Gabriel Eichler
The operation to track down and eliminate the the
arch-terrorist Osama Bin Laden was a well- planned and ultimately well-
executed American intelligence operation- one of the most successful
in recent history.
It was the culmination of long years of patient intelligence
gathering by at least sixteen top secret US organizations, among them:
the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), United States Department of
Defense Air Force Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance Agency
(AFISRA), Army Intelligence and Security Command (INSCOM), Defense
Intelligence Agency (DIA), Marine Corps Intelligence Activity (MCIA),
National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency (NGA), National Reconnaissance
Office (NRO), National Security Agency (NSA), Office of Naval
Intelligence (ONI), United States Department of Energy Office of
Intelligence and Counterintelligence (OICI), United States Department of
Homeland Security Office of Intelligence and Analysis (I&A), Coast
Guard Intelligence (CGI), United States Department of Justice Federal
Bureau of Investigation (FBI), Drug Enforcement Administration, Office
of National Security Intelligence (DEA/ONSI), United States Department
of State Bureau of Intelligence and Research (INR), and the United
States Department of the Treasury Office of Terrorism and Financial
Intelligence (TFI).
The total cost of taking out one really bad guy likely ran into the
very high billions of American taxpayer dollars. For a base line:
according to some credible media reports, on October 30, 2012, the
Director of National Intelligence disclosed that the National
Intelligence Program (NIP) budget for FY 2012 was $53.9 billion. The
Military Intelligence Program (MIP) budget for FY 2012 was reported to
be $21.5 billion. So the combined cost of American intelligence for a
twelve month period alone amounted to a whopping 75.4 billion.
If you consider, that the hunt for Bin Laden went on for a number of
years- combined with the associated costs of the mission- including the
culmination brought about by the professionals of Seal Team Six on May
2, 2011- the ultimate total cost is nearly impossible to estimate.
Of course it was worth every penny – and the US intelligence
professionals who pinpointed his ultimate whereabouts deserve the
highest praise.
In recent months best-selling books were written about the Bin Laden
assassination and to date at least two major motion pictures were
produced on the subject.
The operation to take out Bin Laden will surely be going into the American history books.
With the world’s attention squarely focused on the current Gaza
conflict, people take it almost for granted, that key Palestinian terror
leaders with blood on their hands are eliminated with extraordinary
precision, skill and even a certain amount of “elegance” by the IDF.
The current flare-up started with the superbly executed removal of
Hamas armed wing Izzadin Kassam Brigades commander Ahmed Jabari in
central Gaza last Wednesday. The textbook airstrike marked the beginning
of Operation Pillar of Defense targeting Hamas and Islamic Jihad terror
organizations in Gaza.
Grainy video footage shows a grey Kia saloon car driving through the
crowded streets of Gaza City, at a speed designed not to attract notice.
An ominous target cross-hair tracks the car from high above, which –as
it enters an intersection with no one in the immediate vicinity-is
suddenly engulfed in flames and smoke, as pieces of metal fly off.
The front of the Kia is blown away and blood, glass, shreds of carpet
and one Nike tennis shoe are all that remains of the crushed, burned
out chassis.
Two mangled bodies are retrieved from the burning wreckage, though
parts of them have been hurled as high as the fourth-floor window of an
adjacent building, with blood splashes on its white walls. A score has
been settled with no innocent bystanders getting harmed in the process.
Hamas armed wing Izzadin Kassam Brigades commander Ahmed Jabari is no
more.
Operation Pillar of Defense is an Israel Defense Forces (IDF)
operation in the Gaza Strip, officially launched on 14 November 2012
with the targeted killing of bloody-handed arch terrorist Ahmed Jabari.
The stated aims of the Israeli operation are to halt the
indiscriminate rocket attacks against civilian targets originating from
the Gaza Strip and to disrupt the capabilities of militant
organizations.
The operation began in response to three events: Palestinian groups
launching over 100 rockets at Israeli civilians over a 24-hour period,
an attack on an Israeli military patrol jeep within Israeli borders by
Gaza militants, and a tunnel explosion caused by IEDs near Israeli
soldiers on the Israeli side of the fence.
Subsequently, the IDF has launched more than 1,400 air, tank, and
warship strikes against targets in the Gaza Strip so far including
rocket launching pads, weapons depots, individual key terrorist leaders
and facilities of the Hamas authority in Gaza.
During the operation, Hamas and the Palestinian Islamic Jihad further
intensified their rocket attacks on Israeli cities and towns in an
offensive code named by Hamas Operation “Stones of Baked Clay” in
reference to a verse from the Quran (Surah 105:4).
It is known as “Operation Blue Sky” by members of the Palestinian Islamic Jihad.
The militant groups fired over 1,147 Iranian Fajr-5, Russian Grad
rockets, Qassams and mortars into Rishon LeZion, Beersheba, Ashdod,
Ashkelon and other population centers; Tel Aviv was hit for the first
time since the 1991 Gulf War, and rockets were aimed at Jerusalem. The
Palestinian rockets have killed four Israeli civilians – three of them
in a direct hit on a home in Kiryat Malachi – one Israeli soldier, and
at least two Palestinian civilians.
By November 19, over 252 Israelis had been physically injured in
rocket attacks, and thirty more had been treated for acute stress
reaction.
Israel’s Iron Dome missile defense system has intercepted at least
342 of rockets fired into Israel, 664 rockets have landed in Israeli
territory. (See my earlier column.)
In what the Shin Bet is calling one of the most successful
intelligence-based operations since Operation Pillar of Defense began
last week, four senior Islamic Jihad terrorists were hit during a well
planned and executed precision airstrike on a high-rise building in
Gaza City, on Monday afternoon.
It was the second strike on the above- mentioned building in two
days. The Hamas TV station, Al Aqsa, is located on the top floor. The
building also houses the offices of Britain’s Sky News and Saudi-owned
Al Arabiya Channel. Most journalists heeding repeated Israeli warnings
left the premises on Sunday following the initial strike.
Terrorist leaders targeted at that site were:
Baha Abu al-Ata, a member of the Higher Military Council, was the
commander of the Palestinian Islamic Jihad Gaza City Brigade and is
involved in orchestrating rocket launching and terror attacks against
Israeli civilians. Al-Ata was also deeply involved in the manufacturing
of arms and firing long-range rockets at Israel.
Tissir Mahmoud Mahmedd Jabari was born in 1972 and is a resident of
Sajaiya Turkman, Gaza City. Jabari was also a senior Palestinian Islamic
Jihad operative, a member of the Higher Military Council and Head of
the organization’s operation branch. Previously, Jabari was the Gaza
City Regional Commander for the Palestinian Islamic Jihad.
He was personally involved in carrying out various terror attacks
against Israel, including massive rocket fire and attacks against IDF
soldiers. Jabari also held responsibility for training within the
organization and gave approval for the carrying out of terror attacks.
He is a key figure within the long-range rocket launching operations and responsible for internal security.
Islamic Jihad identified [one of] the dead men as Ramiz Harab, one of
its senior commanders. Harab was born in 1976, was a resident
of Shujaiyya Jadida and was responsible for the propaganda of the Gaza
City brigade, he was an aide to Tissir Jabari and was formerly head of
the Sheikh Rajuan Division.
Another terrorist killed in the surgical airstrike was Hallil
Bahatini, a senior Islamic Jihad commander who has also played a key
role in the rocket fire on Israel’s south.
Just think for a minute: who provided the essential “real-time”
intelligence information on thousands of individual targets to the IAF
and other IDF units?
Who gathered the extraordinary information that was so precise, that
it also provided a reliable system to prevent loss of innocent
Palestinian lives?
Who sent the thousands of text messages, warning emails, leaflets and
Arabic-speaking phone calls to individuals in the conflict zones?
How much Israeli intelligence effort went into preventing as many
innocent Palestinian’s deaths as they did by the pinpoint accuracy
demonstrated in every one of the thousand targeted attacks so far?
In the mind of this writer, in the past week alone, Israel carried
out -with extraordinary preparedness – well over one thousand individual
intelligence coups on the scale of the single US assassination that had
Bin Laden in the crosshairs!
The unsung heroes of Israel’s struggle to live in peace are the
nameless faceless intelligence personnel that are on the front lines of
the country’s defense.
I know what you are thinking, yes, of course you are thinking of the legendary Mossad.
Actually, in great measure, the true intel heroes of the current
conflict are mostly members of the General Security Services (Shin Bet).
This security service lives in the shadows and only rarely is discussed in public.
One such earlier occasion was the elimination of a highly dangerous Palestinian terrorist master bomb maker.
Described as “well educated, ambitious, and soft-spoken,” Yahya Ayyash hailed from a relatively affluent family.
Married, with one child, Ayyash had planned to study for a master’s
degree in Jordan, but was denied permission to do so by Israeli
authorities. It was around this time he joined Hamas.
Ayyash built the bombs used in a number of Hamas suicide attacks: the
Mehola Junction bombing, the Afula Bus massacre, the Hadera central
station massacre, the Tel Aviv bus 5 massacre, the Egged bus 36 bombing,
the Ramat Gan bus 20 bombing, and the Jerusalem bus 26 bombing.
As part of a strategic alliance between Hamas and Palestinian Islamic
Jihad, Ayyash also built the deadly bombs used by Islamic Jihad at the
Beit Lid massacre.
Because TNT and other high explosives were generally not available in
the Palestinian territories (the West Bank and Gaza strip), Ayyash
often used a combination of acetone and detergent, both commonly
available household products. When combined, they form acetone peroxide,
an explosive known as “Mother of Satan” for its extraordinary
instability.
Ayyash first came to the attention of Israeli security forces as a
result of the failed bombing of Ramat Ef’al. Following a high-speed
chase, three would-be Hamas suicide bombers were arrested by police.
When police inspected their car, they found it rigged with a bomb—five
12-kilogram (26 lb) gasoline tanks filled to capacity, connected to an
acetone peroxide-based detonator.
After evacuating the area, sappers used a robot armed with a shotgun
to shoot the detonator, in the hopes of defusing it. Instead, it
detonated, in a massive explosion. [Police investigators] “were sure
that if it had been detonated in a crowded area, it would have killed
hundreds”.
Shin Bet investigators learned Ayyash’s name during subsequent interrogation of the three arrested suspects.
Following the assassination of Yitzhak Rabin, the Palestinian
Authority began to cooperate more closely with Shin Bet in hunting
Ayyash. Shin Bet learned (through means that remain classified to this
day) that Ayyash had, on occasion, spent the night in the Gaza City home
of Osama Hamad, a childhood friend of his. Shin Bet had previously had
dealings with Kamil Hamad, Osama Hamad’s uncle.
In October 1995, Shin Bet operatives approached Kamil Hamad.
Kamil Hamad demanded money and Israeli identity cards for himself and
his wives. After the Shin Bet threatened to inform Hamas of his
betrayal, Kamil Hamad agreed to cooperate.
Shin Bet agents gave Hamad a cell phone, and told him it was bugged
so they could listen in on Ayyash’s conversations. They did not tell
Hamad that, in addition to eavesdropping devices, it also contained 15
grams of RDX explosive.
Kamil Hamad gave the phone to his nephew Osama, knowing that Ayyash
regularly used Osama’s phones. At 8:00 am on 5 January 1996, Ayyash’s
father called him.
Ayyash picked it up and talked with his father. Overhead, an Israeli
plane picked up their conversation and relayed it to an Israeli command
post.
When it was confirmed that it was Ayyash on the phone, Shin Bet remotely detonated it, killing Ayyash instantly.
The assassination was so elegantly masterful that a person standing
right next to the terrorist bomb maker did not get hurt. Another feather
in the cap of the Shin Bet: “The Militant”, an international communist
newsweekly, reported that “100,000 Palestinians… attended the funeral”.
The State of Israel has a long-standing policy that it never confirms
or denies its participation in selective assassinations. In line with
this policy, Israel did not confirm or deny its role in killing Ayyash.
This led to wild rumors and speculations as to the extent of their
involvement.
As we watch in awe how individual terrorists are taken out of
commission one after another in a systematic, highly professional and
surgically precise fashion by the Israel Air Force, Navy and other
special forces, we don’t think of the amount of painstaking intelligence
gathering effort behind the scenes carried out by the undercover
personnel of the Shin Bet.
On many previous occasions the Shin Bet has also worked closely with
the Israeli Air Force in highly successful “targeted killings” of field
commanders and senior leaders of the Palestinian militant factions of
Hamas, the Islamic Jihad, the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, and Fatah.
These high-precision targeted killings are usually done by helicopter
gunships, where both IAF commanders and Shin Bet agents sit together in
the command center monitoring the operation.
Shin Bet’s task is to give precise intelligence when and where the
target will be available for a strike and then reacting to IAF drone
feedback and ensuring the men on the site are indeed the correct
targets.
Shin Bet’s motto is “Magen VeLo Yera’e” –or- “Defender that shall not be seen” .
Among thousands of highly skilled professional intelligence staff
Shin Bet also employs a large number of fluent Arabic speakers, who are
masterfully able to pass themselves off as Palestinians and go freely
about the West Bank.
New recruits to these elite intelligence operations units are said to
have to pass a test by going to a Palestinian market and engaging
shoppers in conversations without raising any suspicions about their
true identity.
The net result of years of meticulous information gathering under
extremely dangerous circumstances in the back alleys of Gaza that is
analyzed then processed- and later refined to actionable battlefield
intelligence will long be remembered as one of history’s most
spectacular intelligence coups.
Shin Bet agents play a highly dangerous game facing extraordinary personal dangers when they develop assets on the ground.
The terrorists are so paranoid that in many cases they also settle
personal scores by accusing members of other clans of being informers to
the Shin Bet.
Terror groups then publicly execute those accused of collaboration
with Israel. At the time of this writing there was such an incident
taking place in Gaza.
Masked gunmen publicly shot dead six suspected collaborators with
Israel at a large Gaza City intersection Tuesday of this week, witnesses
said. An Associated Press reporter saw a mob surrounding five of the
bloodied corpses shortly after the killing.
Some in the crowd stomped and spat on the bodies. A sixth corpse was
tied to a motorcycle and dragged through the streets as people screamed,
“Spy! Spy!”
The Hamas military wing, Izzedine al-Qassam, claimed responsibility
in a large handwritten note attached to a nearby electricity pole. Hamas
said the six were killed because they gave Israel information about
fighters and rocket launching sites.
The killing came on the seventh day of an Israeli military offensive
that has killed more than 120 Palestinians, both militants and
civilians. Israel has launched hundreds of airstrikes, targeting rocket
launching sites, weapons caches and homes of Hamas activists, as
Palestinians fired hundreds of rockets at Israel.
In selecting its targets for airstrikes, Israel relies on unmanned
spy planes, or drones, but also on a network of Palestinian
collaborators who feed information to their handlers from Israel’s
domestic Shin Bet security service.
Israel has relied on informers ever since it captured the West Bank,
Gaza Strip and east Jerusalem in the 1967 Mideast War. Some are
recruited with promises of work permits or money, while others are
blackmailed into collaborating.
There is broad consensus among Palestinians that informers for Israel
deserve harsh punishment, and it is rare to hear someone speak out
against killings of alleged collaborators. Such public killings have
been carried out in the West Bank and Gaza since the first intifada — or
uprising — in the late 1980s.
Last Tuesday’s highly publicized killings took place in Gaza City’s Sheik Radwan neighborhood.
Witnesses said a van stopped at the intersection, where four masked
men pushed the six suspected informers out of the vehicle. Salim
Mahmoud, 18, said the gunmen ordered the six to lie face down in the
street and then shot them dead. Another witness, 13-year-old Mokhmen
al-Gazhali, said the informers were killed one by one, as he mimicked
the sound of gunfire.
They said only a few people were in the street at first — most Gazans
have been staying indoors because of the Israeli airstrikes — but the
crowd quickly grew after the killings. Eventually several hundred men
pushed and shoved to get a close look at the bodies, lying in a jumble
on the ground.
“They should have been killed in a more brutal fashion so others
don’t even think about working with the occupation (Israel),” said one
of the bystanders, 24-year-old Ashraf Maher.
One body was then tied by a cable to the back of a motorcycle and
dragged through the streets. A number of gunmen on motorcycles rode
along as the body was pulled past a house of mourning for victims of an
Israeli airstrike.
In Israel’s last major Gaza offensive four years ago, 17 suspected
collaborators who fled after their prisons were hit in airstrikes were
later shot dead in extra-judicial killings.
During the current offensive, Tuesday’s killings brought to eight the
number of suspected informers being shot dead in public. On Friday, the
body of one alleged informer was found in a garbage bin, and another
was shot dead in the street. Hamas claimed responsibility for both
killings.
Since seizing Gaza in 2007, Hamas has executed four informers by firing squad, and about a dozen more are on death row in Gaza.
When Israel’s controlled Gaza and the entire West Bank, some
informers openly cooperated with Israeli forces. For example, one
informer in the West Bank town of Jericho displayed a photograph of
Israel’s army chief at the time on the wall of his office, in a defiant
display of his allegiance.
After Israel pulled back troops from parts of the West Bank, he and
others were given refuge in Israel. Other informers were evacuated from
Gaza after Israel withdrew in 2005, but Israel is believed to have
maintained a network there. Human rights groups have alleged, for
example, that Gaza medical patients seeking treatment in Israel are
sometimes approached by the Shin Bet at the crossing into Israel.
Some time ago, I learned first- hand from a senior Shin Bet operative
that developing intelligence assets among the opposing population
requires a great amount of skill, patience and sensitivity. The
operative told me about a deep cover Palestinian asset who developed his
cover and reputation among the terrorists by assisting would be suicide
bombers on their way to their targets. (Unbeknownst to the informer,
the Shin Bet replaced the high explosives with a dummy bomb.)
What this particular asset wanted in return for serving as a highly
effective informer over a long period of time was that the Sin Bet
officer running him on his dangerous mission should –as a personal
favor- help him prepare for higher education by actually becoming his de
facto math tutor.
There is no school that can prepare an agent for dealing with the human and psychological aspects of running a valuable asset.
Gathering small- sometimes insignificant-sounding tidbits and then
painstakingly connecting the dots- turning chatter into actionable
intelligence requires extraordinary professionalism.
Such a high degree of professionalism then results in creating an
effective real-time road map to the armed forces of the IDF so that they
can carry out their missions with laser accuracy and – in most cases –
without considerable collateral damage.
Members of Israel’s General Security Service carry out their vital
work in total anonymity most of their careers, but the results of their
diligent work make a huge difference in the outcome of their nation’s
ongoing war on terror.
Those nameless, faceless field officers are Israel’s front-line of
defense, standing guard against the various terror groups whose aim is
to kill as many innocents as possible.
Israel’s citizens owe them a great deal of gratitude!
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