A Year of Strife: Israel, Hamas, and the Shadow War of Intelligence

Exactly a year ago, Hamas and other Palestinian militant groups launched a blitzkrieg on Israel, killing over 1,200 civilians and foreign nationals while taking several hostages. It was a brutal reminder of Israel’s vulnerability and a haunting echo of the surprise attack in the 1973 Yom Kippur War, when Egypt and its allies caught Israel off guard.

Since the ‘Black Sabbath’ or the ‘October 7’ attacks as it has come to be known, Israel, recovering its nerve, has struck back hard, subjecting Gaza to its scorching wrath. It has simultaneously taken on and decapitated the leadership of the Hezbollah, dealing the Iran-backed Lebanese militant outfit a body blow by killing its longtime general-secretary Hassan Nasrallah. Once again, Israel's intelligence apparatus, often touted as the best in the world, proved its lethal efficiency.

But how did Israel’s intelligence apparatus, with its three arms – Mossad, Shin Bet and Aman – come to develop this ruthless efficiency, enabling it to carry out some of the most stunning intelligence coups in the last century and the present time?

The recent attacks on Hezbollah’s pager and walkie-talkie communications not merely paralyzed the organisation’s operations but also underscored the depth of Israeli infiltration. Such successes are not merely the product of modern intelligence techniques but tap into a long-standing tradition of espionage deeply embedded in Jewish history.

In ‘The Secret World’ (2018) - his magisterial survey of the history of intelligence and espionage, Dr. Christopher Andrew – the doyen of intelligence studies – observes how the Jewish Tanakh, or the Christian Old Testament, contains a wealth of references to spies that outnumbers those found in many other national histories. From Moses dispatching agents to scout the Promised Land to Joseph, the Egyptian vizier, feigning ignorance of his brothers while accusing them of espionage, these narratives illustrate the centrality of intelligence in Jewish lore. Yet another early espionage tale is the betrayal of Jesus of Nazareth by Judas Iscariot, who became a paid informant for the high priests on what has been dubbed ‘Spy Wednesday.’

As Andrews observes, Moses himself is a figure of significant importance not only in Judaism but also in Islam, where he is known as Musa. The Quran mentions him 136 times, more than any other human figure. In both scriptures, God commands Moses to send twelve spies into the Promised Land, marking what would become one of the earliest recorded intelligence failures. This failure was less about the quality of the intelligence gathered and more about how it was utilized. It was not until forty years later, following a more organized intelligence operation, that Moses’ successor, Joshua, successfully led the Israelites into Canaan.

The foundational texts advocating for the centrality of intelligence in matters of war and peace emerged not in Greece or Rome, but in ancient China and the Indian subcontinent, in form of Chinese general Sun Tzu seminal ‘The Art of War’ and the ‘Arthashastra’ ascribed to Kautilya.

In this sense, India’s is lucky to have a splendid survey of its intelligence history by Vappala Balachandran, whose superb ‘Intelligence Over the Centuries’ (2022) also mentions the Land of Canaan as the fount of successful spycraft. Balachandran’s lively work offers a compelling exploration of intelligence, tracing the origins of the craft from Ancient Israel to modern-day Ukraine while being packed with thrilling anecdotes of the history of India’s intelligence agency, R&AW, which marked 50 years in 2018.

Since its founding in 1948, Israel has relied heavily on intelligence to safeguard its borders, often resorting to pre-emptive strikes and targeted killings. In what is probably the first comprehensive history of its kind, investigative journalist Ronen Bergman’s ‘Rise and Kill First’ provides a chilling account of Israel's targeted assassination strategy. Through extensive interviews and classified documents, Bergman reveals how Israel’s intelligence agencies—Mossad, Shin Bet, and the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) — have executed a vast campaign of extrajudicial killings aimed at pre-empting threats to the Jewish state.

The book traces this practice from pre-state Jewish underground movements to today’s high-tech precision strikes, illustrating how assassination has become both a tactical weapon and a cornerstone of Israel’s defense doctrine.

Bergman highlights that the Israeli intelligence community maintains strict secrecy, enforced through a complex web of laws, military censorship, and intimidation of journalists, fostering a strong sense of solidarity among its personnel.

Since World War II, Israel has conducted more assassinations than any other Western nation, with leaders often opting for clandestine operations as the primary means of ensuring national security. In many instances, Israeli leaders have justified the endangerment of innocent lives as a necessary evil to eliminate threats.

The figures are striking: prior to the Second Palestinian Intifada in September 2000, Israel had carried out approximately 500 targeted killing operations, resulting in around 1,000 deaths, both civilian and combatant. During the Second Intifada, around 1,000 more operations were conducted, with 168 successful hits. Since then, about 800 targeted killings have occurred, primarily against Hamas in Gaza during conflicts in 2008, 2012, and 2014, and against Palestinian, Syrian, and Iranian targets in various covert operations. In contrast, during George W. Bush’s presidency, the U.S. executed an estimated 48 targeted killings, while under Barack Obama, there were 353.

Israel’s reliance on assassination stems from the revolutionary roots of the Zionist movement, the trauma of the Holocaust, and the belief that the nation is under constant threat of annihilation. This sense of vulnerability has propelled the development of a highly effective military and arguably the world’s most proficient intelligence community, resulting in a formidable assassination apparatus.

Strikingly, the United States has adopted Israeli intelligence techniques as a model, particularly after 9/11 when President Bush initiated targeted killings against Al-Qaeda. Many of the command-and-control systems, information-gathering methods, and drone technologies employed by American forces were developed in Israel.

In his riveting history of intelligence operations during WW2, Max Hastings, in ‘The Secret War,’ points out that intelligence is far from an exact science. For all the success stories, there have been colossal failures. In Hastings’ view, the only question that really matters is how far has secret knowledge changed outcomes? While intelligence might have saved Israel from crises, the unintended consequences have been profound. Assassinations ultimately breed more enemies, radicalizing future generations and perpetuating cycles of violence that undermine peace prospects.

Israel’s reliance on assassination as a military tool is understandably born out of necessity—a small nation surrounded by enemies since its founding. But as the butcher’s bill continues to mount, so does the moral cost.

(Tomorrow, we look at Israel and the Yemen-based Houthi rebel movement, and the global response to this terror outfit)