Debacle or success? experts do

Debacle or success? experts doubt Mossad's role in Dubai assassination

Israeli analysts on the Mossad cast doubt on international reports assuming the legendary spook shop is behind the killing of top Hamas commander, Mahmoud al- Mabhouh in a Dubai hotel room on January 19, and whether the operation was even a success.

MOSSAD KILLS AL-MABHOUH?

"The bottom line is that the whole world, not just Hamas and not just the chief of the Dubai police are 100 percent convinced that Israel's foreign intelligence network - the Mossad - is behind the assassination."

So charged Dr. Ronen Bergman, the author of "The Secret War with Iran," and chief investigative reporter for Yediot Aharonot, Israel's largest daily newspaper.

"I don't know who's behind the assassination, and even if I knew I wouldn't be able to tell you," Bergman told Xinhua Monday in an exclusive interview, hinting at his sources in the Jewish State's security echelon. But he is highly critical of the operation, no matter the outcome.

Bergman dismissed most reports outside of Israel claiming to know specifics details of the case, and particulars about the Mossad units thought involved. When all the details of the case come to light many such articles will be found to be far off the mark, he said.

"I would put a massive question mark above these reports, that they belong to 'Caesaria,' or 'Kidon,'" or any other presumed Mossad liquidation squad, Bergman said.

Everyone connected to the Mossad and the Israeli government kept mum on the story, however, preferring to allow the clandestine deeds to speak for them.

"With Xinhua I am only prepared to talk about relations between Israel and China," laughed former Mossad chief Danny Yatom in a telephone interview with Xinhua.

However, that refusal to comment is also adding to the belief that Israel ordered the assassination of a man who is said to have killed Israelis and planned many attacks against Israeli targets.

Al-Mabhouh is thought to have played a key role in forming connections between Hamas and the Islamic Revolution Guards in Iran. He also held a major role in the coordination of arms shipments - including Iranian-made long-range rockets that can reach Tel Aviv, the country's financial and cultural hub - from Iran to the Gaza Strip via Sudan and Egypt, to the Sinai Peninsula.

THE "INSTITUTE"

The word "Mossad" means "Institute," and the anonymous Dubai assassins, as in other operations throughout the Mideast and Europe, are widely hailed by the Israelis; their techniques have been fodder for scores of spy novels and films.

In comparison to the CIA and British MI-6, the Israeli agency is considered tiny, an estimated 1,200 personnel - both men and women - in total. Most serve at Mossad's headquarters near Tel Aviv in intelligence analysis, regional desks, clerical and logistical roles. The minority comprises the organization's operational units tasked with collecting intelligence around the globe and recruiting foreign sources. A mere fraction of that minority will be sent on assassination missions, which are considered very rare.

The ultimate weapon in Mossad's arsenal are "combatants," as they are known, who belong to a body known as "The Unit." The unit had many names over the years, like "Massada," but its most famous code name has been and remains "Caesarea," Mossad's special operations division.

Candidates designated for service with "Caesarea" embark on a rigorous one-to-two-year training course. Along the path to becoming certified field agents, trainees learn a host of skills: how to build and maintain a credible cover story, tailing a subject and avoiding a tail, clandestine photography, encrypted communication techniques, unarmed combat, operating various vehicles, and extensive training in weapons, explosives and an assortment of killing methods, to name a few.

The Dubai hit squad, which included two women, tailed al- Mabhouh for long hours, carefully observing his every step. Dubai's police chief, Colonel Dahi Khalfan Tamim, revealed in a conversation with Yediot Aharonot, that some of the assassins visited Dubai twice in the past three months, when al-Mabhouh entered the emirate using a forged Iraqi passport.

It is tempting to point the finger at Mossad, as Bergman and others alluded. A recreation of the assassins' every move in Dubai, established through piecing together dozens of hours of film by surveillance cameras, is in line with the Israeli agency's modus operandi. The hit squad's members arrived in Dubai and left on separate flights. They stayed at different hotels and orchestrated their lethal "dance" around their victim in small teams - a classic Mossad methodology.

TACTICAL OR STRATEGIC SUCCESS?

Israel's leading military and intelligence analysts are at odds over whether al-Mabhouh's assassination was a success or failure. Most crowned it a success. The mission, they said, was completed and all the agents returned home safely. But some of Mossad's methods were revealed on tape and the assassins were exposed, thus ending their ability to continue operating abroad.

Bergman thought the operation could only be termed a success on the tactical level.

"Al-Mabhouh is dead and the 11 or 12 perpetrators are long gone and the Dubai police are chasing the wind - they will never be able to catch them," Bergman said.

Al-Mabhouh's body was found in his Dubai hotel room - which was locked from the inside - 14 hours after his death. By that time, his assassins had long vanished, unharmed.

Xinhua also spoke with two leading international intelligence experts, both said the evidence would suggest that the Mossad played a role in the mission. However, they differ as to whether this was a successful operation.

"Their target is no longer alive, is he?" said Francis Tusa, editor of the London-based Defense Analysis newsletter.

He added though, there is a good chance the suspects caught on camera might not be able to work in the field again and certainly not in the United Arab Emirates.

That fact made this a seriously botched operation, according to Theodore Karasik, research and development director at the Dubai- based Institute for Near East & Gulf Military Analysis.

"This does indeed look like a Mossad operation but it is probably one of the more sloppy Mossad operations ever, if it is indeed Mossad," he said.

Bergman largely agreed.

"The diplomatic blunder, the damage to the covert relations of Israel with other countries, like Germany, like France, like Britain... this could not be termed a success."

The fallout from the hit will lead to "an ongoing diplomatic and covert blunder in which everybody views Israel as being in violation of the sovereignty of Dubai, and of other numerous laws of international judicial agreements," Bergman warned.

The British Foreign Ministry is "outraged" while the Irish Foreign Ministry is "fuming." The French, German and Austrian governments, too, are demanding immediate clarifications. Hamas, for its part, has vowed revenge.

But while diplomatic tensions between Israel and some foreign governments following the killing may be high, many Western - and Arab - observers are awe-struck by Israel's spy craft, the kind that enables them to reach anyone, anywhere, at any time.

"I have no clue who killed al-Mabhouh", a former Mossad agent told Xinhua on condition of anonymity, "but I am certain that he will not be missed by many."