A member of the Turkish Special Forces patrols in front of the Reina nightclub in Istanbul on January 4, 2017, three days after a gunman killed 39 people on New Year's Day. (Credit: Ozan Kose/AFP/File photo)
BEIRUT — Turkish intelligence services have reportedly arrested seven people working on behalf of the Israeli Mossad intelligence agency in Turkey and abroad, the Turkish Daily Sabah reported on Monday.
Some of these agents, who are of Lebanese and Syrian origin, were reportedly tasked with identifying Hezbollah positions in Haret Hreik, in Beirut's southern suburbs, with the aim of targeting them with drones, according to the pro-government daily.
"After months of investigation, in collaboration with the Istanbul police anti-terrorist cell, the MIT (Millî İstihbarat Teşkilatı — domestic intelligence) uncovered a cell ... made up of 56 agents, who were spying on non-Turkish residents in the country, on behalf of Mossad," reported the Daily Sabah.
The Turkish newspaper explained that some of these agents were deployed to explore the perimeter of Haret Hreik municipal headquarters, and discovered the exact location of a building occupied by Hezbollah, as well as the identities of senior Hezbollah military and political officials, believed to be in the building.
Contacted by L'Orient Today on Tuesday, Hezbollah spokesman Mohammad Afif Naboulsi said he was "unable to comment" on the news "due to lack of information."
According to the Daily Sabah, another Mossad agent, currently residing in Israel, gave remote instructions to an individual to take photos and collect information on a "strategic" building in the Qudsiyeh district of Damascus.
GPS tracking
MIT reportedly discovered that the agents, who are of Middle Eastern nationality, gathered intelligence on their foreign targets using GPS tracking of vehicles, stalking on foot, and hacking into password-protected networks.
The Daily Sabah explains that the agents "created fake websites of articles likely to be of interest to their targets." A simple click on these pirate links enabled the Israeli network to infiltrate their targets' telephones.
The Daily Sabah also said Turkish media reported in May that MIT identified another cell of 15 suspected Mossad agents in Istanbul, six of whom were arrested.
This is the first major MIT operation since Ibrahim Kalin, former foreign policy advisor to Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, took over the intelligence organization from Hakan Fidan, wrote Al-Monitor, a Washington-based news site.
The effects of these arrests on relations between Israel and Turkey remain unknown, as neither country has yet publicly reacted.
Israeli media, including Haaretz and The Times of Israel newspapers, have simply reported on the Daily Sabah report.
