Tel Aviv
Evening of the Assassinations
There were varying estimates of Mossad’s size. The lay person thought it was a vast organization with a global reach. Those in the intelligence community thought Mossad had about a thousand staff. The CIA, MI6, other Western agencies had their own estimates about its size.
Levin and his predecessors never commented on those estimates. It added to the mystique and the legend of Mossad.
In reality, the organization was smaller than the CIA and MI6. It was also smaller than Hollywood’s portrayal of the agency. What gave the organization incredible reach was the network of sayanim, helpers, Jews who in many cases were dual nationals, scattered all over the world.
Sayanim helped Mossad’s operations the world over. A travel agency in Dubai could arrange the right documents for the operatives. A landlord in London could provide accommodation. Sayanim sometimes worked closely with katsas, Mossad’s field intelligence officers. Often, they worked alone, driven by their commitment to the state of Israel and to the welfare of Jews the world over.
Sayanim were the furthest thing from Levin’s mind as he reached his office in Tel Aviv. The CIA had its headquarters in Langley, MI6 had its at Vauxhall Cross in London. Neither agency made any attempt to hide those locations.
Mossad never advertised where its headquarters was. Other than current and former employees and a few politicians, no one knew where the ramsad ran his agency from.
To the naked eye, the building looked like any office block. Staffers clocked in with key cards, some wearing business suits, some casually dressed. Unsurprisingly, given that many Mossad operatives were stationed overseas, hot-desking was the norm. There were conference rooms scattered around the building, with Levin being one of the very few who had a separate office.
The building’s interior had the feel of a university campus, though its security wouldn’t be found in any college.
Levin greeted people around the office, went into his own and shut the door.
He logged in to his computer and brought up the files of all his kidon.
Kidon, Hebrew for “tip of the spear,” was a special-ops unit in Mossad so secret that most staffers didn’t know who was in it.
It carried out high-profile assassinations, gathered highly sensitive intelligence, and engaged in sabotage operations. Kidon members, male and female, were usually drawn from elite units such as Sayeret Matkal within the Israeli Defense Forces.
They underwent intense psychological profiling before being admitted and trained in the Negev desert. They worked in small teams, khuliyot, of two to four. Each team member was responsible for specific tasks such as recon, logistics and assassination.
If Mossad operatives had been responsible for the killing, they had to be kidon.
It wasn’t hard to reach that conclusion. Like any other intelligence agency, Mossad had several departments. Collections was responsible for espionage; Political Action dealt with relations with other countries, both friendly and hostile; there was a research department and a technology one; and then there were Metsada and Kidon.
Metsada was a special operations unit, and its operatives were trained assassins. However, Levin knew the location of every one of them and received daily video reports. Those calls triangulated their position. It was logistically impossible for any of them to have arrived in the country and carried out the killing.
No, if the killers were from his organization, they had to be kidon. Levin brought up their profiles. Just two of them were in Israel, the rest overseas on various missions.
That didn’t mean much. Unlike the Metsada teams, kidon didn’t call in or send daily reports. Any one of them could have come into the country using fake credentials. After all, they lived large parts of their lives under assumed names and false identities.
Levin looked out at the open-plan office. Men and women going about their work. A lot of it was simple administrative work that held together intelligence-gathering operations and the more lethal missions.
How could he identify the killers? Who could he trust?
President Morgan’s words came to him. Any help you need…
Of course. How could he have forgotten? He deliberated for a moment, going through his decision. Bringing in an outsider to investigate the Mossad? It had never been done before.
But these were exceptional times, and Avichai Levin was an exceptional leader, which was why he was also considered a legend.
And the man he had in mind?
Exceptional was an understatement.
Washington DC, That Evening
The woman who took Avichai Levin’s call could have passed for a banker on Wall Street.
She was dressed in a cream suit over a white blouse and wore a string of pearls around her neck. No rings on her fingers. She wasn’t married or engaged and, other than the necklace, didn’t wear jewelry.
She went by Clare. No second name. Those who knew it, never used it.
She had just returned from briefing President Morgan and had been in the Oval Office when he had spoken to Prime Minister Cantor.
Clare headed the Agency, a virtually unknown black-ops outfit that was answerable only to the president. While the country had many covert units to fight terrorism and deal with national security threats, the Agency was structured differently.
Clare was its only employee and had the opaque title of Director of Strategic Affairs. She had eight agents, all of who worked for a security consulting firm in New York. The firm was genuine; it had real clients and delivered exceptional advice … when the operatives were not on Agency missions. The security business housed all the assets that the covert unit needed, and this resulted in a near-zero administrative footprint for the Agency.
Zeb Carter was the outfit’s lead operative. Prior to joining Clare’s outfit, he had been a private military contractor.
Her phone buzzed. She looked at the number and smiled briefly. She had won a bet with President Morgan.
‘Avichai,’ she said as she took the call, ‘I heard what happened. How can I help you?’
She listened as the Mossad director outlined his request.
‘You know Zeb’s on a mission.’
The ramsad said he was aware of that.
‘You can take my other operatives. They are as good.’
‘I know,’ Levin replied. ‘But I want him. He can pass for an Israeli. Or a Palestinian. I know he’s in Turkey. I spoke to him a few days back.’
Another smile escaped Clare. She knew about that call. Zeb had briefed her, and the incident in the kidon’s hotel room had made her chuckle.
She knew the reasons Levin gave weren’t the real ones. There was history between the Mossad head and Zeb. Good history. They were almost like brothers. It wasn’t surprising that the ramsad wanted that particular operative.
‘I’ll tell him.’
‘Thank you.’
‘Anything you need, you just have to ask.’
‘I know,’ Levin acknowledged. In the world of counter-intelligence agencies, Mossad and the Agency had a history of unstinting cooperation.
Clare broke mission protocol when the call ended. She sent a text message to Zeb Carter.
A friend will call.