Inside Mossad’s Shadow War with Iran, Part 1 (INSIDE Call me Back sneak peek)

Summary

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Call Me Back – Inside Mossad’s Shadow War with Iran, Part 1: The Sabotage Years

Host: Dan Senor
Guest: Ronen Bergman
Date: March 21, 2026
Podcast by Ark Media

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Main Theme & Purpose

This exclusive episode launches a three-part inside series on Mossad’s decades-long “shadow war” with Iran, offering unprecedented behind-the-scenes insights into Israeli intelligence operations aimed at sabotaging Iran’s nuclear ambitions. Journalist and historian Ronen Bergman guides listeners through the chronology, tactics, and ethical dilemmas that have shaped this secret conflict, with part one focusing on “The Sabotage Years” (2007–2012) under Mossad chief Meir Dagan.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Setting the Stage: From Shadow War to Open Conflict

• Initial Context: The conversation opens with Bergman, reporting live from his office near Tel Aviv, as Iranian missile interceptions are occurring outside—a stark reminder that the “shadow war” is increasingly in the open.
  “I am speaking with you now from my office in Ramata Sharon...I hear the explosions of the air defenses, of the interception of Iranian missiles...It's not in the shadows anymore, right?” — Bergman [03:11]

2. Discovery of Iran’s Nuclear Ambitions (1993–2003)

• Early Israeli Concerns: After the Iran-Iraq War, Israel suspects Iran is seeking chemical weapons.

  • Mossad assigns Yossi Cohen (later Mossad chief), a “brilliant young case officer,” to investigate Iran’s interest in weapons of mass destruction.
  • Iran seeks expertise and technology from A.Q. Khan, the “father of the Pakistani nuclear bomb.”
  • The U.S. stops Israel from assassinating A.Q. Khan, promising to handle him themselves.
    “Let's go and cut the head of the snake and kill A.Q. Khan...The US came to them and said, listen, this is our court. We take care of A.Q. Khan. Do not touch it.” — Bergman [05:45]

• 2003 Natanz Revelation:

  • Israel discovers a hidden uranium enrichment facility at Natanz, with thousands of centrifuges being installed.
  • Ariel Sharon considers a military strike but deems it unfeasible due to technological and intelligence limitations, and global chaos during the Iraq War buildup.
  • Iran, fearing a US invasion after the fall of Iraq, orders “Project Ahmad” (weaponization) dismantled—but only superficially. Secrets and key scientists are relocated to universities under the guise of legitimate research.
    • The mastermind: Professor Mohsen Fakhrizadeh, aka “the old fox.”
      “While dismantling his own project...he was secretly relocating nucleus of that project into the universities...hiding in plain sight.” — Bergman [09:20]

• US-Israeli Intelligence Debate:

  • Rifts emerge between US and Israeli assessments regarding Iran’s intentions and capabilities. “Even in 2025, the assessment of parts of the American intelligence community were that Iran is not producing nuclear weapon... The Israelis were claiming this is not a coincidence, these are all interconnected.” — Bergman [12:00]

3. Penetrating Iranian Intelligence

• Hacker Wars & Codebreaking:
  • Mossad targets Iranian encrypted communications by infiltrating an Iranian embassy in Europe, photographing documents and equipment—outperforming the CIA and NSA in such operations. “A Mossad team broke into an Iranian embassy in one of the European countries...helped the Israelis understand much, much, much better how Iran is encrypting its communication.” — Bergman [13:18]
  • They share these breakthroughs with the NSA, strengthening US-Israel intelligence ties further.

4. Operation Avalanche: The Laptop and the “Blueprints for a Bomb”

• Pivot Point—Agent ‘Dolphin’ & German Intel Cooperation:
  • German intelligence recruits a scientist close to Fakhrizadeh (codename: Agent Dolphin). He offers a laptop with bomb blueprints in exchange for defecting with his family.
  • The CIA and Germans successfully extract his family and the laptop, but the scientist is captured and executed in Iran—a major tragedy. “They missed the opportunity of bringing the scientist, Agent Dolphin, and he was caught by the Iranians and executed. I was told that his boss, Fakhri Zadeh, made sure that they torture him and they kill him. Of course, he saw it as a betrayal in his trust, a big tragedy.” — Bergman [18:20]
  • The blueprints expose Iran’s nuclear weaponization efforts and bring greater scrutiny from the IAEA, though the agency stops short of declaring Iran in full breach of the Non-Proliferation Treaty.

5. The Sabotage Years (2007–2012): Meir Dagan’s Doctrine

a. Meir Dagan’s Leadership

• Dagan’s Ethos & Strategies:
  • A “ruthless” military man, Dagan transforms Mossad from “just” an intelligence collection agency to an operational force bent on halting Iran’s nuclear project through direct, multi-pronged action.
  • He believed Israel must delay or prevent enemy advancements with covert operations—not war. “Dagan didn't want just to collect. He said, I have the responsibility to stop Iranian adversaries from acquiring nuclear weapon.” — Bergman [20:18]
  • Doctrine:
    1. Simultaneous deployment of sabotage, cyber-attacks, assassination, and psychological operations to slow and disrupt Iran’s progress.
    2. The goal: buy time, sow confusion, and avoid direct war. “If we do sabotage, if we do cyber attacks, if we assassinate the leaders...if we do all of that together, he said, we will be able to stop and we will not need to resort for war.” — Bergman [21:29]

b. Game-Changing Recruitment Tactics

• Israeli Agent Protocols Upended:
  • Mossad pivots from sending Israelis undercover to recruiting actual Iranians—so-called “warrior agents”—indoctrinated, trained, and tasked with sabotage and even assassination, since new biometric controls make forged identities far more difficult. “Reality is that most of the work, most of the secret operations...were done by Iranians and not by Itzik from Petah Tikva, who learned Farsi and was sent under disguise to Tehran.” — Bergman [23:52]

c. Detailed Sabotage Operations

• Supply Chain Attacks:

  • Mossad targets the international supply chain for Iran’s nuclear program, sabotaging key equipment at source—sometimes even destroying them at foreign factories, or tampering to cause future failures after delivery to Iran. “Iran cannot produce all the parts of the nuclear project by itself. Let's say that we deprive them of 100 of these components...” — Bergman [24:22]
  • Disruption methods include:
    • Inciting confusion and finger-pointing within Iranian procurement teams
    • Planting remote-monitoring devices
    • Causing subtle malfunctions that waste time and resources

• Anecdote: The Dog Leash Trick

  • A Mossad operative recounts how she infiltrated an Austrian factory by pretending to search for her lost dog—a creative example of everyday tradecraft. “She bought a new running suit and a leash for a dog...she came to the gate of the factory and said, I lost Rexy, my dog. He ran away from me...they let her walk in the factory with them for three hours, collecting all the necessary intelligence that she needed.” — Bergman [27:09]

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On the changing nature of “shadow wars”:
  “...it's not in the shadows anymore, right?”
  — Ronen Bergman [03:11]

• On the Mossad-CIA relationship:
  “I spoke with Hayden. He had nothing but great respect for the Dagan. He thought that the Dagan was honest and was thinking operationally like him.”
  — Ronen Bergman [16:07]

• On recruiting “warrior agents” inside Iran:
  “This new kind of agent would travel to another country, be trained by Mossad not just to supply intelligence, but also to do all sorts of things, including assassinations.”
  — Ronen Bergman [23:28]

• On the sabotage doctrine:
  “If we do all of that together...[sabotage, cyber, assassinations], we will be able to stop and we will not need to resort for war.”
  — Ronen Bergman [21:29]

• On real vs. Hollywood spycraft:
  “Maybe I'm sort of disillusioning people here about seeing Fouda or Tehran, but reality is that most of the work...was done by Iranians...”
  — Ronen Bergman [23:52]

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Timestamps for Key Segments

• 00:00–03:11 — Introduction; context for the series and present-day relevance
• 03:11–06:40 — Early detection of Iran’s WMD ambitions; Yossi Cohen and Project Sako; US-Israel disagreement over A.Q. Khan
• 07:06–10:55 — Discovery of Natanz site; Sharon/Dagan calculate and decide against military strike; Project Ahmad dispersal
• 11:55–13:18 — US-Israeli intelligence debate; ambiguity of Iran's nuclear intentions
• 13:18–15:32 — Mossad breaks Iranian codes; partnership with NSA
• 15:57–16:46 — Formation of Mossad-CIA leadership alliance; Dagan & Hayden
• 16:54–19:31 — Operation Avalanche; Agent Dolphin; IAEA implications
• 19:31–22:19 — The rise of Meir Dagan; doctrine of multidimensional sabotage
• 22:19–24:12 — Recruitment innovations; switch to Iranian “warrior agents”
• 24:22–27:40 — Detailed sabotage tactics; factory infiltration story

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Conclusion

This “Inside” episode provides a gripping, candid look at Israel’s evolving strategy against Iran’s nuclear program, blending strategic insight, intelligence history, and firsthand operational tales. Key themes include the escalation from espionage to action, the nuances of international cooperation (and mistrust), and the human ingenuity—often invisible to the public—that underpins decades of global intelligence wars.
Parts two and three will tackle aborted military plans (2012) and Mossad/CIA’s “death by a thousand cuts” (2018–2021).

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Transcript

[A]

Hi, it's Dan. This is a sneak peek from the members only edition of our show, Inside Call Me Back. I hope you enjoyed this segment and if you want to get the full episode and support our mission at ARC Media, please become an inside Call Me Back member by following the link in the description or by going to ark media.org that's ark media.org and to all our insiders, thank you. It's your support that keeps the lights on at ARK Media. You are listening to an art media podcast. Welcome to the inside edition of the Call Me Back podcast where we pull back the curtain and have the conversations we typically have after the cameras stop rolling. Thank you for subscribing to the show and supporting the Call Me Back podcast and all we do here at ARC Media. And also welcome to those of you who have recently joined us with me for a special inside Call Me Back series is Ronen Bergman. Ronen, who is well known to our audience. Welcome to the Inside.

[B]

Always pleasure.

[A]

The water's warm here, it's cozy. You can be freewheeling. I know we're going to work through a story, but you can be even more comfortable here than you are on the regular Call Me Back feed. Exactly. This is the mishpocha. Exactly. For our non Hebrew speaking insiders, that means the family. Okay, so Ronan, this is the first time we're creating an exclusive special series and the idea came to us when we tried to better understand the moment. We're in this all out war with Iran in the context of a longer war, one that has been unraveling or progressing depending on how you look at it, for decades. In the shadows, Mossad's shadow war with Iran, which began in the 1990s and included some of the most dramatic and dazzling operations in the world of espionage and intelligence. So in this three part series, Yu Ronan will tell this story and reveal new details which have largely been kept out of public view since the early 2000s. Part one is titled the Sabotage Years, which will focus on the period of assassinations and sabotage between 2007 and 2012, mostly led by the head of the Mossad, Mayor Dagan. Part two will focus on a dramatic 2012 military operation to take out the nuclear sites, but was called off at the last moment. And part three examines the joint Mossad CIA strategy of quote, death by a thousand cuts, which was a sustained effort to slow Iran's nuclear program between the years 2018 and 2021. So today we're going to dive into part one, the sabotage years. And I want to set this up, Ronen, before we get into the period of sabotage, we need to roll back the tape to the period in which Israel first discovers Iran's nuclear ambitions. So take me back to 1993 when the Mossad first gets a whiff Iran is up to as it relates to a project titled Project Sako.

[B]

You know, then for years we called that the shadow war because it was in the shadow secret sabotage or everything that we are going to discuss. And I am speaking with you now from my office in Ramata Sharon, a northern suburb of Tel Aviv. And in the background I hear the explosions of the air defenses, of the interception of Iranian missiles coming, trying to hit Israel, trying to hit basically this neighborhood. And I thought while you were speaking and I heard the explosions, I thought, well, it's not in the shadows anymore, right? But the beginning is exactly in the place where you mentioned Iran. War with Iraq ended in the late 80s that left both countries in much ruins and 1 million casualties, 3 million with it. But it left both countries with some energy to get back to old visions, dreams and basically invest in military, military projects that are not just about fighting the enemy. And Israel in the early 90s started to be concerned that Iran is trying to get hold of chemical agents to be deployed and thrown at their enemies. Now we need to bear in mind that Iraq was using chemical weapons on Iran. So the Iranians were looking for something whether to defend themselves, to attack the enemy and maybe to attack Israel. So they were trying to recruit people from the inner circle of Iranian scientists, proliferators and people in the know how of producing new kind of weaponry they thought chemical. The Mossad was sending one of their like most brilliant young case officers, a man they said can recruit phone poles, can recruit stones and make them talk. They said that one day he will be the chief of Mossad. The nickname was Kalan, some hero of a British TV series. And his real name was Yossi Cohen,

[A]

who later became literally became head of the Mossad. Right, Ronan, help me just establish who the different characters are at this phase. So there's Yossi Kon, as you mentioned. Who are the other key players?

[B]

The key players is the Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabid, who was Minister of Defense until 92 and then became the Prime Minister from 92. Mossad Chief Shabtai Shavid, and the Iranian Mohsen Fahrizade, who was a professor of physics and chemistry from Teh Iran University. And then Israel learned that he was assigned to be the chief of the secret nuclear project of Iran. And he was the POC with Abdelkader Khan, the father of the Pakistani nuclear bomb.

[A]

We know him as A Q Khan. That's how he was referred to in the U.S. right.

[B]

And a Q Khan was not just building a bomb, he was also selling atomic merchandise to other countries to make a lot of money. And Cohen received the blueprints of something that they were building. And soon after, of course, they realized this is not chemical. These are blueprints for centrifuges that are coming from Pakistan, the blueprints of Pakistani centrifuges that are used to enrich uranium. And they were starting to fear this is aimed to build a nuclear bomb. So the second Islamic bomb after Pakistan, that was also already in possession of that. And then Mossad said, well, let's go and cut the head of the snake and kill A Qcon, assassinate him. Because they already saw his proliferation in other places in the world. North Korea and then Libya and some to Iraq. They said, he is the core of the problem, let's hit him. And then the US Came to them and said, listen, this is our court. This is where we make the calls. We take care of the Ayku Khan. Do not touch it. Of course, Israel obeyed. And indeed this is not something, an area that Israel works in, usually Pakistan and India and all of these people. So they basically they stood down from, from killing Enkyu Khan and the US took care of that. But so many years later, when it was too late for Pakistan and too late for other countries.

[A]

Okay, so now let's Fast forward to 2003. About a decade later, Israel discovers that Iran is building some kind of facility in Natanz. So tell us about that facility, how it's discovered and who all's involved on the Israeli side at this time and how do they respond to this discovery?

[B]

So 2003, 10 years after Israel first learned that Iran might be seeking nuclear weapon era, Sharon is the Israeli Prime Minister. Mayor Dagan, legendary figure in the history of Israeli intelligence, is the chief of Mossad. And Israel was investing growing amounts of intelligence effort and budgets and bandwidth to try and understand what is happening in Iran. At the beginning, mainly not because of nuclear issues, but because of Iran's support of proxies throughout the Middle East. Names that now everybody knows. Hezbollah, Hamas, Palestinian, Islamic Jihad. And they were trying to monitor the chains of command and control inside Iran. And through that surveillance, they discover a secret Iranian site being extensively built by a place called Natanz where Iran is installing thousands of centrifuges for the enrichment of uranium and the Israelis just installment of the centrifuges was enough. But the fact that Iran was trying to hide that from the IAEA inspectors in violation of its own signatory to the non proliferation Treaty. These two together brought Israel to the conclusion that Iran is hiding a nuclear military project and Iran now is aiming for the A bomb as soon as possible. When all this material was brought to Ariel Shawn, the Prime Minister, he said okay, let's examine the possibility of attacking the site. But at the end they decided not. It was too long distant. The Israeli Air force was not properly equipped for these kind of bombing. There were few different targets, some of them underground. The munition for JDAMs, the bunkupusters did not yet exist in the former they are today. And of course there were also doubts about how much Israel really knows about what is happening in Iran. They know about one side, but who says there's not another side or sides? They figure that this is not the maybe not the right time to attack. They need to learn more. Then we need to keep in mind that this is all happening during the military buildup in the Gulf towards the second Iraq War. And the Iranians are certain that they're next that the US would not satisfy itself just with Iraq. And their most common well kept secret was something called Project Ahmad, which by expertise called the weapon Group, which is a group of experts that are dealing not with the enrichment of uranium. This is done in that place in Natanz, with the centrifuges, but they are dealing with the warhead, how to take the enriched uranium once produced, put this in a mechanism that would start the chain reaction and explode a nuclear bomb. Now, while having centrifuges enriching uranium could be explained that this is done for energy, for peaceful purposes. The weapon group is only about a weapon. And they were terrified that the US will find any kind of traces that they have a weapon group and use that as an excuse to go after them and conquer Iran. The determination of the US to go into Iraq after September 11th made the Iranians convinced that there is likelihood that the US will go into Iran, boots on the ground. And the first thing they did was immediately secretly dismantling Project Ahmad. Now we have the documents they had, the detailed manuals of what they are going to do, how they are dismantling the project sites. And the guy who wrote these manual was Professor Mohsen Fakhrizadeh, codename in Israel, the old Fox, who was the chief of Ahmad and the most important figure in the history of the Iranian nuclear project. But he was not just dismantling a project, he was thinking immediately how to reorganize this project in ways that are not going to be exposed or if exposed could be explained with regular research. So while dismantling his own project, his own agency, he was secretly relocating nucleus of that project into the universities as part of regular, seemingly legitimate academic project research projects, and left very small parts, only those that if they identified, they cannot be anything else but creating a weapon, leaving them in secret site and all the rest just bringing to the open, hiding in plain sight.

[A]

And there's disagreement between the Americans and the Israelis at this point, right? About what actually Iran is up to? Yeah.

[B]

And the disagreement is exactly in the point of what Fakhrizadeh has done after dismantling Project Ahmad, did he reassemble that? Or like did these scientists just by themselves looking for jobs, went to that university or that team, that research group. And the Israelis were claiming this is not a coincidence, these are all interconnected. This debate has been going on for quite a long time. To an extent it goes on until today, because even in 2025, the assessment of the parts of the American intelligence community were that Iran is not producing nuclear weapon. Now what is producing nuclear weapon? Japan. Japan is a peaceful country. They are something like three months away from producing nuclear weapon. This is the tricky part with understanding if countries pursuing a nuclear project for purpose of energy research or, or they, they want to bomb. Because the most of the research, most of the advancement, most of the learning, educating scientists how and what to do and engineers can be used for both. And only the last part, the last tip is only about a weapon. And Iran is basically claiming we won't have a bomb.

[A]

So the Israelis are focused at this point on obtaining proof, something concrete, some kind of signal. So what do they do?

[B]

So they want to get inside the Iranian communication to get as much information as possible. They realize they cannot recruit agent to be under every bed and around every corner around it. It will take time. So what they do is they are looking to decrypt the Iranian intelligence communication, worldwide communication network. Iran is an advanced country. And their intelligence, their vast intelligence world network was already using very sophisticated equipment, including connecting all the stations of the Ministry of Intelligence located in all the embassies of Iran around the world in highly sophisticated, highly encrypted communication system. And the Israelis wanted to understand how that works. How the so called Enigma machine, so the encryption machine, borrowing that from second World War, how the Iranian Enigma works, figuring out if they understand one machine, they will understand the whole network. So one day in 2002, a Mossad team broke into an Iranian embassy in one of the European countries. And they took photographs of documents and equipment that when brought to Israel and analyzed, they helped the Israelis understand much, much, much better how Iran is encrypting its communication. And by the way, Mossad knew that the CIA and the NSA tried to break into an embassy in another place in the world, and they failed. So they knew it's about them. They brought back the photographs. They gave that to a 200, that's the Israeli equivalent to the NSA, to a special group inside the a 200 called Merkaza Khibu, the center of connection, which is in charge of breaking codes. These are the creme de la creme. The creme of the crop of Israeli youth being recruited to Israeli intelligence at age of 18 or 19. Carefully selected, some of the main, I would say entrepreneurs, the chief founders of companies, and the most brilliant geniuses that later became the leaders of the startup nation were serving in that unit, including one Gil Schweid, who established checkpoint that you wrote so much about then.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

So Israeli intelligence shared the secret of decoding, breaking the code with the nsa. And of course, they want to share the burden of the work, the labor. But what they actually also did was to show the Americans that they could bring valuable assets to the table. And this was the beginning of a much, I would say a deeper relation, deeper trust in the relationship between.

[A]

So just Ronan, can you tell us a little more about the relationship between Mayor Degan, who's the head of the Mossad at this time, and Michael Hayden, who you've referenced, who was head of the NSA and later head of the CIA.

[B]

We are looking at a time like early 2000, where capabilities but also people had impact but turned to be historical events. So you have this American distinguished officer with his sharp tone, and Dagan was known to be sort of like this ruthless assassin spy. You wouldn't expect them, but I spoke with both of them, and I spoke with Hayden. He had nothing but great respect for the gun. He thought that the gun was honest and was thinking operationally like him. And they formed alliance that became even tighter when Hayden became the chief of the CIA.

[A]

So then a new piece of information ends up being revealed by German intelligence. Tell us about Operation Avalanche.

[B]

German intelligence was able to recruit a scientist that was working closely with Mohsen Fahrizadeh. You remember the old fox, the head of the Iranian nuclear project. And for family reasons, he was traveling between Iran and Germany, so they could cultivate him, they could debrief him, they could pay him. It was an ongoing relations. And he told them that Iran is trying to get hold of blueprints of a warhead. And they're trying to get blueprints of Chinese warheads that were originally stolen by A. Q. Khan from China, used in Pakistan, and now they were trying to acquire them from Pakistan. And at a certain point they did. And the. The agents that they recruited, codename Dolphin, Agent Dolphin told them they have the blueprints and he's willing to give it to them. He said, I have this on a laptop, many documents regarding the blueprints of and how basically how you produce a bomb that could fit into the shoulders of Shihab ballistic missile that can be fired, for example, on Israel. He said, I am willing to give you the laptop if you promise me full relocation to Germany with me, my family and the laptop. The Germans did not feel they have enough intelligence and operational capabilities to do that. So they joined the CIA. They asked the CIA to join and they ran operation called Avalanche to bring the laptop and the scientist and his family. They were very successful with the laptop and the family, but for some mishap that is still in bitter discussion, bitter debate between the CIA and B. And they missed the opportunity of bringing the scientist, Agent Dolphin, and he was caught by the Iranians and executed. I was told that his boss, Fakhri Zadeh, made sure that they torture him and they kill him. Of course, he saw it as a betrayal in his trust, a big tragedy. But at the end, they did have the blueprints. They have a blueprint of a bomb that Iran was trying to build. And I would say it was not. It was enough to get the IAEA on board to say, listen, you are lying to us. You are hiding, you are misleading us. You are not showing us the secret site in Perchim where you test high explosives, something that you need for a warhead. And the IAEA became more and more aggressive against Iran. Of course, they don't have a military power. They can do it only to a certain extent, but they were a little bit shy of declaring Iran in full breach of the npt.

[A]

Okay, so, Ronan, this brings us to the sabotage years 2007 to 2012. This is a strategy developed by Mayor Degan, who was head of the Mossad. Tell us more about Mayor Degan.

[B]

Dagan is a character. He is one of those people that you really, as a writer, as a historian, you really look for because they have so many layers and it's so complicated, but they also have great imprint on history. Dagan was never at Mossad, but it was always his dream. He had a military career, and he was pushed up the chain of command by Ariel Sharon that met him back in the late 60s in the Southern Command. And the gun was always about special operations, always about working under disguise, always about removing the threat physically. Sharon said that Dagan's main expertise was how to separate between a terrorist and his head. And the GUN came to Mossad and was very unhappy from the mindset and the direction and the sort of atmosphere that Mossad took that basically called for collection of intelligence. Dagan didn't want just to collect. He said, I have the responsibility to stop Iranian adversaries from acquiring nuclear weapon. And so it's not just about collection. It's about taking the intelligence and translate that into operation kinetic operations way beyond enemy lines. Sabotage, cyber assassination, explosions, to basically use secret means in order to counter a danger from the adversary. And the GUN told me, listen, our main military strategy always has been to enlarge the gaps between each war because we won't be able to sustain frequent wars and not long wars. We have to make a war to go to war, to go to a full attack only when the knife is on our head. All the rest should be dealt, should be handled by secret operations, assassination, sabotage, etc. And in order to have operations, he needed to basically disassemble and reassemble Mossad to fit his demands. And he built a theory, a doctrine that had different components. He said, the only way in which we can stop and maybe destroy first delay and then stop and maybe destroy the Iranian nuclear project was if we deploy many, many tactics and war efforts or secret war efforts at the same time. He said, if we do sabotage, if we do cyber attacks, if we assassinate the leaders of the Iranian nuclear project, if we do all of that together, he said, we will be able to stop and we will not need to resort for war.

[A]

And he put a high focus on, or an intense focus on recruiting Iranians.

[B]

Yeah. And in order to do all of that, he needed to basically rewrite the protocol for agents because they needed to recruit people inside Iran. That would do much of the work that is traditionally done by Mossad agents. The biometric systems that were installed after September 11 to stop terrorists from moving from one country to another were, of course, a great deal and helped a lot in stopping terrorism. But also it created a massive challenge for Mossad because it's not enough that you forge a passport, you need to forge the biometric statistics inside the passport. Rafael Itanu was a longtime Mossad veteran. He said back in the 50s and 60s, it was so easy for us to forge passports. So sometimes we forge passports of countries that do not exist. But once biometrics are part of that, it was much harder to go Elycoin style and work inside enemy territory for a long time. And so they created a new kind of agent, the fighting agent, or they call it the warrior agent. So someone that is recruited from Iran, you don't need to create false identity because he's already Iranian. He's already there. He already speaks the language. He doesn't have a cover story because it's his story. This new kind of agent would travel to another country, be trained by Mossad not just to supply intelligence, but also to do all sorts of things, including assassinations. I know maybe that I'm sort of disillusioning people here about seeing Fouda or Tehran, but reality is that most of the work, most of the secret operations that were done in the last 20 years in Iran were done by Iranians and not by Itzik from Petah Tikva, who learned Farsi and was sent under disguise to Tehran.

[A]

So I want to focus a little bit more on the sabotage tactics. You talked about Dagan's strategy of sabotage. So what were the sabotage tactics that this strategy relied on?

[B]

So the first kind of sabotage was about components of the project that are being bought outside of Iran. He said there are 13,000 parts in a car and there's no one factory that can produce all these parts by itself. Iran cannot produce all the parts of the nuclear project by itself. Let's say that we deprive them of 100 of these components. And they bought that all over the world, in many, many different countries, many companies, many factories, some of them even in Europe, that turn a blind eye that the buyer is Iranian or connected to Iran, and they are not supposed to sell this dual use equipment. And that started a campaign of many, many Mossad teams breaking in factories and labs throughout Europe, throughout the world, and either sabotaging or burning down, destroying the precious components, the precious equipment, knowing that it will take a long time to reproduce or tampering with the equipment in a way that it would be seen as if nothing happened to it and it would be shipped to Iran and only months on only when installed in the nuclear site, it would either start sending Israel intelligence on what is happening or just stop working. That would lead to much delays. And also the Iranians not Necessarily know which part is sabotage or which parts stop working, they will start blaming each other. So this is just an ongoing effort to do as much possible, even in small quantities, every time to interfere, to delay the project. I had a very long interview or few meetings with one of the Mossad operatives that participated in that. A woman. She was trained in few of the most secret and special operation elite special operation unit of the military, then moved to Mossad. So I asked her, like, how do you break in? So she said that they have all sorts of mechanisms, how to break in first to surveil and see what are the alarms, what is the. Where's the equipment? And there was one time that they wanted to break into one company, one factory in Austria. So first of all, the first thing they did was a technique that they were using again and again, which is a woman, a young woman comes banging on the door of the factory and said, do you have a phone? Do you have a phone? Because my grandfather has a heart attack. I need to call for an ambulance. And of course, in the car there was a veteran Mossad agent that was fabricating a heart attack. And this woman, this agent is originally from Germany. She said, listen, it would not work on them. They will not care if this guy is having a heart attack. They won't mind. And they tried it and indeed it didn't work. But she told me she bought a new running suit and a leash for a dog. So she was running for. She was jogging for 2km until she was sweating with the leash of a dog. And then she came to the gate of the factory and said, I lost Rexy, my dog. He ran away from me. And I saw him running into your factory. And that thing touched the guard's heart. And they let her walk in the factory with them for three hours, collecting all the necessary intelligence that she needed.

[A]

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