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- 18 apr 2011
Ben Ali accused of spying for Israel
Deposed Tunisian President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali
The bodyguard of deposed Tunisian President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali has revealed that the ousted president was allegedly spying for the Israeli intelligence service, Mossad.
He accused Ben Ali, his wife and his son-in-law plus a number of senior Tunisian security officials of spying for Israel, IRNA quoted the bodyguard as telling the Algerian al Shorouk newspaper.
Back in 1991, Leila Trabelsi, Ben Ali's wife, instructed two Tunisian intelligence agents to assassinate a Tunisian businessman who was one of Ben Ali's closest friends, said the bodyguard.
Leila was also involved in the assassination of several Palestinian leaders in Tunisia, added Ben Ali's bodyguard.
Ben Ali's son-in-law was also involved in the murder of a 4-year-old girl in 1992, added his bodyguard.
Investigations carried out by the Tunisian security apparatus showed he had commissioned somebody to commit the crime, Ben Ali's bodyguard added.
http://www.presstv.com/detail/175421.html 18 may 2011, 09:30 , Respect -
Maria 16 mei 2011
Mossad operated in heart of London?
According to the Daily Telegraph , Mossad's secret agents followed a Syrian official , broke into his hotel room in London, and stole the diplomat's documents , while UK government was totally indifferent.
Britain took one more supportive step in favor of Israel, as it was thoroughly unconcerned over Mossad, the Israeli secret service's London operation in 2006.
The Israeli secret service seemingly had planned to assassinate the Syrian official but averted the plan fearing the huge diplomatic rift with the British government.
The Daily Telegraph reports : the secret service had sent three secret teams to London including a group of spotters that were dispatched to Heathrow airport to spot the official when he arrived from Damascus . The second team was staying in the hotel, and the third kept an eye on his visitors and his actions.
The secret agents were the members of Kidon [Spear], Mossad's hit squad, and the Neviot [Springs] section who were the professional members in breaking into embassies, and hotel rooms to install bugging tools.
The Kidon team were following the Syrian diplomat in London when the Neviot agents entered his room, and stole the data on his laptop.
While the analysts spot mirror similarities between the London operation and the assassination of Mahmud al-Mabhouh who was assassinated in his hotel room in Dubai by Israeli hit squad using British cloned passports , there remains serious questions about the British government leniency over a foreign spying agency operation on British soil or using the cloned British passports in an assassination plot.
http://www.presstv.com/detail/180280.html 12 jun 2011, 17:51 , Respect -
Maria 9 juni 2011
Ex-Mossad chief: Purity of arms eroded
Former Mossad Chief Zvi Zamir
In interview with Israel Army Radio Zvi Zamir criticizes decision to open fire on Syrian protestors on 'Naksa Day,' discusses recent remarks made by Meir Dagan.
Zvi Zamir, Israel's Mossad chief in the years 1968-1974 is criticizing the government over its way of handling the 'Naksa Day' events which saw 23 Syrian protestors killed.
In an interview with Israel Army Radio, Zamir attacked the decision to open fire at the Syrian protestors who tried to breach the border fence and said: "I'm concerned by the fact that soldiers, my grandchildren, are firing at unarmed people."
Zamir said: "I believe that if the barbed wire fence was 30 meters (100 foot) wide then they wouldn't be able to pass through it and we could have prevented the events without opening fire. We are eroding the purity of arms."
During the interview, Zamir also addressed the "Dagan affair" that broke 10 days ago following comments made by former Mossad Chief Meir Dagan. Zamir defended Dagan but also noted that he was surprised by the way Dagan chose to express his opinions.
"I'm sure Dagan was distressed and that could be seen in the way he expressed himself. Formally speaking, he hasn't broken any laws, though he may have broken some ethically. I can't recall a Mossad chief that had this kind of outburst. I was as shocked as any reader and wondered why this was in the newspaper but he didn't reveal any secrets."
'Lessons not utilized'
Former Mossad Chief Meir Dagan - distressed?
Recollecting his own term as Mossad head, Zamir said that he had been in a similar situation during the Yom Kippur War. "Everyone thought we were heading for war and I couldn't break through the inability of the defense minister, military intelligence director and chief of staff to see other options, it was impossible."
Zamir noted that "the lessons of the 1973 war haven't been implemented and I cannot forgive that, I am a part of that. There is disregard and misunderstanding by the echelons who should be aware that it rests upon our shoulders."
http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-4079941,00.html 12 jun 2011, 17:54 , Respect -
Maria 10 juni 2011
Israel Is Spying In And On The U.S.? Part 1
Published: 12/12/01 FOX News. These items have since been removed from the FOX News web site
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JWpWc_suPWo
BRIT HUME, HOST: It has been more than 16 years since a civilian working for the Navy was charged with passing secrets to Israel. Jonathan Pollard pled guilty to conspiracy to commit espionage and is serving a life sentence. At first, Israeli leaders claimed Pollard was part of a rogue operation, but later took responsibility for his work.
Now Fox News has learned some U.S. investigators believe that there are Israelis again very much engaged in spying in and on the U.S., who may have known things they didn't tell us before September 11. Fox News correspondent Carl Cameron has details in the first of a four-part series.
Author Carl Cameron Investigates
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
CARL CAMERON, FOX NEWS CORRESPONDENT: Since September 11, more than 60 Israelis have been arrested or detained, either under the new patriot anti-terrorism law, or for immigration violations. A handful of active Israeli military were among those detained, according to investigators, who say some of the detainees also failed polygraph questions when asked about alleged surveillance activities against and in the United States.
There is no indication that the Israelis were involved in the 9-11 attacks, but investigators suspect that they Israelis may have gathered intelligence about the attacks in advance, and not shared it. A highly placed investigator said there are "tie-ins." But when asked for details, he flatly refused to describe them, saying, "evidence linking these Israelis to 9-11 is classified. I cannot tell you about evidence that has been gathered. It's classified information."
Fox News has learned that one group of Israelis, spotted in North Carolina recently, is suspected of keeping an apartment in California to spy on a group of Arabs who the United States is also investigating for links to terrorism. Numerous classified documents obtained by Fox News indicate that even prior to September 11, as many as 140 other Israelis had been detained or arrested in a secretive and sprawling investigation into suspected espionage by Israelis in the United States.
Investigators from numerous government agencies are part of a working group that's been compiling evidence since the mid '90s. These documents detail hundreds of incidents in cities and towns across the country that investigators say, "may well be an organized intelligence gathering activity."
The first part of the investigation focuses on Israelis who say they are art students from the University of Jerusalem and Bazala Academy. They repeatedly made contact with U.S. government personnel, the report says, by saying they wanted to sell cheap art or handiwork.
Documents say they, "targeted and penetrated military bases." The DEA, FBI and dozens of government facilities, and even secret offices and unlisted private homes of law enforcement and intelligence personnel. The majority of those questioned, "stated they served in military intelligence, electronic surveillance intercept and or explosive ordinance units."
Another part of the investigation has resulted in the detention and arrests of dozens of Israelis at American mall kiosks, where they've been selling toys called Puzzle Car and Zoom Copter. Investigators suspect a front.
Shortly after The New York Times and Washington Post reported the Israeli detentions last months, the carts began vanishing. Zoom Copter's Web page says, "We are aware of the situation caused by thousands of mall carts being closed at the last minute. This in no way reflects the quality of the toy or its salability. The problem lies in the operators' business policies."
Why would Israelis spy in and on the U.S.? A general accounting office investigation referred to Israel as country A and said, "According to a U.S. intelligence agency, the government of country A conducts the most aggressive espionage operations against the U.S. of any U.S. ally."
A defense intelligence report said Israel has a voracious appetite for information and said, "the Israelis are motivated by strong survival instincts which dictate every possible facet of their political and economical policies. It aggressively collects military and industrial technology and the U.S. is a high priority target."
The document concludes: "Israel possesses the resources and technical capability to achieve its collection objectives."
(END VIDEO CLIP)
A spokesman for the Israeli embassy here in Washington issued a denial saying that any suggestion that Israelis are spying in or on the U.S. is "simply not true." There are other things to consider. And in the days ahead, we'll take a look at the U.S. phone system and law enforcement's methods for wiretaps. And an investigation that both have been compromised by our friends overseas.
HUME: Carl, what about this question of advanced knowledge of what was going to happen on 9-11? How clear are investigators that some Israeli agents may have known something?
CAMERON: It's very explosive information, obviously, and there's a great deal of evidence that they say they have collected — none of it necessarily conclusive. It's more when they put it all together. A bigger question, they say, is how could they not have know? Almost a direct quote.
HUME: Going into the fact that they were spying on some Arabs, right?
CAMERON: Correct.
HUME: All right, Carl, thanks very much. http://fwd4.me/03dy
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KhAEjSQghj8
Part 2 13/12/01
Last time we reported on the approximately 60 Israelis who had been detained in connection with the Sept. 11 terrorism investigation. Carl Cameron reported that U.S. investigators suspect that some of these Israelis were spying on Arabs in this country, and may have turned up information on the planned terrorist attacks back in September that was not passed on.
Tonight, in the second of four reports on spying by Israelis in the U.S., we learn about an Israeli-based private communications company, for whom a half-dozen of those 60 detained suspects worked. American investigators fear information generated by this firm may have fallen into the wrong hands and had the effect of impeded the Sept. 11 terror inquiry. Here's Carl Cameron's second report.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
CARL CAMERON, FOX NEWS CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Fox News has learned that some American terrorist investigators fear certain suspects in the Sept. 11 attacks may have managed to stay ahead of them, by knowing who and when investigators are calling on the telephone. How?
By obtaining and analyzing data that's generated every time someone in the U.S. makes a call.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: What city and state, please?
CAMERON: Here's how the system works. Most directory assistance calls, and virtually all call records and billing in the U.S. are done for the phone companies by Amdocs Ltd., an Israeli-based private elecommunications company.
Amdocs has contracts with the 25 biggest phone companies in America, and more worldwide. The White House and other secure government phone lines are protected, but it is virtually impossible to make a call on normal phones without generating an Amdocs record of it.
In recent years, the FBI and other government agencies have investigated Amdocs more than once. The firm has repeatedly and adamantly denied any security breaches or wrongdoing. But sources tell Fox News that in 1999, the super secret national security agency, headquartered in northern Maryland, issued what's called a Top Secret sensitive compartmentalized information report, TS/SCI, warning that records of calls in the United States were getting into foreign hands – in Israel, in particular.
Investigators don't believe calls are being listened to, but the data about who is calling whom and when is plenty valuable in itself. An internal Amdocs memo to senior company executives suggests just how Amdocs generated call records could be used. “Widespread data mining techniques and algorithms.... combining both the properties of the customer (e.g., credit rating) and properties of the specific ‘behavior….’” Specific behavior, such as who the customers are calling.
The Amdocs memo says the system should be used to prevent phone fraud. But U.S. counterintelligence analysts say it could also be used to spy through the phone system. Fox News has learned that the N.S.A has held numerous classified conferences to warn the F.B.I. and C.I.A. how Amdocs records could be used. At one NSA briefing, a diagram by the Argon national lab was used to show that if the phone records are not secure, major security breaches are possible.
Another briefing document said, "It has become increasingly apparent that systems and networks are vulnerable.…Such crimes always involve unauthorized persons, or persons who exceed their authorization...citing on exploitable vulnerabilities."
Those vulnerabilities are growing, because according to another briefing, the U.S. relies too much on foreign companies like Amdocs for high-tech equipment and software. "Many factors have led to increased dependence on code developed overseas.... We buy rather than train or develop solutions."
U.S. intelligence does not believe the Israeli government is involved in a misuse of information, and Amdocs insists that its data is secure. What U.S. government officials are worried about, however, is the possibility that Amdocs data could get into the wrong hands, particularly organized crime. And that would not be the first thing that such a thing has happened. Fox News has documents of a 1997 drug trafficking case in Los Angeles, in which telephone information, the type that Amdocs collects, was used to "completely compromise the communications of the FBI, the Secret Service, the DEO and the LAPD."
We'll have that and a lot more in the days ahead – Brit.
HUME: Carl, I want to take you back to your report last night on those 60 Israelis who were detained in the anti-terror investigation, and the suspicion that some investigators have that they may have picked up information on the 9/11 attacks ahead of time and not passed it on.
There was a report, you'll recall, that the Mossad, the Israeli intelligence agency, did indeed send representatives to the U.S. to warn, just before 9/11, that a major terrorist attack was imminent. How does that leave room for the lack of a warning?
CAMERON: I remember the report, Brit. We did it first internationally right here on your show on the 14th. What investigators are saying is that that warning from the Mossad was nonspecific and general, and they believe that it may have had something to do with the desire to protect what are called sources and methods in the intelligence community. The suspicion being, perhaps those sources and methods were taking place right here in the United States.
The question came up in select intelligence committee on Capitol Hill today. They intend to look into what we reported last night, and specifically that possibility – Brit.
HUME: So in other words, the problem wasn't lack of a warning, the problem was lack of useful details?
CAMERON: Quantity of information.
HUME: All right, Carl, thank you very much. http://fwd4.me/03e0
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ENwze5owq4w
Part 3 Comverse, CALEA, Israel and the terror investigation
HUME: Last time we reported on an Israeli-based company called Amdocs Ltd. that generates the computerized records and billing data for nearly every phone call made in America. As Carl Cameron reported, U.S. investigators digging into the 9/11 terrorist attacks fear that suspects may have been tipped off to what they were doing by information leaking out of Amdocs.
In tonight's report, we learn that the concern about phone security extends to another company, founded in Israel, that provides the technology that the U.S. government uses for electronic eavesdropping. Here is Carl Cameron's third report.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
CARL CAMERON, FOX NEWS CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The company is Comverse Infosys, a subsidiary of an Israeli-run private telecommunications firm, with offices throughout the U.S. It provides wiretapping equipment for law enforcement. Here's how wiretapping works in the U.S.
Every time you make a call, it passes through the nation's elaborate network of switchers and routers run by the phone companies. Custom computers and software, made by companies like Comverse, are tied into that network to intercept, record and store the wiretapped calls, and at the same time transmit them to investigators.
The manufacturers have continuing access to the computers so they can service them and keep them free of glitches. This process was authorized by the 1994 Communications Assistance for Law Enforcement Act, or CALEA. Senior government officials have now told Fox News that while CALEA made wiretapping easier, it has led to a system that is seriously vulnerable to compromise, and may have undermined the whole wiretapping system.
Indeed, Fox News has learned that Attorney General John Ashcroft and FBI Director Robert Mueller were both warned Oct. 18 in a hand-delivered letter from 15 local, state and federal law enforcement officials, who complained that "law enforcement's current electronic surveillance capabilities are less effective today than they were at the time CALEA was enacted."
Congress insists the equipment it installs is secure. But the complaint about this system is that the wiretap computer programs made by Comverse have, in effect, a back door through which wiretaps themselves can be intercepted by unauthorized parties.
Adding to the suspicions is the fact that in Israel, Comverse works closely with the Israeli government, and under special programs, gets reimbursed for up to 50 percent of its research and development costs by the Israeli Ministry of Industry and Trade. But investigators within the DEA, INS and FBI have all told Fox News that to pursue or even suggest Israeli spying through Comverse is considered career suicide.
And sources say that while various F.B.I. inquiries into Comverse have been conducted over the years, they've been halted before the actual equipment has ever been thoroughly tested for leaks. A 1999 F.C.C. document indicates several government agencies expressed deep concerns that too many unauthorized non-law enforcement personnel can access the wiretap system. And the FBI's own nondescript office in Chantilly, Virginia that actually oversees the CALEA wiretapping program, is among the most agitated about the threat.
But there is a bitter turf war internally at F.B.I. It is the FBI's office in Quantico, Virginia, that has jurisdiction over awarding contracts and buying intercept equipment. And for years, they've thrown much of the business to Comverse. A handful of former U.S. law enforcement officials involved in awarding Comverse government contracts over the years now work for the company.
Numerous sources say some of those individuals were asked to leave government service under what knowledgeable sources call "troublesome circumstances" that remain under administrative review within the Justice Department.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JwckJoP7-wg
And what troubles investigators most, particularly in New York, in the counter terrorism investigation of the World Trade Center attack, is that on a number of cases, suspects that they had sought to wiretap and survey immediately changed their telecommunications processes. They started acting much differently as soon as those supposedly secret wiretaps went into place – Brit.
HUME: Carl, is there any reason to suspect in this instance that the Israeli government is involved?
CAMERON: No, there's not. But there are growing instincts in an awful lot of law enforcement officials in a variety of agencies who suspect that it had begun compiling evidence, and a highly classified investigation into that possibility – Brit.
HUME: All right, Carl. Thanks very much. http://fwd4.me/03e2
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ieWVkPIVaBw
Part 4 17/12/01
TONY SNOW, HOST: This week, senior correspondent Carl Cameron has reported on a longstanding government espionage investigation. Federal officials this year have arrested or detained nearly 200 Israeli citizens suspected of belonging to an "organized intelligence-gathering operation." The Bush administration has deported most of those arrested after Sept. 11, although some are in custody under the new anti-terrorism law.
Cameron also investigates the possibility that an Israeli firm generated billing data that could be used for intelligence purpose, and describes concerns that the federal government's own wiretapping system may be vulnerable. Tonight, in part four of the series, we'll learn about the probable roots of the probe: a drug case that went bad four years ago in L.A.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
CARL CAMERON, FOX NEWS CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Los Angeles, 1997, a major local, state and federal drug investigating sours. The suspects: Israeli organized crime with operations in New York, Miami, Las Vegas, Canada, Israel and Egypt. The allegations: cocaine and ecstasy trafficking, and sophisticated white-collar credit card and computer fraud.
The problem: according to classified law enforcement documents obtained by Fox News, the bad guys had the cops’ beepers, cell phones, even home phones under surveillance. Some who did get caught admitted to having hundreds of numbers and using them to avoid arrest.
"This compromised law enforcement communications between LAPD detectives and other assigned law enforcement officers working various aspects of the case. The organization discovered communications between organized crime intelligence division detectives, the FBI and the Secret Service."
Shock spread from the DEA to the FBI in Washington, and then the CIA. An investigation of the problem, according to law enforcement documents, concluded, "The organization has apparent extensive access to database systems to identify pertinent personal and biographical information."
When investigators tried to find out where the information might have come from, they looked at Amdocs, a publicly traded firm based in Israel. Amdocs generates billing data for virtually every call in America, and they do credit checks. The company denies any leaks, but investigators still fear that the firm's data is getting into the wrong hands.
When investigators checked their own wiretapping system for leaks, they grew concerned about potential vulnerabilities in the computers that intercept, record and store the wiretapped calls. A main contractor is Comverse Infosys, which works closely with the Israeli government, and under a special grant program, is reimbursed for up to 50 percent of its research and development costs by Israel's Ministry of Industry and Trade.
Asked this week about another sprawling investigation and the detention of 60 Israeli since Sept. 11, the Bush administration treated the questions like hot potatoes.
ARI FLEISCHER, WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: I would just refer you to the Department of Justice with that. I'm not familiar with the report.
COLIN POWELL, SECRETARY OF STATE: I'm aware that some Israeli citizens have been detained. With respect to why they're being detained and the other aspects of your question – whether it's because they're in intelligence services, or what they were doing – I will defer to the Department of Justice and the FBI to answer that.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
CAMERON: Beyond the 60 apprehended or detained, and many deported since Sept. 11, another group of 140 Israeli individuals have been arrested and detained in this year in what government documents describe as "an organized intelligence gathering operation," designed to "penetrate government facilities." Most of those individuals said they had served in the Israeli military, which is compulsory there.
But they also had, most of them, intelligence expertise, and either worked for Amdocs or other companies in Israel that specialize in wiretapping. Earlier this week, the Israeli embassy in Washington denied any spying against or in the United States – Tony.
SNOW: Carl, we've heard the comments from Ari Fleischer and Colin Powell. What are officials saying behind the scenes?
CAMERON: Well, there's real pandemonium described at the FBI, the DEA and the INS. A lot of these problems have been well known to some investigators, many of who have contributed to the reporting on this story. And what they say is happening is supervisors and management are now going back and collecting much of the information, because there's tremendous pressure from the top levels of all of those agencies to find out exactly what's going on.
At the DEA and the FBI already a variety of administration reviews are under way, in addition to the investigation of the phenomenon. They want to find out how it is all this has come out, as well as be very careful because of the explosive nature and very political ramifications of the story itself – Tony.
SNOW: All right, Carl, thanks.
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article5133.htm
Ex-CIA officer: Israel spies on US
Former CIA counterterrorism officer Philip Giraldi
Former CIA counterterrorism officer Philip Giraldi says Israel conducts more espionage against the United States than any other US ally.
The former CIA officer explained how Israel steals both technologies and secrets from the US, and sells them to other countries. An example, Giraldi said, is the Chinese Chengdu Jet J-10 that has been built with technologies that originally came from the US.
This is despite the fact that Israel relies heavily on the US for political and military support.
“It should almost be seen as an act of war,” Giraldi said.
He also made reference to the strong Israeli lobbies in Washington.
The ex-CIA officer, who is currently the Executive Director of the Council for the National Interest Foundation, has authored the report The Spy Who Loves Us.
In the report, Giraldi has sought to expose the dangers and costs Israeli espionage poses for the US.
According to the report, almost all US government bodies including the FBI and General Accountability Office have confirmed that Israeli espionage continues to take place.
In a 2010 interview with Press TV, Giraldi said “many of these state agencies are actually Israeli companies that are working for the States,”
http://www.presstv.ir/detail/184016.html 13 jun 2011, 23:30 , Respect -
Maria 12 juni 2011
Report: Egypt arrests Israeli spy
'Mossad agent' said to have been active in Tahrir Square revolt, but Israel calls report 'groundless'.
Egypt has arrested an Israeli man on suspicion of spying and of trying to recruit Egyptian youths to act against the authorities after President Hosni Mubarak's overthrow, sources and the state news agency said on Sunday.
But Jerusalem claimed Sunday that the report was unreliable. "Once every month or two such a report comes out. It is a groundless report and very unfortunate that people want to maintain such a hostile and negative image of Israel," an official source from the Foreign Ministry told Ynet.
Judge Hesham Badawi of the supreme state security prosecution ordered the man to be detained for 15 days on suspicion of "spying on Egypt with the aim of harming its economic and political interests," MENA news agency reported.
A judiciary source said the man was arrested on Sunday. MENA said the man worked for the Mossad. It named him as Ilan Goren.
Detention orders of 15 days are often renewed in Egypt if further questioning is deemed necessary.
One judiciary source said the man had been active in Cairo's Tahrir Square, the epicenter of the revolt against Mubarak, after the former president stepped down.
"He was there on a daily basis inciting youths towards sectarian strife. He was distributing money to some of them," the source said, adding he had been encouraging some youths to clash with the army. He said youths reported the man's actions.
The detention may add to tensions raised by a row over the halting of Egypt's gas exports to Israel after a pipeline blast and Cairo's easing of restrictions at the Rafah border crossing with Gaza, which Mubarak had kept very tightly controlled.
Officials at Egypt's Foreign Ministry could not be reached for comment, and the Foreign Ministry said it was not aware of the case.
http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-4081105,00.html
13 juni 2011
Egypt questions suspected Israeli spy
CAIRO (AFP) -- Egypt's state security prosecution on Monday began questioning an Israeli man suspected of spying for the Mossad intelligence agency, state television reported.
Ilan Grapel was detained on Sunday from a Cairo hotel and ordered to be held for 15 days pending investigation.
The US embassy in Cairo confirmed that Grapel is a "US-Israel dual national" and said US consular staff had visited him.
"We have confirmed that Ilan Chaim Grapel, age 27, is a US citizen and was detained on June 12, 2011 by Egyptian authorities," embassy spokeswoman Elizabeth Colton told AFP.
"A consular officer visited Mr Grapel on June 13 and confirmed that he was in good health," she said.
News of his arrest was plastered over the front pages of the press, with the state-owned Al-Akhbar describing it as a "painful Egyptian hit against the Mossad."
Grapel, who according to state media is a "Mossad officer," is accused of sowing sectarian strife and chaos in Egypt after a popular uprising forced President Hosni Mubarak to step down on February 11.
Authorities said on Sunday that the Israeli man had been "posing as a foreign correspondent," and that his movements and phone calls had been monitored before his arrest.
Several pictures of Grapel were released showing him in Israeli army uniform posing with other soldiers, and shaking hands with worshipers at a mosque in Cairo.
Another picture shows Grapel standing in Tahrir Square -- the symbolic heart of protests that brought down Mubarak -- wearing sunglasses and holding a large sign that read: "Oh stupid Obama, it is a pride revolution not a food revolution."
Another front-page photo on the state-owned daily Al-Ahram and shown repeatedly on state TV shows Grapel holding a microphone in a mosque, apparently "preaching."
Israel's foreign ministry said on Sunday it was unaware of any reports of Israeli citizens being detained in Egypt.
Israeli commentators said reports that an Israeli citizen had been arrested for spying for the Mossad in Cairo seemed strange.
"I can't imagine that there will be any Israeli reactions, but anyone who knows even a little bit about these things knows that you don't have an Israeli with an Israeli passport sitting in a foreign capital collecting things," said Channel 2 news analyst Ehud Yaari.
Last year, Egypt -- which signed a 1979 peace treaty with Israel -- said the confessions of an Egyptian accused of spying for Israel had led to three espionage cells being dismantled in Lebanon and Syria.
http://www.maannews.net/eng/ViewDetails.aspx?ID=396395 1 jul 2011, 10:07 , Respect -
1 juli 2011
Author Sami Michael: Mossad tried to recruit me in 1950s
Once Israeli intelligence realized Michael was not going to take up their offer, they turned to his brother-in-law, Eli Cohen, and persuaded him to spy on Syria.
The author Sami Michael, who is president of the Association for Civil Rights in Israel, says that during the 1950s, the Mossad tried to recruit him in order to send him on espionage missions in Arab countries.
Michael says that he considered the offer seriously, but ultimately turned it down. Once they realized in Israeli intelligence that Michael was not going to take up their offer, they turned to his brother-in-law, Eli Cohen, and persuaded him to spy on Syria, using a false identity. Cohen was captured by Syrian security and was executed on May 18, 1965.
Michael tells this story in an interview with Amir Ben-David for the television program Shabbat Culture, which will be aired tomorrow on Channel 2 in a discussion of his new book, "The Flight of the Swans."
In the interview Michael says the fact that Eli Cohen, the husband of his sister Nadia, spied for Israel was something he knew before Cohen was caught in Syria.
"In those days, I worked a great deal on the Syrian border," Michael says during the interview. "Eli always told the family that he was a spy, but said that it was economic espionage. I did not buy the story. One day, we had a long talk, and he told me that he worked in an Arab country. That was right before his last trip. He would travel and return to Syria, never directly, but via an European country. He even told me the terms of his remuneration, and how he was envied by those sitting in offices," Michael says.
"When he was caught, I became glued to the radio. Syria broadcast the entire thing and then the trial, and I heard his courageous stance before the judges. I was amazed that even though, at the time, I was ostracized for being Communist, they constantly made me enticing offers. They even pressured me. All of them. Intelligence, Military Intelligence, Shin Bet. At one point, I told them, 'If you convince me that this is good for the Jewish people, I will do it.' They offered me to travel to some places. The dumbest idea was that I would return to Iraq, and they would make sure I was imprisoned, and there I would link up with the Kurdish leadership in prison."
http://fwd4.me/05N1 22 jul 2011, 11:18 , Respect -
Maria 22 juli 2011
Israeli Mossad told to stop using fake foreign passports
TEL AVIV, Israel (Ma'an) -- Several countries have sent diplomatic messages to Israel demanding that the government stop using their national passports in Mossad operations, news reports said.
The countries informed Israel that they were aware that Mossad operatives were using their passports in foreign operations and urged the government to immediately end the procedure, Israeli daily Ynet reported Thursday.
The issue of Mossad agents using foreign passports was put under the spotlight in February 2010 when Hamas official Mahmoud Al-Mabhouh was assassinated in Dubai by Israeli agents.
Foreign governments were outraged at the use of fraudulent versions of their national passports in the killing and a diplomatic crisis followed.
On Wednesday, New Zealand Prime Minister John Key denied reports suggesting that three Israelis killed in the Christchurch earthquake were Mossad agents, Ynet reported.
"There was no link between those individuals and the Israeli intelligence agencies," he said.
He stressed that none of the passports found in the name of Ofer Mizrahi, the Israeli who was killed during the devastating quake, were New Zealand passports.
http://www.maannews.net/eng/ViewDetails.aspx?ID=407349 3 aug 2011, 22:51 , Respect -
Maria 3 aug 2011
Mossad killed Iranian scientist
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Br3cFx-GLEU
Israel was behind the assassination of the Iranian nuclear scientist last week in Tehran, the German Der Spiegel magazine reported.
The article claimed it was the first major operation of the new Mossad director Tamir Pardo and surveys a series of assassination attempts of Iranian nuclear scientisits in the past 18 months.
The newspaper claims the victim was involved in the development of switches for a nuclear bomb and had worked in a research center in northern Tehran. It pointed out that following the scientist's death there were conflicting reports concerning his identity.
Initially he was identified as Darioush Rezaei a physics professor and expert in neutron transport but later Iranian authorities identified him as Darioush Rezaeinejad an electronics student. The German newspaper insists the victim was Professor Rezaei who has not been seen in public since the incident.
The intelligence sources told Der Spiegel that the Israeli Air Force support launching an aerial attack on Iran's nuclear sites, a plan the Mossad opposes. As long as the Mossad is leading the campaign against the Iranian nuclear program it continues to get the big targets, the source said.
'Mossad may be behind Sinai attack'
Several Egyptian political parties say the Israeli spy agency Mossad may have been behind a deadly attack on a police station in the Egyptian city of al-Arish in troubled Sinai Peninsula.
During a meeting in the office of Egypt's al-Wafd party in al-Arish on Tuesday, several Egyptian political parties said Mossad may have been involved in the fatal attack that occurred on Friday, DPA reported.
During the Friday assault, six people were killed and more than 20 others were injured after masked gunmen driving about 150 vehicles attacked the police station in the city of al-Arish.
The Egyptian parties also said that those responsible for the attack have been connected to the former Egyptian regime.
The parties called on Egypt's ruling military council to enhance the country's security.
http://www.presstv.ir/detail/192153.html
15 oct 2011
Was Mossad using Fox and Werritty as 'useful idiots'? Ex-Ambassador reveals how links made by 'advisers' set alarm bells ringing
Vulnerable: Defence Secretary Liam Fox, seen here during a tour of Afghanistan, potentially compromised national security through his relationship with Adam Werritty
By CRAIG MURRAY
The real reason Liam Fox had to resign was not a grubby little money scandal about firms funding Adam Werritty as he jetted round the world with the Defence Secretary. It was much more important, and much worse, than that.
Last Sunday, ‘friends of Liam Fox’ were letting it be known that the investigation of Werritty would bring up nothing scandalous.
These friends were widely reported as saying that Werritty’s funding came from those wishing to promote U.S. and Israeli interests to the British government.
Yet that ‘defence’ of Fox touched on precisely the point that had started alarm bells ringing among senior civil servants throughout Whitehall.
Not only was Werritty being paid to act as an unofficial part of the Defence Secretary’s entourage, the money was coming from people who may have been ready to promote the interests of certain foreign governments, particularly the United States, Israel and Sri Lanka.
While the United States is a very close ally, its commercial and other interests are not always identical to UK interests.
Israel is not a military ally of the UK. There are often tensions between its interests in the Middle East and the UK’s interests, as in the attack on the Gaza Aid convoy which resulted in the death of Turkish citizens. Turkey is an ally of the UK, being a vital member of NATO.
As for the Sri Lankan government, there are serious concerns over its human rights record, particularly after major hostilities with Tamil rebel fighters had ceased.
The British Defence Secretary should be exclusively concerned with the interests only of Britain.
But it is plain as a pikestaff that Fox had retained his effective partnership with Werritty in lobbying activities that not only were concerned with Israel and Sri Lanka, but which actively sought to promote the geo-strategic interests of those countries – for money.
I was contacted early last week by a senior Whitehall source – somebody I have known for more than a decade – who has access to the Cabinet Office investigation.
They were worried the Cabinet Secretary Gus O’Donnell’s investigation was being misdirected onto only the very narrow question of whether Werritty received specific payments for setting up specific meetings with Fox – playing into Fox’s extraordinary House of Commons defence that Werritty was ‘not dependent on any transactional behaviour to maintain his income’.
But my source told me that what really was worrying senior officials in the MOD, FCO and Cabinet Office was the possibility that Fox could be being used as a ‘useful idiot’ by Mossad, Israel’s far-reaching and extremely effective intelligence service.
Key funding sources for Werritty were from the Israeli lobby and a rather obscure commercial intelligence agency.
Might Mossad be pulling Werritty’s strings, with or without his knowledge?
On Friday, two senior Fleet Street journalists also reported hearing similar concerns from other Whitehall officials about possible Israeli intelligence service involvement with Fox and Werritty.
By working closely with an unofficial aide with extraordinary access but no security vetting and murky funding sources, Fox had potentially compromised national security. That is the real story here.
Let us hope that Fox’s fall will remind future Defence Secretaries that there is only one country whose interests they should seek to defend – and that is this one.
http://fwd4.me/0dvv 17 oct 2011, 09:48 , Respect -
Maria 16 oct 2011
Besieged Former UK Defense Minister’s Buddy Funded by Pro-Israel Lobby, Linked to Mossad
Adam Werrity and Liam Fox (R)
Not to be outdone by the ludicrous goings-on in Washington DC, where our own Justice Department has tried to turn a drug-dealing, wife abusing, failed businessman into an Iranian Terrorist Mastermind, the Brits are trying to best us. The Tory government’s recently resigned defense minister, Liam Fox, left in disgrace after he was deeply implicated in a pay for play scandal involvinga best friend, Adam Werrity, who jet-setted around the world with Fox and freelanced an independent foreign and defense policy that set official government figures on edge.
I’d followed this scandal peripherally until I started hearing more about Werrity’s doings, and then I really took notice. Werrity, it appears, held views roughly similar to Michael Ledeen and cultivated wealthy pro-Israel donors who funded his travels to Iran, Israel and other locales where, among other things, he plotted the overthrow of the Iranian regime:
The revelation that the man who had unrestricted access to Mr Fox while he was serving in David Cameron’s Cabinet was at the same time attempting to unseat the Iranian President will fuel alarm in the Foreign Office that he was pursuing a freelance foreign policy and acting as a “rogue operator”.
In order to be a neocon version of James Bond, Werrity required an extensive bankroll to fund his stays at first class luxury hotels. He found funding to the tune of hundred of thousands of pounds from some of the most well-known Tory and pro-Israel fatcats in Britain including the chair of the UK equivalent of Aipac (called Bicom):
The Finnish billionaire Chaim “Poju” Zabludowicz, who has given the Tories more than £100,000, was also named as a Pargav donor, via his company, Tamares Real Estate. Mr Zabludowicz shares Mr Fox’s pro-Israel opinions and chairs the pro-Israel lobbying group Bicom. He was yesterday said to be “extremely disappointed” to discover the truth about how his money was used.
Another key Werrity donor and central figure in Bicom was Michael Hintze:
Most significant of all was the involvement of Michael Hintze, the billionaire fund manager who has given the Tories more than £1.4m – including individual donations to Mr Fox, George Osborne and Boris Johnson. He had already been brought under scrutiny after it was revealed that Mr Werritty worked from a desk at the offices of Mr Hintze’s hedge fund, CQS – and that Mr Hintze had donated £29,000 to Atlantic Bridge.
Werrity was cozy not just with the UK pro-Israel lobby, but with figures likely from the Mossad as well:
Mr Werritty, 33, has been debriefed by MI6 about his travels and is so highly regarded by the Israeli intelligence service Mossad – who thought he was Mr Fox’s chief of staff – that he was able to arrange meetings at the highest levels of the Israeli government, multiple sources have told The IoS.
Werrity brought Fox to a dinner meeting with the British ambassador to Israel during a Herzlyia security conference, at which they met Israeli political figures including likely Mossad operatives. The Israelis were interested in Werrity’s travels to Iran, where he met with opposition figures and likely plotted his regime change agenda. All of this, of course, allowed the Iranians to claim, falsely we believed, during the post-election riots that British agents were plotting to overthrow the government.
Turns out it likely was true. Though the Iranians may not have known that Werrity was doing so unofficially, not on behalf of the British government. But how can you blame the Iranians for not understanding the difference when it appears neither the Israelis, nor lots of others did either. In fact, an Israeli is quoted as saying he understood Werrity was Fox’s chief of staff.
Here is what official Britain thought of Werrity’s doings:
One Whitehall source was scathing of Mr Werritty. The source said: “Ask yourself what he was doing there. It’s regime change but only in his own mind. I can’t think of anything more stupid, wandering round Iran flying the British flag. Does he really think the answer to Iran’s nuclear ambitions – which we all want to resolve – is to have a bunch of people encouraging the opposition there in that way? We do have a responsibility to those people, and anything that’s done like that has to have government approval, which he doesn’t seem to have had. It’s ridiculous. You are inviting people to believe you have the Government’s resources behind them, and in fact the opposition is likely to be brutally crushed.
Now, what other foreign intelligence agency is plotting regime change? The Mossad of course. So the questions arises–just whose interest was Werrity serving when he engaged in all this razzle dazzle and subterfuge? He appears to suffer from the same illness that afflicts the pro-Israel lobby in the U.S. They pursue Israel’s interest to the detriment of the interests of their own country, because they don’t see any difference between the two. Israel’s interests in their eyes become U.S. or UK interests through some miraculous process of transsubstantiation. Here is how Craig Murray described the problem:
Not only was Werritty being paid to act as an unofficial part of the Defence Secretary’s entourage, the money was coming from people who may have been ready to promote the interests of certain foreign governments, particularly the United States, Israel and Sri Lanka.
…It is plain as a pikestaff that Fox had retained his effective partnership with Werritty in lobbying activities that not only were concerned with Israel and Sri Lanka, but which actively sought to promote the geo-strategic interests of those countries – for money.
…What really was worrying senior officials in the MOD [Ministry of Defense]and Cabinet Office was the possibility that Fox could be being used as a ‘useful idiot’ by Mossad, Israel’s far-reaching and extremely effective intelligence service. Key funding sources for Werritty were from the Israeli lobby and a rather obscure commercial intelligence agency. Might Mossad be pulling Werritty’s strings, with or without his knowledge?
On Friday, two senior Fleet Street journalists also reported hearing similar concerns from other Whitehall officials about possible Israeli intelligence service involvement with Fox and Werritty. By working closely with an unofficial aide with extraordinary access but no security vetting and murky funding sources, Fox had potentially compromised national security. That is the real story here.
http://fwd4.me/0dw7
How Britain works: follow the money
By Brian Brady, Matt Chorley and Jane Merrick
The Defence Secretary's fatal mistake was to bring unwelcome publicity to a group of super-rich men.
At the end of a long and champagne-fuelled gathering at the Conservative Party conference this month, Liam Fox, his wife, Jesme Baird, and a tall, thick-set man crowded with others into a lift on the 23rd floor of the Manchester Hilton Hotel. The man – Adam Werritty – pressed the ground-floor button. The small group was in jolly mood: Mr Fox had just received rapturous applause for reminding the partygoers – Tory donors, right-wing members of the 1922 Committee and invitees of the Conservative Home website – that he was an "unreconstructed, free-marketeer, Unionist, Eurosceptic, Atlanticist". In short, he was the heir to the Thatcherite crown.
Circles of influence: download full graphic (185k)
Or was until the events of the past 10 days. It is a cruel irony that it was an ally of Baroness Thatcher, the PR chief Lord Bell, who played a key part in the downfall of the Defence Secretary. The qualities that had commanded the loyalty of the Tory right had helped Mr Fox to cling to his job last week; in his refusal to budge – and his aggressive countering of attacks from all quarters – he showed all the stoicism of the zealot. Moreover, he remained secure in the belief that David Cameron showed neither the inclination nor the political clout to dismiss one of his most fearsome colleagues and one-time rival for the Tory leadership.
But the fatal problem for Mr Fox was that his misadventures had discomforted a group of individuals who ultimately proved even more influential that the Prime Minister. The well-connected and super-rich party donors, the lobbyists and defence contractors hauled into the open as the Werritty story developed prefer to do their business out of the spotlight; when they moved decisively to protect their privacy, Mr Fox had no choice but to leave the stage.
The story of his final days is as much an education in how the British Establishment works as it is an illustration of how the Conservative Party manages its internal affairs. Henry Macrory's arrival in No 10 on Thursday was a bad sign. Downing Street staff said that the last time the Tories' deputy political director was so conspicuous was in the hours before Andy Coulson quit in January. In the dimly lit corners of Downing Street, senior advisers whispered that journalists were "following the money".
"We knew then Fox's days were numbered," said a No 10 source. And as the first editions of Friday's papers began to appear, it was clear that the media had followed one very clear cash trail. This was not what Mr Cameron wanted. At least not yet. While some around the Prime Minister were convinced Mr Fox should have "done a [David] Laws" and resigned as soon as the scandal broke, Mr Cameron wanted to bide his time. If Mr Fox's cabinet career was shot, it had to be "fatal", said a No 10 aide. "The last thing we wanted was him wounded and angry on the back benches."
Mr Cameron calculated early on that he would make no decision on Mr Fox's future until next week, fearing a clean bill of health would be undermined by a further round of allegations in the Sunday papers. It was the Friday papers that did for him. The tipping point was the revelation that Mr Werritty's extensive travels around the world were being bankrolled by a series of wealthy figures who had paid money into the previously unheralded company Pargav Ltd. It was a crushing blow for Mr Fox's chances of survival, as the unexpurgated details of Pargav's accounts immediately put men who would otherwise be his allies into the public domain.
Jon Moulton, a venture capital investor who has donated more than £450,000 to the Tories – including £150,000 to Mr Fox himself – protested that he had believed his £35,000 contribution to Pargav was towards a "security policy analysis research organisation". He was "not very happy" to discover that it had helped fund Mr Werritty's travels. Worse, Mr Moulton revealed that it was Mr Fox who had asked him to make the donation – raising questions about Mr Fox's claims that he had not known about Mr Werritty's activities.
The Finnish billionaire Chaim "Poju" Zabludowicz, who has given the Tories more than £100,000, was also named as a Pargav donor, via his company, Tamares Real Estate. Mr Zabludowicz shares Mr Fox's pro-Israel opinions and chairs the pro-Israel lobbying group Bicom. He was yesterday said to be "extremely disappointed" to discover the truth about how his money was used.
Michael Lewis, who gave £30,000 through his firm Oceana Investments, has also contributed to the Tories and to Mr Fox's now-defunct Atlantic Bridge charity, set up to promote the US-UK "special relationship". Most significant of all was the involvement of Michael Hintze, the billionaire fund manager who has given the Tories more than £1.4m – including individual donations to Mr Fox, George Osborne and Boris Johnson.
He had already been brought under scrutiny after it was revealed that Mr Werritty worked from a desk at the offices of Mr Hintze's hedge fund, CQS – and that Mr Hintze had donated £29,000 to Atlantic Bridge. But it was subsequently revealed that CQS's charity adviser, Oliver Hylton, was the sole director of Pargav.
The complex web of connections, regardless of the Government's intentions, ultimately pulled Mr Fox towards his endgame. Mr Hintze's PR man, the arch-Thatcherite Lord Bell, was called in as the fixer for a story that was running out of control and threatening serious damage to more than just the Defence Secretary and his best man. Earlier in the week, Lord Bell had confirmed dealings with Mr Werritty while his public relations agency Bell Pottinger was working for the Sri Lankan government. While he insisted that Mr Fox was "a friend of 30 years", keeping the minister in his job was not Lord Bell's top priority. Mr Hintze was keen to make it clear that he had not bankrolled Mr Werritty's first-class travel and luxury accommodation, and the Pargav revelations, which were published in The Times, conclusively proved his case. Lord Bell has now confirmed that the leak was an orchestrated operation. "Oliver Hylton offered information relating to Pargav and this has been reported," he told the Daily Mail.
The bank statements detailed exactly who had funded Pargav, and the collateral damage proved fatal for Mr Fox's ministerial career. Yet it had all seemed so different during his bombastic performance in the Commons on Monday. After Jim Murphy, Labour's defence spokesman, recited the numerous sub-clauses of the ministerial code that appeared to have been breached, Mr Fox responded flippantly by saying he was not sure if Mr Murphy had asked any questions, going on to dismiss a jibe from the Labour stalwart Dennis Skinner.
This was not the performance of someone who thought he was going down. And his mates rallied round: 20 in total spoke in the Commons to support him. Mr Fox is an assiduous networker. One Tory MP describes him as "clubbable, a nice guy". A minister remarks that he is more likely to be found in the Strangers' bar "than the rest of the Cabinet put together". Another adds: "He's the kind of man who would leave a bar at 3am and then make a point of being at a breakfast meeting looking fresh as a daisy."
But as the week went on and the allegations mounted, the number of Tory MPs willing to speak up for Mr Fox dwindled. They hoped something would turn up to absolve him, because they liked him. When they heard him challenge "those who have genuine allegations of wrongdoing to ... bring them into the public domain", they thought he was calling their bluff. In the end what turned up was more bad news.
The Prime Minister remained an impassive observer. Fearing recriminations if he was seen to move too quickly against Mr Fox, he sat back and let events unfold. Mr Fox has spent his political life as an outsider, running a freelance foreign policy operation, wooing the neo-cons, paying more interest to events across the Atlantic. He believed Mr Cameron was powerless to sack him. He was right. It was his other life – and other forces – that did for him in the end.
http://fwd4.me/0dvd
Revealed: Fox's best man and his ties to Iran's opposition
Liam Fox on his wedding day, with Adam Werritty, right
By Jane Merrick and James Hanning
An IoS Investigation: The murky world of Adam Werritty: Self-styled adviser 'had links to Mossad'.
Adam Werritty, the man at the centre of the Liam Fox cash-for-access scandal, has been involved in an audacious plot to topple Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, it was claimed last night.
The self-styled adviser to Mr Fox, whose close personal friendship with the former defence secretary led to Mr Fox's downfall, has visited Iran on several occasions and met Iranian opposition groups in Washington and London over the past few years, The Independent on Sunday has learnt.
Mr Werritty, 33, has been debriefed by MI6 about his travels and is so highly regarded by the Israeli intelligence service Mossad – who thought he was Mr Fox's chief of staff – that he was able to arrange meetings at the highest levels of the Israeli government, multiple sources have told The IoS.
Mr Fox resigned on Friday after a stream of revelations surrounding his dealings with his adviser, centring on 18 meetings abroad at which Mr Werritty was present, including in Dubai, Sri Lanka and Israel, and 22 at the Ministry of Defence. After vowing to fight the disclosures a week ago, Mr Fox quit the Cabinet on Friday when details emerged of the business and intelligence interests of Mr Werritty's financial backers.
The minister admitted that he had allowed the distinction between his personal interests and government activities had become "blurred". But The IoS has learnt that Mr Werritty's travels went further than the luxury hotels of Colombo and Dubai: he has used his House of Commons-branded business card, which said he was Mr Fox's adviser, to pursue his business interests in conflict-torn South Sudan, other developing African countries and Iraq. The aide has also held talks in London with representatives of the new Libyan government in recent weeks. It is not known whether Mr Fox was present.
The fresh disclosures are likely to form part of Sir Gus O'Donnell's inquiry into Mr Fox and Mr Werritty, which was launched last week as the scandal unfolded. The revelation that the man who had unrestricted access to Mr Fox while he was serving in David Cameron's Cabinet was at the same time attempting to unseat the Iranian President will fuel alarm in the Foreign Office that he was pursuing a freelance foreign policy and acting as a "rogue operator".
At the height of the storm surrounding Mr Fox last week, "friends" of the MP tried to distance him from Mr Werritty by describing him as a "Walter Mitty" figure, to the fury of Mr Fox.
Yet the access to senior government figures Mr Werritty enjoyed across the globe suggests otherwise. Mr Werritty, said one source, worked closely with US-backed neocons who thought they could "bring down Ahmadinejad".
Even though such a plot would be highly ambitious, if not impossible, Mr Werritty's activities fly in the face of the British Government's efforts to pursue a diplomatic solution, through the UN, to Iran's nuclear ambitions.
Mr Werritty joined Mr Fox, while he was shadow defence secretary, on a visit to Iran in the summer of 2007. The IoS understands the adviser has also visited the country on several occasions before and after, although it is not known how long he stayed or whom he met.
Mr Fox is an enthusiastic Atlanticist and is sympathetic to the neocon movement in the United States, which takes a hawkish stance on Iran's nuclear ambitions, although on his 2007 visit to the country he said he hoped for a "diplomatic solution" to the issue. An associate said that Mr Werritty, who can speak some Farsi, would act as a "facilitator" and "take messages" between various opposition figures, although the source insisted he was not a "freelance spy". One diplomatic source suggested that Mr Werritty, once back in London, had been debriefed by MI6 about his travels to Iran. It is not known whether Mr Fox knew the full extent of Mr Werritty's activities, or whether he was merely allowed to continue, and provide information to the British Government on an unofficial basis.
This newspaper has made repeated attempts to contact Mr Werritty but has received no response.
One Whitehall source was scathing of Mr Werritty. The source said: "Ask yourself what he was doing there. It's regime change but only in his own mind. I can't think of anything more stupid, wandering round Iran flying the British flag. Does he really think the answer to Iran's nuclear ambitions – which we all want to resolve – is to have a bunch of people encouraging the opposition there in that way? We do have a responsibility to those people, and anything that's done like that has to have government approval, which he doesn't seem to have had. It's ridiculous. You are inviting people to believe you have the Government's resources behind them, and in fact the opposition is likely to be brutally crushed.
"That is not to say that if he came back to London and he offered to tell MI6 what he had seen while he was in Iran, they wouldn't say 'yes please'. But them picking up as much information as they can, and deniably, is quite different from him being licensed by them."
The IoS has learnt that one senior military figure in a developing country, which this newspaper is not naming to protect his identity, feels he was taken in by Mr Werritty. Last night Labour MP John Mann called on Scotland Yard to launch a fraud inquiry into Mr Werritty and his use of a business card falsely giving his position as an adviser to the former Defence Secretary.
In May 2009, Mr Werritty arranged a meeting in Portcullis House between Mr Fox and an Iranian lobbyist with close links to President Ahmadinejad's regime. In February this year, Mr Werritty arranged a dinner with Mr Fox, Britain's ambassador to Israel, Matthew Gould, and senior political figures – understood to include Israeli intelligence agents – during an Israeli security conference in Herzliya, during which sanctions against Iran were discussed. Despite Mr Werritty having no official MoD capacity, an Israeli source said there was "no question" that Mr Werritty was regarded as anyone other than Mr Fox's chief of staff who was able to fix meetings at the highest levels, and was seen as an "expert on Iran".
The Foreign Office declined last night to comment on any aspect of Mr Werritty's activities .
http://fwd4.me/0ZZB