SAEDNEWS: Despite efforts to downplay Iran’s intelligence reach, a senior Mossad-linked analyst has admitted that Israel's security services failed to stop the infiltration of up to 1,000 citizens recruited by Iranian intelligence through social media.
According to Saed News, despite attempts to minimize the extent of Iran’s intelligence penetration, a Zionist analyst affiliated with Mossad has acknowledged that Israel's security service has failed to prevent its citizens from spying for Iran, attributing this failure to the collapse of social cohesion within Israeli society.
As reported by the political desk of Saed News, Kayhan wrote that Yossi Melman, a senior Israeli intelligence and espionage expert who has authored several books for Mossad, recently wrote in Haaretz that since Hamas attacked Israel on October 7, 2023 (15 Mehr 1402), Iranian intelligence agents managed to contact 1,000 Israeli citizens via social media for espionage purposes.
Referring to Israel’s unprecedented anti-espionage campaign titled “Easy Money, Heavy Price,” which began airing in Israeli media last week, Melman wrote that court proceedings for those accused of espionage are only a fraction of the contacts Iranian intelligence established with 1,000 Israeli citizens. Of these contacts, only a small group actually engaged in espionage.
For about two years, Israel’s internal security agency, Shin Bet, has been trying to counter a new phenomenon in which hundreds of Israelis have agreed to communicate with Iranian intelligence agencies. While Shin Bet has succeeded in neutralizing and arresting those who were actively engaged in espionage, it has failed in its primary mission to prevent its citizens from becoming spies.
According to Radio Farda, Melman expressed doubts about the effectiveness of Israel’s recent anti-espionage campaign, attributing the phenomenon to a breakdown in solidarity and cohesion within Israeli society.
He wrote that those arrested over the past two years include the elderly, youth, civilians, soldiers, ultra-Orthodox religious individuals, secular people, Ashkenazis and Sephardis, recent immigrants, men and women, and Arab Israelis — all sharing a single motive: greed for money.
Melman added that most of these individuals did not have access to sensitive security secrets, and the damage from their actions was minor. Initially, the internal security agency believed that only isolated and marginalized individuals responded to such contacts, but recently, an increasing number of Israelis have been involved in these contacts — even during the war between Israel and Iran.
Israeli media reported that a military serviceman who appeared in a military court on July 16 this year on charges of “espionage” for Iran was a member of a unit tasked with sensitive and classified missions, requiring security clearance.
It is noteworthy that the latest Iranian spy arrested in Israel had been active in the army’s most sensitive unit. This soldier had carried out missions for the Iranians, including transmitting images related to intercepts and filming rocket strike sites in Israel. Additionally, an Israeli female teacher has been arrested on charges of spying for Iran. During the 12-day war, she was tasked with capturing images of fighter jets stationed at the Nevatim Airbase.
Meanwhile, according to the Zionist website Iran International, following Iranian missile strikes and the exposure of damage to sensitive sites, Israeli officials were stunned to discover dozens of Jewish citizens born in Israel had been spying for Iran. These individuals are accused of gathering intelligence and identifying strategic targets for Iranian attacks.
