Meir Dagan, Israeli Spymaster Turned Netanyahu Critic, Dies at 71
Meir Dagan Image by Getty Images
JERUSALEM — Mossad director Meir Dagan, who after a long career spearheading shadow wars against Israel’s enemies became a vociferous critic of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s saber-rattling on Iran, died of cancer on Thursday, aged 71.
A pugnacious retired army general, Dagan took over the Mossad in 2002, when a Palestinian revolt was raging, international Islamist militancy was on the rise and world powers learned of Iran’s secret uranium enrichment projects.
His eight-year tenure saw a series of aggressive covert actions that were widely attributed to Israel. Among them was a 2007 air strike that destroyed a suspected Syrian atomic reactor and assassinations and cyber-sabotage targeting Tehran’s nuclear scientists and technologies.
But weeks before he stepped down, Dagan suspended convention by summoning Israeli reporters to Mossad headquarters, where he disputed Netanyahu’s assessment of the imminence of an Iranian threat and declared readiness to launch a pre-emptive war to foil it.
“Israel should not hasten to attack Iran, doing so only when the sword is upon its neck,” Dagan said in the briefing. Enraged Netanyahu aides quickly dismissed his statement as pique after the prime minister declined to retain him as Mossad chief.
In a tribute to Dagan published by his office on Wednesday, Netanyahu made no mention of their disputes. “Meir was a bold warrior and commander determined to ensure the people of Israel will never again be powerless or defenseless,” it said.
Asked by Army Radio on Wednesday whether Dagan had effectively scotched an Israeli attack on Iran, Netanyahu’s defense minister at the time, Ehud Barak, said: “Could well be.”
The son of Polish survivors of the Holocaust, Dagan said he had spoken out for fear that Netanyahu was needlessly endangering the Jewish homeland. His dissent over strategy on Iran and the Palestinians was soon echoed by other national security figures.
Two scandals tarnished Dagan’s Mossad legacy, however.
In 2010, Dubai published pictures of an alleged Mossad hit squad that had killed a Hamas armorer in a hotel in the emirate and dressed his death up as a heart attack. The suspects used cloned passports of foreign Jews who had emigrated to Israel.
Also that year, an Australian-born Mossad officer accused of leaking Israeli state secrets committed suicide while in prison.
Dagan had been ill for years, and Netanyahu and Barak helped to arrange a liver transplant for him in Belarus in 2012 after he was denied the operation in Israel because of his age. — Reuters
I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s award-winning journalism this Passover.
In this age of misinformation, our work is needed like never before. We report on the news that matters most to American Jews, driven by truth, not ideology.
At a time when newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall. That means for the first time in our 126-year history, Forward journalism is free to everyone, everywhere. With an ongoing war, rising antisemitism, and a flood of disinformation that may affect the upcoming election, we believe that free and open access to Jewish journalism is imperative.
Readers like you make it all possible. Right now, we’re in the middle of our Passover Pledge Drive and we still need 300 people to step up and make a gift to sustain our trustworthy, independent journalism.
Make a gift of any size and become a Forward member today. You’ll support our mission to tell the American Jewish story fully and fairly.
— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO
Join our mission to tell the Jewish story fully and fairly.
Only 300 more gifts needed by April 30
