“Those seeking to understand Israel’s saber-rattling have a new piece of required reading,” writes Isaac Wolf. “In their rich volume, ‘Spies Against Armageddon,’ published by Levant Books, veteran reporters Dan Raviv and Yossi Melman tell the history of Israel’s intelligence community. It’s one cast from the horrors of the Holocaust and steeled by their Arab neighbors.

“Raviv, who has over 30 years of experience as a CBS News correspondent, and Melman, a longtime Israeli newspaper reporter on military and intelligence issues, trace the growth of Israel’s intelligence community, showing the long-standing tension between Israel’s efforts to gain respect from American spies as it simultaneously tries to trick them.”

Raviv on LarsLarson Part1 14aug12

“Yeah, it’s not a good feeling, but it might have a good outcome: if Iran’s nuclear program can be shut down.  You’d favor that.  I’d favor that.  Americans would favor that.  But it’s a very tough mission.  Israel’s not anxious to do it.  In many ways, Israel’s been sending a signal — to the U.S. government, especially — saying, please ‘You take care of this, but you’ve got to promise you will.’

“And frankly, no one is promising absolutely.  So Israelis say, ‘We’re the people who are threatened the most by Iran’s nuclear program, and we might have to act.  And we’re sorry, Mr. Obama, we might not even wait ’til November 6th…”

Larson asked if it’s legitimate for Obama to ask Israel not to act until after Election Day.  And he also asked Raviv about the fact that the United States keeps its embassy in Tel Aviv, rather than moving it to Jerusalem:

Raviv on LarsLarson Part2 14aug12

Raviv noted that while candidates have spoken of moving the U.S. Embassy to Jerusalem, to recognize that city as Israel’s capital, even Mitt Romney may well decide — if he is elected president, but then takes advice from the State Department and other agencies — to keep the embassy in Tel Aviv.

Halevy added that, other than attacking Iran’s nuclear facilities directly, there were various options available that could harm Tehran’s nuclear program. “It is incorrect to use the ‘bomb or bombing’ formula [referring to either Iran obtaining a nuclear bomb or Israel bombing its nuclear facilities to prevent it from doing so]. The minute people say this, they are in fact saying that if there’s a bombing, Iran will not have a bomb. And if this is true? If we decide to bomb, then what will we bomb? A nuclear reactor? Iran’s nuclear manpower? [The Iranians'] other methods for a counterattack?”

According to Halevy, “U.S. sanctions are effective, but negotiations with the Iranians have stopped. This is a situation in which an accumulation of negative things are happening to Iran. Either because of the international pressure or because of instability in Syria, Iran’s situation is deteriorating rapidly. In this situation, the Iranian regime could make wrong, unsound decisions which could affect us as well.”

Last week, Halevy told The New York Times, “If I were an Iranian, I would be very fearful of the next 12 weeks,” in line with the belief of some that a strike could come in September or early October.

Halevy’s statements join a series of remarks made by former Israeli security officials, including former Mossad chief Meir Dagan and former Israel Security Agency (Shin Bet) chief Yuval Diskin, who in the last year have come out against a possible Israeli strike on Iran’s nuclear sites.

An Israeli official said last week, after Halevy’s interview with The New York Times, that the statements reflect “irresponsibility of the first order.” In addition, he said they were largely directed at American ears, and were designed to interfere with the Israeli political leadership’s ability to decide for itself what to do regarding Iran.

Halevy said on Saturday that he was “sorry the statements were not to the liking of some” and noted that he himself did not like certain remarks made by the others, hinting at Netanyahu’s previous comment that the situation with Iran was similar to the eve of the start of World War II.

Maj. Gen. (res.) Aharon Ze’evi-Farkash, who served as head of Israel’s Military Intelligence Directorate from 2001 to 2006, was also interviewed over the weekend on Channel 2 news. Ze’evi-Farkash assessed that if an Israeli attack were to take place, it would occur in the near future: “I do not know if Israel will attack. The prime minister said he has not decided yet, but from my understanding of the big picture, I can say that it could be soon, within weeks or months.”

He added that Israel must take into account the possible risks arising from an attack on Iran, the consequences on the home front in Israel, and the implications this would have for Iranian unity.

“There are several options and only the last one should be to bomb Iran,” Ze’evi-Farkash said. “The Iranians have to understand if they do not stop this [nuclear] process, they will eventually have to absorb a blow to most of their military bases — from a possible coalition of countries, from the Americans or from Israel.”

“It’s not right to break this hard-won legitimacy now,” suggesting what could happen to Israel in the eyes of the international community if it decided to attack Iran soon.

Another ex-security chief, Maj. Gen. Danny Yatom, who served as head of Mossad, told Army Radio on Sunday that he believed the recent statements by former security heads were harming Israel’s national security.

He said he was “very concerned” over their statements and that he hopes “reports saying former defense officials are intentionally presenting positions that are not entirely correct in order to give themselves cover in the face of future inquiry committees, are not true.”

He added, “The officials should not be presenting their views to the prime minister or defense minister through statements made in the media. This discussion, in my opinion, harms our security.”

Yatom emphasized that U.S. support for an Israeli attack, if there is one, is very important. “I urge Israel to make every effort to coordinate an attack on Iran with the U.S. Although Israel is a sovereign country and it will eventually be its decision whether to attack Iran, U.S. support is still important,” he said.

israel spy, covert operations, Dan Raviv, Yossi Melman, Spies Against Armageddon

The writer tweets at @HichemKaroui.

Mr. Karoui’s article is titled “Spies, Murders, and Secret Wars.”  He writes of the “very intriguing book …  Spies Against Armageddon: Inside Israel’s Secret Wars.

“In their introduction, the authors say that Israel’s goal now ‘is to win – or, thinking of Iran, to distract and delay the enemy’s most dangerous plans – without committing large numbers of troops and planes, and without putting a major part of the Israeli population at risk from attacks by hostile neighbours’ forces.’  Thereupon, they add that their book ‘will reveal more than Israel has ever been willing to declare publicly about assassinations as a tool, about its flattening in 2007 of a nuclear reactor in Syria, and about the sabotage and murders aimed at choking Iran’s nuclear ambitions.’”

Listen here to Part One:

BatchelorShow Raviv Part1 19july12

Listen here to Part Two:

BatchelorShow Raviv Part2 19july12

We think we have some important stories to tell, and thus we returned to the subject of Israeli espionage. Our first effort in that field was a book in 1990 titled “Every Spy a Prince.” Twenty-two years later, in our new Spies Against Armageddon, we spoke with more people and got more stories — about recent events, but also new details about important operations going back to the beginnings of the Jewish state in 1948.

We are not surprised that the news media put their focus on our description of Israel’s covert activities aimed at stopping — or at least slowing — Iran’s nuclear program. Many of those were accurate, if brief, summaries of what we reported: notably, a news article by the Associated Press on July 8, 2012.

We had mixed feelings, therefore, when The New York Times gave our book significant attention on July 11. The headline atop a full column on Page A8 said: “Tehran Abuzz as Book Says Israel Killed 5 Scientists.”

Several of our friends said there is no such thing as bad publicity when one has written a book and it is just out, and the project thrives or languishes depending on how much attention it can get, yet the wording of the Times article would lead newspaper readers to think we were accusing Jews in Iran — where approximately 25,000 still reside — of participating in secret Mossad missions, including assassinations.

The article says that our book contains the “assertion” that five scientists were killed in Iran “by operatives, most likely of Persian Jewish heritage, employed by Mossad …”

We do not want to attack the reporter. We feel, however, that while the main thrust of his article turned out to be reporting what the news media in Iran are saying about our book, he himself distorted what we wrote. We are not suggesting that it was intentional, but there were some exaggerations and too much certainty — whereas we were cautious in suggesting what might be true about covert Mossad operations in Iran.

In a carefully worded passage on Page 14 — in our first chapter, “Stopping Iran” — our book says: “The Mossad also had a human treasury: Tens of thousands of ex-Iranians now lived in Israel. Iranian Jews had fled, especially just after the 1979 revolution, and many of their children also were well acquainted with the Persian language and customs. Individuals who were brave enough — and then selected and trained by the Mossad — could move back to Iran and secretly serve Israel.

“Israeli operatives inside Iran were available for all kinds of espionage and even, if and when the time came, for pinpointing targets for air strikes.”

We were not reporting that the assassins in 2007-2012 were Persian Jews returning to their homeland. We said that the Mossad “could” call upon the repository of ex-Iranians as well as other Israelis in the secret agency.

The Times article also mentioned “the book’s assertion that the assassins were all Mossad agents who used agency safe houses maintained inside Iran since the era of the shah.”

Again, we carefully report in our book that the Mossad has had safe houses in Iran since pre-1979 days, but we don’t report that all the assassins stayed in such houses.

The key paragraph on Page 13 of our book speaks of “possibilities.” We do not claim to know or to reveal how the assassins traveled or where they stayed:

“Naturally, no one in Tel Aviv was talking about any operational details of how Israelis entered and left Iran — or where they stayed while inside the Islamic Republic.

“There were many possibilities. Obviously, Israeli operatives traveled using the passports of other countries, including both bogus and genuine documents. That fact had been inadvertently revealed several times, over many years. In addition, the Mossad continuously maintained safe houses in Iran, dating back to the pre-1979 years under the Shah. That was an investment in the future, typical for Israeli intelligence.”

The Times article then caused some discomfort to some Persian Jews in the United States — and we heard from some — when it stated that our book contains “assertions about the assassins’ nationalities or religious beliefs …” We never discuss their religious beliefs. Yes, their nationality is Israeli. We do report that, and we explain that against the background of Mossad operations that penetrated enemy countries in decades past.

Our book treads carefully on some very sensitive territory, but we would like to think that we got the balance right. It is the historian’s job to tell readers what happened and to set it in context — and as historians of the espionage world, we further endeavor not to endanger anyone by revealing too many details.

Let us be clear, and we have written about this elsewhere and will continue to do so: Israel’s Mossad does not use local Jews as agents, saboteurs or assassins. Bitter lessons were learned more than half a century ago in Egypt, Iraq and other countries, where early operations by Israeli intelligence sometimes did use local Jews— and, if caught, the individuals were hanged, and their entire communities suffered official retribution from the Arab regime.

The use of Jonathan Pollard, an American with a high-level security clearance in U.S. naval intelligence, as a spy for Israel was an aberration. The Mossad would not have hired him. It was a separate agency, Lakam (the Science Liaison Bureau), that ran Pollard — who is now serving a life sentence for an operation that most Israeli officials and intelligence professionals believe was a mistake.

The Mossad, we believe, would have known not to put the important American Jewish community in peril — not the least, American Jews working in U.S. defense and intelligence jobs — by employing Pollard.

Original article.

To read the Associated Press and New York Times articles mentioned above, visit:

• Associated Press on July 8.
• The New York Times

Dan Raviv, a CBS News correspondent based in Washington, and veteran Israeli intelligence reporter and commentator Yossi Melman are co-authors of the new “Spies Against Armageddon: Inside Israel’s Secret Wars.” They also wrote the best seller “Every Spy a Prince.” They blog at IsraelSpy.com  . A version of this article appeared in print in the Los Angeles Jewish Journal.