Epstein Secrets

ighters of Hizbollah said publicly, our withdrawal would be bad news for them. It would deprive them of their “‘anti-occupation” rationale for firing Katyushas into towns and settlements in northern Israel, and free us politically to strike back hard if that proved necessary. It was clear to me that Hizbolla

s never responded. Equally predictable were the prophets of doom on the Israeli right, who said the Lebanon withdrawal would bury northern Israel in Katyushas and in blood. The reality was that in the half-dozen years following the pullout, the Israel-Lebanon border was quieter than at any time since the la

. The first of about a half-dozen meetings came a few days later at the Prime Minister’s residence in Jerusalem. Then, we shifted venue, meeting at a Mossad-owned villa north of Tel Aviv. I brought along Bougie Herzog, a bright young lawyer, and Labor Party member, who was working in the same law firm and

fighters of Hizbollah said publicly, our withdrawal would be bad news for them. It would deprive them of their "anti-occupation" rationale for firing Katyushas into towns and settlements in northern Israel, and free us politically to strike back hard if that proved necessary. It was clear to me that Hizbolla

ns never responded. Equally predictable were the prophets of doom on the Israeli right, who said the Lebanon withdrawal would bury northern Israel in Katyushas and in blood. The reality was that in the half-dozen years following the pullout, the Israel-Lebanon border was quieter than at any time since the la

. The first of about a half-dozen meetings came a few days later at the Prime Minister's residence in Jerusalem. Then, we shifted venue, meeting at a Mossad-owned villa north of Tel Aviv. I brought along Bougie Herzog, a bright young lawyer, and Labor Party member, who was working in the same law firm and

se-fire to halt Palestinian Katyusha rocket fire into Israel. It was generally holding. But fundamentally, Arik’s war plan was not a response to the Katyushas. It was a way of using military force to achieve Prime Minister Begin’s political aim: stopping the Camp David peace process in its tracks, and ensur

ne of it, however, could alter the reply I got from Ahrahle a couple of hours later. “We decided to send Zvika,” he said. Zvika Zamir was the head of Mossad, and he would be going only as an observer. Any operation against the terrorists would still be in the hands of German units. The German police’s bu

at the “Litani line” might help impede cross-border raids. But especially since the remaining Palestinian fighters and Hizbollah were acquiring newer Katyushas, with a range of up to 20 kilometers, they could fire rockets over the security zone. My deeper concern was that we intended to hold the area with be

diplomacy in the hopes of reducing one of the obvious risks in such an attack: a conflict with Jordan, which we’d have to overfly to reach Iraq. The Mossad had a unit called 7evel, a kind of shadow foreign ministry for states with which we had no formal relations but with which, in both side’s interests,

ase-fire to halt Palestinian Katyusha rocket fire into Israel. It was generally holding. But fundamentally, Arik's war plan was not a response to the Katyushas. It was a way of using military force to achieve Prime Minister Begin's political aim: stopping the Camp David peace process in its tracks, and ensur

ne of it, however, could alter the reply I got from Ahrahle a couple of hours later. "We decided to send Zvika," he said. Zvika Zamir was the head of Mossad, and he would be going only as an observer. Any operation against the terrorists would still be in the hands of German units. The German police's bun

at the "Litani line" might help impede cross-border raids. But especially since the remaining Palestinian fighters and Hizbollah were acquiring newer Katyushas, with a range of up to 20 kilometers, they could fire rockets over the security zone. My deeper concern was that we intended to hold the area with be

diplomacy in the hopes of reducing one of the obvious risks in such an attack: a conflict with Jordan, which we'd have to overfly to reach Iraq. The Mossad had a unit called Tevel, a kind of shadow foreign ministry for states with which we had no formal relations but with which, in both side's interests,