Israel’s Shin Bet Security Service Foils Iranian Plot to Kidnap Israeli Academics, Former Defense Officials
Iranian “operatives attempted to gather information about the Israelis and possibly lure them abroad with the intention of kidnapping or harming them.”
Israel has foiled an elaborate Iranian plot to kidnap prominent Israelis, the country’s internal security agency Shin Bet revealed. Iranian agents tried to lure Israeli academics, businessmen, and former defense officials abroad and kidnap them, the Israeli security and counter-terrorism agency confirmed.
“The Iranians targeted members of Israel’s academic community and former members of the security agencies,” the Israeli news outlet Ynet wrote. The purpose of the Iranian operation was to “kidnap or harm them and to gather intelligence,” the Jerusalem Post reported.
The revelations come just weeks after the Israeli intelligence agency Mossad thwarted an Iranian plot to assassinate high-profile targets in Germany, France, and Turkey. Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) had planned to murder an Israeli diplomat and a U.S. general as part of a transnational terrorist operation, the Israeli media reported earlier this month.
The Times of Israel reported the details of the foiled Iranian plot:
The Shin Bet security agency said Thursday it had uncovered an attempt by Iranian operatives to lure Israeli academics, business people, and former defense officials abroad, in an effort to kidnap or otherwise harm them.
The agency has warned in the past that Iran has attempted to lure Israelis abroad. “It is a well-known method of operation of the Iranian intelligence and security bodies, headed by the Intelligence Organization of the Revolutionary Guards, Quds Force and the Ministry of Intelligence,” the Shin Bet charged on Thursday.
The agency said the operatives used spoofed emails, pretending to be academics, journalists, businessmen, and philanthropists.
May 19, 2022. (Shin Bet) The Shin Bet security agency said Thursday it had uncovered an attempt by Iranian operatives to lure Israeli academics, business people, and former defense officials abroad, in an effort to kidnap or otherwise harm them.
The agency has warned in the past that Iran has attempted to lure Israelis abroad. “It is a well-known method of operation of the Iranian intelligence and security bodies, headed by the Intelligence Organization of the Revolutionary Guards, Quds Force and the Ministry of Intelligence,” the Shin Bet charged on Thursday.
According to the Shin Bet, the operatives attempted to gather information about the Israelis and possibly lure them abroad with the intention of kidnapping or harming them.
A number of targets were duped and nearly went abroad, the Shin Bet said.
In some of the cases listed by the Shin Bet, the operatives invited the potential victims to a conference in Europe, using email addresses similar to official institutes and with their logos.
Once establishing an initial connection, conversations would continue over WhatsApp, the Shin Bet said.
The thwarted plot came to light following reports that President Joe Biden’s administration — in a desperate bid to restore the 2015 nuclear deal — has been considering the removal of Iran’s Islamic Guard (IRGC) from the U.S. list of global terrorist organizations, reversing a decision taken by the Trump administration in 2019.
President Biden’s concessions, which include easing several Trump-era sanctions, has only embolden Iran into pursuing its nuclear weapons program. According to the Israeli defense ministry, Tehran is just “weeks away” from amassing enough enriched uranium and other fissile material to build its first nuclear bomb.
While the Mullah regime moves ever closer to acquiring a nuclear arsenal, it is intensifying its terror campaign against Israel, the key U.S. ally in the region. “Israel is seeing some tensions growing with Hezbollah and Iran in Syria,” the Jerusalem Post noted on Friday.
Iran, supported by a network of proxy jihadi and terrorist groups, is ramping up its offensive military capabilities across the Middle East. Iran is “developing operational systems throughout the region, equipped with accurate capabilities including cruise missiles, surface-to-surface missiles and UAVs, capable of reaching thousands of kilometers,” Israeli Defense Minister Benny Gantz confirmed this week.
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A new day brings yet another terrorist operation from the Dhimmi-crats’ friends and partners in the malignant Iranian regime, who are so incorrigibly and transparently committed to their Islamic supremacist/terrorist ways, and, to their genocidal aspirations against Israeli Jews.
I wish we had a national security apparatus that remembered what its actual damn job was.
Another day and Israeli’s let the iranians make war while they stand aside.
Destroy Tehran and put an end to this Israel.