Man in the Shadows

Israel’s Mossad is thought by many to be one of the most powerful intelligence agencies in the world. In Man in the Shadows, Efraim Halevy—a Mossad officer since 1961 and its chief between 1998 and 2002—provides an unprecidented portrait of the Middle East crisis. Having served as the secret envoy of prime ministers Rabin, Shamir, Netanyahu, Barak, and Sharon, Halevy was privy to many of the top-level negotiations that determined the progress of the region’s struggle for peace during the years when the threat of Islamic terror became increasingly powerful. Informed by his extraordinary access, he writes candidly about the workings of the Mossad, the prime ministers he served under, and other major players on the international stage: Yasir Arafat, Saddam Hussein, Hafiz al-Assad, Mu’amar Gadhafi, Bill Clinton, George H. W. Bush, and George W. Bush.

 

From the vantage point of a chief in charge of a large organization, Halevy frankly describes the difficulty of running an intelligence agency during a time when heads of state are immersed, as never before, in using intelligence to protect their nations while, at the same time, acting to protect themselves politically. Most important, he writes without hesitation about how the world might achieve peace in the face of the growing threat from Islamic terrorist organizations.

In this inside look, Halevy opens his private dossier on events past and present: the assassination attempt by the Mossad on the life of Khaled Mashal, now the leader of Khammas; the negotiations surrounding the Israel-Jordan Peace Accord and its importance for the stability of the region; figures in the CIA, like George Tenet and counterintelligence chief Jim Angleton, with whom he worked. He tells the truth about what the Mossad really knew before 9/11. He writes about assessing the threat of the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction in the region and beyond, and what this spells for the future of international stability and survival. He touches on the increasing visibility of the CIA in the Middle East and shares his personal misgivings about both the report of the 9/11 Commission and the Middle East road map to peace that was pressed on all sides of the conflict by the U.S. government. He looks at the terrorist attacks in Madrid and London and their far-reaching effects and shares his conclusion: he believes the world has yet to see the worst of radical Islamic terrorism.