The Mullahs in Iran declared war on Israel in particular and the West in general. They failed the most important component in this war, which is Israel’s intelligence.
One of the most important components of fighting a war is to be able to gather intelligence of one’s enemy. Such information supports one’s deterrence and also leads to successful operations, possibly deep inside the enemy’s lines.
The Mossad Insignia
The insignia of the Mossad, Israel’s intelligence agency, is a blue menorah with blue Hebrew writing surrounding it, along with the organization’s motto from the Bible: “Where no counsel is, the people fall, but in the multitude of counselors there is safety.” ~ Proverbs 11:14.
The menorah is a symbol of Judaism and universal enlightenment, and its shape is said to come from the seven-branches of the moriah plant. The emblem may also be based on a vision from the biblical prophet Zechariah, Zechariah Book Chapter 4, who described seeing a menorah flanked by two olive trees.
Israel’s intelligence Vs Iran’s
Israel Mossad, the Institute for Intelligence and Special Operations, is the national intelligence agency of the State of Israel. The Mossad along with Israel’s Military Intelligence, abbreviation Aman and the Shin Bet (Security Services) make up the Israeli Intelligence Community.
The Mossad gained a James Bond kind of name.
While Israel has time and again proven to excell in the area of intelligence, Israel’s main foe, Iran, has not been able to penetrate Israel’s barricade of intelligence secrecy.
Just six days before the assassination of Hamas political leader Ismail Haniyeh, what proves this point are the words of Ismail Khatib, the outgoing Iranian Minister of Intelligence who claimed the following in his “secret” room in Tehran: “Dismantling the Mossad’s infiltration network in Iran is the greatest achievement during my tenure.”
Haniyeh’s assassination proves that this quote really had a very short shelf-life!
The Secrecy of Espionage
No one can attest how exactly Israel pulls off its attacks on Iranian and Iran-run proxies. One can only infer that this masterwork is being done by Israel exploiting locals who hold grudges against Israel’s enemies, their regimes. There is no shortage of those aiders and abettors, while one can count on one hand the Israelis who have spied on Israel for its enemies.
Since the state of Israel’s inception in 1948, the rebirth of the Jewish nation’s 3rd Commonwealth, Israel’s intelligence has found its way into Iran and its tentacles, Hezbollah, Hamas, Houthis and others locals. While those locals seem to be supporters of their regime, they are actually happy to cooperate with the Mossad and leak important intelligence.
Infiltration
I am prepared to bet that most of the Mossad agents speak Arabic or Farsi, the language of Iran, as fluently as a native of an Arab state or of Iran.
This gives Israel intelligence advantage in its wars. The Mossad agents, posing as locals, are able to infiltrate and blend in with their enemy’s local population. On the other hand Israel’s enemies will find it a much more difficult task to speak Hebrew like a native Israeli and thus be able to infiltrate and blend in with Israeli society.
One can remember well the case of the successful Mossad operation that retrieved Iran’s nuclear archive which is part of Israel’s constant attempts to block Tehran’s path to attain a nuclear bomb.
Apparently it took 24 agents and six and a half hours to successfully retrieve the archive.
The book “Target Tehran: How Israel Is Using Sabotage, Cyberwarfare, Assassination – and Secret Diplomacy – to Stop a Nuclear Iran and Create a New Middle East” details Israel’s efforts using sabotage, assassination, cyberwar-and diplomacy-to thwart Iran’s development of nuclear weapons and, in the process, also attempting to reshape the Middle East.
Iran often finds scapegoats to blame for espionage for Israel. For instance, on December 16, 2023 Iran executed an individual accused of spying for Israel, following a death sentence issued by the judiciary.
In its latest, as reported by the New York Times (NYT), Iran began a sweeping intensive investigation and arrested dozens in search for suspects in the killing of Ismail Haniyeh, the Hamas leader. So far, more than 20 people were secretly arrested, including workers at the guest house where Haniyeh was staying and where he was assassinated, without a word in Iran’s media. This is all a clear sign of how damaging and shocking the security failure was.
Comparing Intelligence Capability
If one compares Israel’s intelligence work with, for example, the United States, Iranian and other hostile agents easily infiltrated the US task force that dealt, for example, with negotiations with Iran. The most blatant example is the hushed-up Robert Malley scandal.
The FBI is still investigating the Biden administration’s Iran envoy, Rob Malley, accused of allegedly moving classified information onto his personal email and thus it may have fallen into the hands of a foreign actor.
The reason being, blending foreign agents in with America’s local population is an easy task. Many Americans speak the main language English with an accent and thus such manner of speech does not raise any suspicion. A foreign agent, a spy, speaking with an accent and living next door will pass as one’s unsuspected neighbor who would be greeted and treated in a friendly manner.
In Israel, a Robert Malley type of scandal would become a shattering social earthquake. Steps would have been taken to quickly remedy the situation and close all the gaps that led to such a scandal.
In the US, Malley’s scandal made the news for a week and then was hushed-up and literally forgotten with the help of the left-leaning media that protects its puppeteers, the Democrat Party.
Going back to the Mossad’s Hollywood James Bond style activities. When Israelis wake up in the morning to learn that Mahmoud al-Mabhouh, the co-founder of the Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Brigades, the military wing of Hamas, was assassinated in a hotel room in Dubai on January 19, 2010; or, on August 2, 2021 the agency’s operatives broke into the building where the nuclear program archive trove was housed in January of that year, and removed the files and disks, and smuggled it out of Iran in a speedy operation; or, that Ismail Haniyeh, the political leader of Hamas, was assassinated along with his personal bodyguard, in the Iranian capital Tehran on July 31, 2024, they know full well that their intelligence agencies, tasked to protect them, do not slumber nor sleep.
