of Khalid Mishal and the Rise of Hamas' (Quartet Books, 2009) pp 221-223
²Ibid
³Pakistani Intelligence Agency

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British Suspect Disappears from his Kibbutz

The Israeli newspaper "Yediot Ahronot" reports on the disappearance of one of the individuals whose name appears on the list of those thought to have perpetrated the assassination of the Hamas leader Mahmoud Mabhouh…

A correspondent from the newspaper visited the Kibbutz Givat Ha'shlosha where the man named James Clark lives in an attempt to locate him or just to perhaps catch a glimpse of him in the flow of people. However, according to the correspondent, some residents of the Kibbutz refused to cooperate with him in his enquiries and he was advised to leave the area while others referred to the disappeared man as a 'hero' hinting at his participation in the assassination.

The Yediot Ahronot reporter emphasised that the man in question had simply disappeared from his place of residence in Givat Ha'shlosha and that other inhabitants of the Kibbutz had been instructed not to interact or cooperate with the media. He also states that Mr. Clark "is not answering either phone calls or text messages" and confirms that "his house is completely closed and the curtains are shut."

After several failed attempts to contact Mr.Clark, the reporter wondered around the streets of the Kibbutz "trying to find symbols or signs leading me to the person; it may be that he has shaved his beard and removed his glasses. Nevertheless, the man has evaporated - simply disappeared." He adds that when he walked into a shop in the Kibbutz to buy something, "everyone went silent around him" and the shopkeeper told him: "You must understand that if we talk to you, we will be in trouble." The shopkeeper went on to say: "I can tell you that he is no longer here. He left, and you will not find him here. But I cannot say any more because this is dangerous for us. People here know him. We do not want to get involved. "

In describing the atmosphere in the Kibbutz, the correspondent reported that "the feeling of fear and panic is spreading everywhere. It seems that someone has explained to them that a single word could cause complications, and they would prefer to keep quiet for the time being."

One of the Kibbutz children playing outside told the reporter: "He has not been here for the past day; he is a very nice man, greeting me when he passes me, but I have not seen him in recent times and they told me that he left and will not be back."

The correspondent says "Anyone who knows I am a journalist stares at me angrily. There are those who asked me to take my car and leave the Kibbutz. There are those who evaded the questions impolitely."

A female resident of the Kibbutz said that Mr. Clark "has a normal job like all the rest of us" then added "is he a secret agent? You make me laugh. This family has lived here for many years. They are not secretive. They eat with us in the dining hall, and believe me if he was a secret agent, I would notice. I have an alert eye."

The reporter ends his piece by saying that when he I knocked on the door of the family home, a neighbour said to me: "Leave it. Since morning, the entire media has been trying to find him. They have left for the family home until things calm down. In all truth, I always thought they were hiding something, but I didn't know that he was a hero in this way. All respect to him. If this is true, then he is the hero of Givat Ha'shlosha"

Source: Yediot Ahronot;
Author: Dani Spector

According to Times online, James Leonard Clarke, 49, known as Jim, moved to Israel several years ago and now lives in the Kibbutz Givat Ha'shlosha in central Israel. He is originally from East Sussex. Details on the passport used in Dubai appear to match his. A spokesperson for the Kibbutz said, "It's all nonsense."


Dubai assassins left behind their "eye fingerprints"

A security analyst believes that those who carried out the assassination of Mahmoud al-Mabhouh will soon be unable to pass through any airport in the world because their iris images were recorded on entry to the emirate through Dubai International Airport. It is expected that Dubai Police Department will soon circulate the details to airports around the world via Interpol.

Dubai is considered to be one of the world's most advanced countries in the use of technology for security and surveillance. Among the equipment available to immigration officers at the airport is the latest in iris identification cameras through which a person's unique identity can be stored regardless of how much they have tried to change their outward physical appearance. The system is the most trusted of identity verification techniques. Police investigators have confirmed that all passengers entering Dubai, including the so-called "hit-squad", have full-face photographs taken as well as their iris images.

With 80 percent of its residents coming from overseas, Dubai has long been at the forefront of security systems to monitor those using the airport. Since the installation of the iris imaging equipment to record the "eye fingerprints", it is estimated that 25,000 would-be illegal immigrants have been stopped and returned to their countries of origin.

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Apparently a number of European states cannot avoid dealing with their rogue state friend...

Interpol puts Dubai killing suspects on wanted list

Hamas's Mahmoud al-Mabhouh in the Dubai hotel the day before his killing

The 11 people suspected of killing a Hamas commander in Dubai have been placed on international police organisation Interpol's wanted list.

Interpol has posted the photographs and names it suspects were used fraudulently by the individuals.

Dubai's police chief says he is 99% sure Israeli secret service agents were involved in Mahmoud al-Mabhouh's death, but Israel says there is no proof.

The UK has expressed "outrage" that six British passports were used.

Miliband vow

Interpol has issued Red Notices for the suspects. Although not an international arrest warrant, a Red Notice requests that the suspects be arrested pending extradition.

Interpol does not believe that we know the true identities of these wanted persons Ronald K Noble, Interpol secretary general Pictures of '11 Europeans' Israel's 'covert killing' history No proof of Dubai hit - Israel Why was Hamas man in Dubai?

Interpol said it believed the suspects had stolen the identities of real people and the names were used as aliases.

It said it was posting the photos and names "in order to limit the ability of accused murderers from travelling freely using the same false passports".

Interpol secretary general Ronald K Noble said: "[We do] not believe that we know the true identities of these wanted persons."

Mr Noble said he hoped the investigation process would "help to establish the innocence of the ordinary citizens and even of countries whose identities were stolen and fraudulently used".

In response to the Interpol move, Dubai police chief Dahi Khalfan Tamim called for it to issue "a Red Notice against the head of Mossad", the Israeli secret service.

Hamas killing Police in Dubai are hunting 11 people they believe are behind the killing of a senior Hamas commander. The suspects are accused of using fake passports bearing their own pictures, but the names of innocent Europeans. Six British-Israelis were among those whose identities were stolen. Three more suspects, including one woman, were travelling on false Irish passports. Two others had French and German papers. One of the victims of the identity theft was British-Israeli Paul John Keeley (pictured right). The passport used by one of the suspected assassins bore his name, but featured a photograph of another man (pictured left). Palestinian militant Mahmoud al-Mabhouh was killed in his hotel room in Dubai in January. Police claim one of the suspects, pictured on the left, went to a hotel to put on a disguise. He is seen leaving a toilet wearing a wig. Surveillance cameras also recorded Mr Mabhouh, circled in red above, at the hotel's reception before his death. At the bottom of the image the head of one of the suspects can be seen. As Mr Mabhouh leaves, the suspect follows. Mr Mabhouh is trailed into the lift by a number of the suspects, including two pictured here in tennis gear. Investigators believe he had been followed from Syria to Dubai where it is thought he wanted to buy weapons for Hamas. When Mr Mabhouh leaves the lift, police allege two of the murder suspects can be seen following him down the corridor to establish which room he was staying in. He was found dead in his room on 20 January. BACK 1 of 7 NEXT A number of Western nations, including the UK and France, have increased the pressure on Israel to provide any details it may have on the killing in a Dubai hotel on 20 January. The passports suspected to have been used fraudulently comprised six British, three Irish, and one each from France and Germany. Germany is the latest country to become involved, summoning the Israeli charge d'affaires for an explanation. [Ireland] takes grave exception to the forgery and misuse of Irish passports Micheal Martin, Irish Foreign Minister Bumpy road for relations Reactions to the British connection Irish passports real numbers The UK and Irish Republic governments summoned their Israeli ambassadors to meetings on Thursday. UK Foreign Secretary David Miliband vowed to "get to the bottom" of the case. Israel's ambassador to the UK, Ron Prosor, said he was "unable to add additional information". Irish Foreign Minister Micheal Martin said there had been "frank" talks with Israel's envoy. Mr Martin said: "Regardless of who was responsible, [Ireland] takes grave exception to the forgery and misuse of Irish passports. "The ambassador said he had no information on the matter." Israeli Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman said on Wednesday there was no evidence of Israeli involvement. He added: "Israel never responds, never confirms and never denies." Israel's UK ambassador Ron Prosor on the Dubai murder Reports have suggested Mahmoud al-Mabhouh was in Dubai to buy weapons for Hamas, the Palestinian Islamist movement. Two Palestinian suspects are being questioned about the murder. Police said the pair fled to Jordan after the killing, but were extradited back to Dubai on Sunday. The BBC's Jeremy Bowen in Dubai says in terms of Israeli involvement there is only circumstantial evidence and the fact that Mossad has a history of assassinations. He says that although none of the Dubai 11 are in custody, there are the two Palestinians and more evidence might be coming out of them. The BBC's Katya Adler in Jerusalem says more details of the two have emerged. Hamas spokesman Sami Abu Suhri told the BBC the men were members of the Palestinian Authority's security apparatus. They were originally from Gaza, he said, but fled the Strip three years ago when Hamas took over the territory. CCTV of Hamas murder suspects released by Dubai police

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Robert Fisk: Britain's explanation is riddled with inconsistencies. It's time to come clean

How could the Arabs pick up on a Mossad killing, if that is what it was? Well, we shall see

REUTERS

Mahmoud al-Mabhouh - the victim of British collusion with Israel?

Collusion. That's what it's all about. The United Arab Emirates suspect – only suspect, mark you – that Europe's "security collaboration" with Israel has crossed a line into illegality, where British passports (and those of other other EU nations) can now be used to send Israeli agents into the Gulf to kill Israel's enemies. At 3.49pm yesterday afternoon (Beirut time, 1.49pm in London), my Lebanese phone rang. It was a source – impeccable, I know him, he spoke with the authority I know he has in Abu Dhabi – to say that "the British passports are real. They are hologram pictures with the biometric stamp. They are not forged or fake. The names were really there. If you can fake a hologram or biometric stamp, what does this mean?"

The voice – I know the man and his origins well – wants to talk. "There are 18 people involved in the killing of Mahmoud al-Mabhouh. Besides the 11 already named, there are two Palestinians who are being interrogated and five others, including a woman. She was part of the team that staked out the hotel lobby." Two hours later, an SMS arrives on my Beirut phone from Abu Dhabi, the capital of the United Arab Emirates. It is the same source.

"ONE MORE THING," it says in capital letters, then continues in lower case. "The command room of the operation was in Austria (sic, in fact, all things are "sic" in this report)... meaning the suspects when here did not talk to each other but thru the command room on separate lines to avoid detection or linking themselves to one another... but it was detected and identified OK??" OK? I ask myself.

My source is both angry and insistent. "We have sent out details of the 11 named people to Interpol. Interpol has circulated them to 188 countries – but why hasn't Britain warned foreign nations that these people are using passports in these names?" There was more to come.

"We have identified five credit cards belonging to these people, all issued in the United States." The man will not give the EU nationalities of the extra five – this would make two women involved in Mr Mabhouh's murder. He said that EU countries were cooperating with the UAE, including the UK. But "not one of the countries we have been speaking to has notified Interpol of the passports used in their name. Why not?"

Video: UK demands Israel answers

The source insisted that one of the names on a passport – the name of a man who denies any knowledge of its use – has travelled on it in Asia (probably Indonesia) and EU countries over the past year. The Emirates have proof that an American entered their country in June 2006 on a British passport issued in the name of a UK citizen who was already in prison in the Emirates. The Emirates claim that the passport of an Israeli agent sent to kill a Hamas leader in Jordan was a genuine Canadian passport issued to a dual national of Israel.

Intelligence agencies – who in the view of this correspondent are often very unintelligent – have long used false passports. Oliver North and Robert McFarlane travelled to Iran to seek the release of US hostages in Lebanon on passports that were previously stolen from the Irish embassy in Athens. But the Emirates' new information may make some European governments draw in their breath – and they had better have good replies to the questions. Intelligence services – Arab, Israeli, European or American – often adopt an arrogant attitude towards those from whom they wish to hide. How could the Arabs pick up on a Mossad killing, if that is what it was? Well, we shall see.

Collusion is a word the Arabs understand. It speaks of the 1956 Suez War, when Britain and France cooperated with Israel to invade Egypt. Both London and Paris denied the plot. They were lying. But for an Arab Gulf country which suspects its former masters (the UK, by name) may have connived in the murder of a visiting Hamas official, this is apparently now too much. There is much more to come out of this story. We will wait to see if there are any replies in Europe.

More from Robert Fisk

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Print How did the assassins obtain British Passports?

Gordon Brown promises a full investigation as to how an assassination squad completed their murderous mission with the use of British passports

The involvement of six British passport holders in the killing of senior Hamas official, Mahmoud Al-Mabhouh, last month in Dubai was described in the Guardian today as "an extraordinary tale of modern-day espionage." The Brits in question have denied any part in the assassination and have proclaimed their innocence stating that their passports must have been forged, a line of argument that the British Foreign Office seems to be supporting. Prime Minister Gordon Brown today promised that a full investigation will be launched into the connection of the British passports with the murder. His intervention, viewed by some as belated, demonstrates the gravity of the situation and the serious diplomatic and international ramifications that may now stem from this one event.

All the hallmarks of a Mossad assassination

Whether or not these particular individuals were actually involved is yet to be seen but what is clear is that when such a high profile Hamas figure is murdered, there is really only one logical culprit; Mossad. For 21 years this individual had eluded the Israelis. Who else stands to gain from the death of Mabhouh to such a degree that they would employ an assassination squad of at least 11 killers? The Telegraph today confirmed that "in the past year, Al-Mabhouh had moved to the top of Mossad's list of targets." Mossad already has a well established record of assassinations and botched operations against high profile senior Hamas officials, the attempt on the life of Khalid Mishal in 1997 being just one example. That failed attempt was carried out on the watch of then Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and it looks as though under his watch Mossad may be implicated once again.

Mossad agents also have a track record of using passports from other countries to circumvent the obvious obstacle they would face when trying to enter an Arab country with an Israeli passport. This has been a clearly documented Mossad tactic. Author Paul McGeough gives some examples in his book "Kill Khalid - The failed Mossad assassination of Khalid Mishal and the rise of Hamas" when he discussed the case of the would-be assassins of Khalid Mishal.

He writes,

"Shawn Kendall and Barry Beads, whose identities had been assumed by the Mossad agents arrested in Amman, were Canadian Jews living in Israel who had been asked if their passport details might be "borrowed" by one of the Israeli security services. These were not isolated cases. A former Canadian kibbutznik emerged to reveal that Israeli agents had gathered up passports on a kibbutz where he had worked in the late 1970s and early 1980s. A Canadian diplomat in the region would explain later that the Israeli authorities had proved adept at extracting current or expired passports by pressuring Canadian passport holders living in Israel to view their willingness to lend their identities to the authorities as a test of their loyalty to Israel."(p.222)

Similarly he also recounts how

"In 1974, about fifty blank Canadian passports disappeared from a vault at the Canadian Embassy in Vienna. In Nicosia a year later, Cypriot authorities seized the kit of a Mossad team after a hotel bombing in which a Palestinian guerrilla leader was killed. The passport used by one of the Israeli hit men bore a number that revealed it to be from among the fifty stolen in Vienna."(p.221)

The murder of Al-Mabhouh certainly bears many of the hallmarks of a Mossad attack, but what does this mean for Britain and what are the implications this murder has for our country in terms of our relationship with Israel and the larger Arab world?

Scenario One - Mossad are compromising the safety of British citizens

There are two likely scenarios. The first scenario is that the dual British-Israeli citizens are telling the truth, are wholly innocent and had nothing to do with the murder, in which case the killers somehow managed to steal their identities and obtain their passports via forgery, theft etc.. If, as the British Foreign Office are claiming, their passports were forged then this raises questions relating to the British Home Office and their security measures regarding the identities of its citizens. How was this allowed to happen?

It raises serious concerns relating to the laxity that the government has previously shown towards the personal information of its citizens. To give just a few examples, in 2008 alone Alistair Darling, the Chancellor, had to admit that CDs with the private details of 25 million child benefit claimants and their parents had "gone missing" in the post; Ruth Kelly, the Transport Secretary, announced that a hard disk containing the private information relating to three million learner drivers had gone missing; and Jacqui Smith confirmed that a private firm had downloaded the details of thousands of criminals held on a memory stick. Such breaches in security relating to the way our private information is held becomes more ominous when events like this occur and we are forced to ask, into who's hands does such "lost" information fall and for what nefarious purposes can it be used.

Scenario Two - British citizens involvement in the operation

The second is that the British people in question are involved, in one way or another, as the Dubai authorities claimed after revealing their passport details. Such involvement may entail them having provided genuine passports as was the case in the failed assassination attempt of Khalid Mishal by two Israeli-Canadian citizens. If that is so, and it remains to be seen whether that is in fact the case, taking into consideration that the Israeli-British citizens deny any knowledge or participation in this operation, it falls on the British authorities, as in any other crime involving its citizens, to launch a full investigation into the facts. It is not enough to take protestations of innocence at face value in a high profile case such as this, one which could become the catalyst for sparking off more international tensions in an already inflamed region. A thorough investigation is certainly required. No stone must be left unturned. If it materialises that they are involved, in any way, it raises serious questions as to why British citizens were doing Israel's dirty work in the first place.

Furthermore, in light of the special relationship that exists between Israel and Britain and shared intelligence resources, were the killers acting with the knowledge and complicity of persons within the British establishment or were they able to operate under the radar of British intelligence? As Robert Fisk rightly asks, why did the British government not react immediately after the Dubai authorities informed them about these passports six days before they made it public? In all cases, this is an issue of grave concern for all British citizens and a matter of serious widespread implication for our government.

What is striking about the media coverage thus far is how easy it has been for the dual Israeli-British citizens involved in this saga to shift attention away from themselves. The press largely seem to have taken their explanation at face value and have run with the stolen identity angle raising no other possibilities. It begs the question that if these were British Muslim defendants who had been identified as assassins through their passports, would the media be quite so forgiving before a throughout investigation had been launched? Unlikely.

It should also raise a serious red flag for the British government if one of their staunchest allies, without their knowledge or complicity, stole and used the identities of British citizens to enter a foreign land and commit a murder which has now put the lives of those citizens, and indeed the safety of all Brits travelling abroad, in serious jeopardy.

Furthermore, it is well known that, if Mossad carried out this act, which seems to be entirely plausible, then they did so with the full knowledge and approval of the Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu who would have signed off on the mission. The Telegraph today cites Meir Amit, the ex-Director of Mossad who said "Each execution must be sanctioned by the incumbent prime minister. Any execution is therefore state-sponsored." If that is indeed the case, then once again, Britain must surely revaluate its relationship with Israel, a country whose military has not only been found to have committed war crimes but also does not hesitate to send out its own agents disguised as British citizens to carry out extra-judicial killings, murders, in foreign lands.

Former Liberal Democrat leader Sir Menzies Campbell and current member of the Commons Foreign Affairs Committee this morning called on the Foreign Office to demand an urgent explanation from the Israeli authorities. "If the Israeli government was party to behaviour of this kind it would be a serious violation of trust between nations," he said. "If legitimate British passport holders were put at risk it would be a disgrace. Given the current speculation, the Israeli government has some explaining to do and the ambassador should be summoned to the Foreign Office to do so in double-quick time."

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The murder of Mahmoud Al Mabhouh

Footage from CCTV cameras shows a chronological timeline of the events that took place on the day that Hamas commander Mahmoud Al Mabhouh was assassinated.

* Footage supplied by The Media Office of Dubai Government

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Mossad is supposed to gather intelligence, not sow death

By Gideon Levy, Haaretz Correspondent

Let's suppose the Dubai assassination project had worked out well. Mahmoud al-Mabhouh would have received his kiss of death, the assassins would have returned safe and sound to their bases, and no Israeli would have run into identity complications. And then? Mahmoud's place would have been taken by Mohammed, who also would have tried to kill Israeli soldiers and smuggle Iranian arms into Gaza. Perhaps the heir would even outperform his predecessor, as has happened in several previous liquidations. We eliminated Abbas al-Musawi? Well done, Israel Defense Forces. We got Hassan Nasrallah. We killed Ahmed Yassin? Well done, Shin Bet security service. We got a Hamas many times stronger. Abu Jihad was eliminated? Well done to the Sayeret Matkal special forces unit - of course, according to foreign news reports. We killed a potential partner, relatively moderate and charismatic. As a bonus, we got revenge attacks like those after "the Engineer" Yihyeh Ayash was slain. We also got the danger hovering over every Israeli and Jew in the world each anniversary of the assassination of Imad Mughniyeh, which was also blamed on Israel.

Let's suppose the Dubai operation had worked out well and the suspicion that the Mossad had a hand in it proved correct. Do we really want to live in a country that has death squads, that sends the cream of its youth to suffocate people with pillows in hotel rooms, that has a man who craves adventurous actions as head of its intelligence organization and a man who approves them as its prime minister?
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What do these liquidators tell their children when they get home safe and sound? That today they killed someone with a pillow? That they dressed up as tennis players, just like in the movies? And what do they say to themselves when they look in the mirror? That all's fair and right in the war on terror? That they have made a contribution to the state's security?

And what would have happened if they killed the wrong guy? It does happen. It happened in Lillehammer in 1973, for example. And what if their operation endangered Israelis and got the country into a mess?

Although assassinations are neither effective nor legal and sometimes not moral - when the target is a political leader or someone who could have been detained - we have not only awarded the assassins a kashrut certificate but also an aura of heroism. Oh, how proud we could have been of those stranglers of Dubai if they had only pulled off their mission without entangling some innocent Israelis whose identities were stolen.

How we love winking at each other and feeling proud of the Mossad, whose long arm can reach any hotel, according to foreign news reports. How we love being the Israeli Rambo, all blue and white, who long ago replaced the cartoon figure Srulik in his innocent kova tembel bucket hat as our image of who we are. Between you and me, what are we prouder of, the cherry tomatoes we developed here or assassinations?

There's no difference between the assassins by the Border Police or the Duvdevan unit that kills wanted people in the occupied territories, and the daring hush-hush assassins of Dubai. The only debate since Dubai is about whether it was a snafu. But the real snafu is that assassinations have long been a legitimate weapon: no doubts and no questions asked, all without the true designation - executions.

Only a few weeks have passed since the finest security pundits were wallowing in well-orchestrated magazine cover stories and articles of appreciation for the head of the Mossad, Meir Dagan. These pieces almost totally ignored his dark past in Gaza and Lebanon and adulated his adventurism. We have long forgotten that the Mossad is supposed to be an intelligence-gathering organization, not one that sows death, and that a lawful state does not operate hit squads. To the roars of approval by the pundits, Dagan has just been given another year on job, his eighth. Why? Partly because he's a specialist at liquidation.

But we shouldn't complain about Dagan. He has the right to propose reckless operations to his heart's desire, of the kind that will earn him and his organization compliments and budgets. The responsibility for liquidations lies with the person who approves them, namely Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who learned nothing from the Khaled Meshal fiasco in 1997 and has struck again (if indeed Israel did it) - yet another margin note for the debate about whether Bibi has changed, whether there's a "new Netanyahu."

We can believe that the Mossad actually carried out everything that has been ascribed to it, and we can even agree that Mabhouh deserved to die. It's also possible to understand the desire to take revenge and punish him, as well as the need to combat weapons smuggling into Gaza. We can also continue ignoring, as is our wont, the motive for terrorism: the Israeli occupation. But after the liquidation of Mabhouh with a pillow, we are left in a country that not only dispatches assassins, but in which no questions are asked afterward.

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