Mossad missed Hezbollah threat

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Israel's storied foreign-intelligence service failed to fully understand the threat posed by Hezbollah in southern Lebanon, based on a view among many analysts that the guerrilla organization was an evolving political group, according to U.S. officials and private intelligence specialists.

The Mossad had intelligence about most Hezbollah weapons, including rockets fired into Israel and other hardware. But the service knew little about the military and intelligence side of Hezbollah, a diverse organization made up of Islamic terrorists, conventionally armed militia forces, a charity wing and a political movement.

Mossad is famous for past exploits, including the global campaign in the 1970s to track down and kill Palestinian terrorists in retaliation for the deaths of 11 Israeli athletes and coaches at the 1972 Munich Olympics. Its specialty has been recruiting agents inside terrorist groups and using their information to effectively counter or limit attacks.

However, the recent fighting in southern Lebanon revealed major shortcomings in the agency's intelligence on the precise locations of Hezbollah leaders and rocket launchers, said officials who spoke on the condition of anonymity.

"This was an intelligence failure, but not on the same scale as those of the United States prior to 9/11," said one U.S. official long involved in intelligence matters.

The U.S. official said Mossad's lack of intelligence about Hezbollah dates back to 1998, when the terrorist group began a strategy of conducting clandestine attacks while also seeking public support through charitable work and joining the political process in Lebanon.

The bias regarding Hezbollah's evolving nature had an effect on the activities of Israeli spies and agents in the field, which contributed to misperceptions about the group, the officials said.

Robert Baer, a former CIA operations officer who is familiar with Mossad, said the Israeli intelligence agency failed to gather good intelligence on Hezbollah, in stark contrast to its very successful efforts against Palestinian terrorists.

Israeli intelligence, mainly the Shin Bet domestic service, thoroughly penetrated many Palestinian terrorist groups. But Hezbollah employs extremely tight operational security to prevent penetration by Mossad or other intelligence services, Mr. Baer said.

Hezbollah operates its military and intelligence wings in utmost secrecy, and they are completely separate from the charitable and political wings, he said.