Israel Matzav

Der Spiegel: Abu Sesi believed to have information about Shalit

When the Dirar Abu Sesi story broke, I told you all that the Mossad does not go around randomly kidnapping people in foreign countries, and that if they undertook this kind of operation, there must have been a reason for it. I even said that you should think in terms of Mordechai Vanunu. A story in Wednesday's Der Spiegel may shed a lot of light on why the Mossad wanted Abu Sesi.

One informant says Israel had considered Abu Sisi a high-ranking Hamas man who knows a number of secrets. "If Mossad goes to such an expense, and interrogates the man for six weeks, then he must know something Israel absolutely wants to hear," says the source, who would only speak on the condition of anonymity. If Abu Sisi was just an "irritant," he would have simply been killed.

Jerusalem may believe that Abu Sisi had information relating to Gilad Shalit, the Israeli soldier kidnapped four and a half years ago by Hamas, according to another source. Since Shalit, now 24, was captured, Israel and Hamas have discussed a prisoner exchange, partly with German mediation. Hamas wants 1,000 Palestinians freed from jail in exchange for his freedom. Jerusalem has not wholly given up hope of liberating him with a commando mission. But Israeli forces would have to know exactly where he's held (presumably in the Gaza Strip) -- information they appear to be hoping to obtain from Abu Sisi.

Read the whole thing. The only indication it gives of why Abu Sesi was captured was because of Shalit.

But if that's the case, the fact that it's now public knowledge will make any attempt to rescue Shalit much harder. For starters, you can be sure that if he has been held in one place the entire time, he will now be moved. I don't believe he will be killed, because he is worth more to Hamas alive than dead. But it will definitely make a rescue mission much harder.

By the way, the role of the Ukrainian intelligence services in this story is fascinating. I never would have thought that the Mossad had such good relations with them.

Labels: Dirar Abu Sesi, Gilad Shalit, Mossad

posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 7:59 AM