Skip to main content

Been there....done that! Dubai, Mossad, assassinations, CCTV, etc. etc.

It's all over the news....what appears almost certain to have been Mossad's assassination of a Hamas leader in Dubai. The story has still some way to unfold.

Meanwhile, Paul McGeough, veteran journalist in the Middle East and author of the must-read book, Kill Khalid: The Failed Mossad Assassination of Khalid Mishal and the Rise of Hamas, [the true account of the attempt by Mossad to assassinate Khalid Mishal in Amman back in 1997] is interviewed on Democracy Now, bringing up-to-date the present situation of the assassination in Dubai and putting the whole thing into context:

"Well, the similarities are that the Mossad chose, and funnily enough, while Benjamin Netanyahu was prime minister in an earlier incarnation—these sorts of missions require the prime minister’s sign-off—they chose a foreign setting. They chose Amman, the capital of Jordan, notwithstanding the fact that King Hussein of Jordan was Israel’s best friend in the Arab world and had gone out on a limb to sign a peace treaty with Israel.

Again, it was a very clever plan. They proposed that they would inject a secret mysterious poison into Khalid Mishal’s ear as he walked down the street. He wasn’t expected to be aware that this had happened. The hope was that he would go home and lie down, feeling tired, and die. And when there was an autopsy, there would be no trace of this mysterious poison in his system.

In fact, what happened was, the brilliance of the plan ended up being its Achilles’ heel, because they left enough time for the poison to work so that Mishal would have departed the setting of the injection, so that his people would not link the accidental bumping of somebody up against him in the street with his subsequent death. But the time they left for the poison to work was the time in which Jordanian doctors were able to put in place the effort to save him.

And while that was going on, Mishal’s bodyguards captured two of the Mossad agents, thereby delivering to King Hussein bargaining chips. King Hussein was able to demand, in deliberate humiliation of Benjamin Netanyahu, the release of Hamas prisoners from Israeli prisons. And also he put the word on Bill Clinton, then US president, to force Netanyahu to hand over to the Jordanians the secret poison and an antidote."

Go here to read the whole most interesting interview.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Reading the Chilcot Inquiry Report more closely

Most commentary on the Chilcot Inquiry Report of and associated with the Iraq War, has been "lifted" from the Executive Summary.   The Intercept has actually gone and dug into the Report, with these revelations : "THE CHILCOT REPORT, the U.K.’s official inquiry into its participation in the Iraq War, has finally been released after seven years of investigation. Its executive summary certainly makes former Prime Minister Tony Blair, who led the British push for war, look terrible. According to the report, Blair made statements about Iraq’s nonexistent chemical, biological, and nuclear programs based on “what Mr. Blair believed” rather than the intelligence he had been given. The U.K. went to war despite the fact that “diplomatic options had not been exhausted.” Blair was warned by British intelligence that terrorism would “increase in the event of war, reflecting intensified anti-US/anti-Western sentiment in the Muslim world, including among Muslim communities in the

Robert Fisk's predictions for the Middle East in 2013

There is no gain-saying that Robert Fisk, fiercely independent and feisty to boot, is the veteran journalist and author covering the Middle East. Who doesn't he know or hasn't he met over the years in reporting from Beirut - where he lives?  In his latest op-ed piece for The Independent he lays out his predictions for the Middle East for 2013. Read the piece in full, here - well worthwhile - but an extract... "Never make predictions in the Middle East. My crystal ball broke long ago. But predicting the region has an honourable pedigree. “An Arab movement, newly-risen, is looming in the distance,” a French traveller to the Gulf and Baghdad wrote in 1883, “and a race hitherto downtrodden will presently claim its due place in the destinies of Islam.” A year earlier, a British diplomat in Jeddah confided that “it is within my knowledge... that the idea of freedom does at present agitate some minds even in Mecca...” So let’s say this for 2013: the “Arab Awakening” (the t

An unpalatable truth!

Quinoa has for the last years been the "new" food on the block for foodies. Known for its health properties, foodies the world over have taken to it. Many restaurants have added it to their menu. But, as this piece " Can vegans stomach the unpalatable truth about quinoa? " from The Guardian so clearly details, the cost to Bolivians and Peruvians - from where quinoa hails - has been substantial. "Not long ago, quinoa was just an obscure Peruvian grain you could only buy in wholefood shops. We struggled to pronounce it (it's keen-wa, not qui-no-a), yet it was feted by food lovers as a novel addition to the familiar ranks of couscous and rice. Dieticians clucked over quinoa approvingly because it ticked the low-fat box and fitted in with government healthy eating advice to "base your meals on starchy foods". Adventurous eaters liked its slightly bitter taste and the little white curls that formed around the grains. Vegans embraced quinoa as