Hit 'unprofessional' says ex Mossad official
Updated on 17 February 2010
A former high-ranking Mossad intelligence official tells Channel 4 News that Israel could not have been involved in the plot to assassinate the Hamas commander Mahmoud al-Mabhouh because it was "so unprofessional".
Israel's foreign minister said today that the use of identities of foreign-born Israelis did not prove the Mossad spy agency assassinated Mahmoud al-Mabhouh in Dubai last month.
Police have named 11 suspects - all carrying European credentials - who were allegedly part of a plot to kill the Hamas military commander.
"There is no reason to think that it was the Israeli Mossad, and not some other intelligence service or country up to some mischief," Avigdor Lieberman told Army Radio today.
Former Mossad intelligence officer Rami Igra told Channel 4 News he did not believe the assassination was the work of Israel.
"This looks so weird that it looks as though someone is trying to frame Israel. It's more likely to be somebody else's operation."
Mr Igra said the fact that six of the alleged assassins identified by the Dubai police had the same names as British-Israeli citizens living in Israel suggested that the intention had been to blacken his country's name in the UK.
"It's easy to take British and Irish names and forge passports. It's so stupid, it looks like someone is trying to frame Israel.
"Even Enid Blyton would have written a better story than this. The whole thing, the photographs, the only thing we don't have is the sound. Otherwise, we have the whole movie.
"People are trying to portray Israel in the UK as a rogue country, which it is not. There are people in this debate, especially in the UK, who want to portray Israel as an aggressive country."
Mr Igra said if Israel had carried out the operation, it would have attempted to limit the damage by contacting the people whose identities had been used.
It was also strange that the events leading up to the killing were caught on CCTV cameras, which "could always have been shut down".
Had Israel been involved, he said, it would not "reflect positively" on the country. "This is not an aggressive country, one that takes the law into its own hands. This is a land of science, a peace-wanting country."
Mr Igra said two Palestinians living in Jordan had been arrested. "There's a big debate between the PLO and Hamas about who they belong to."
Mabhouh was "chief (weapons) procurement officer for Hamas ... there are many people who didn't like him and wanted to get him out of the way".
