The Angel Page 7

  Early in April 1971, Meir was summoned to Yariv’s office. There he found Yariv seated along with Shalev, as well as the commander of Air Force Intelligence, Col. Shmuel Shefer. Yariv wasted no time. He gave Meir some general background about a new source that the Mossad had found in Egypt, describing how he had been engaged. Yariv did not reveal the source’s name, but Meir understood from the materials he had delivered that it was an exceptionally high-quality source, someone with top-level access to highly classified information on both the military and diplomatic fronts, including intelligence on Egyptian-Soviet relations. Yariv added that the reliability of the source’s information had yet to be determined and told Meir that the Mossad had given its consent for a representative of MI to join the next meeting with the operative. From the presence of the chief of IAF Intelligence, Meir understood that someone from the air force would be joining the meeting as well.

  Yariv concluded by ordering Meir to head straight for Mossad headquarters, where he would receive a briefing in advance of his flight to London the next morning. Beyond the goal of making the dialogue with the agent more productive from MI’s point of view, the main purpose of the meeting was to take advantage of Meir’s expertise in Egypt in order to answer two key questions: first, whether the source was in fact real and not a trap; and second, whether he really had the access that he claimed to have. In order to answer these, Meir would have to prepare a detailed list of questions before taking off for London.

  Meir was not terribly surprised by all this. Since taking up the post, he had gone abroad a number of times to meet Egyptians offering their services to Israeli intelligence. The greatest fear was always that these walk-ins were really double agents; the best way to check them out was to send an expert who would have a long, detailed conversation with them, in which it would become clear whether their information matched what was already known, and whether the volunteers’ description of themselves and reasons for betraying their country sounded plausible. Moreover, such a conversation enabled the expert to create his own direct impression of the potential value that the source offered.

  And yet, despite Meir’s experience with Egyptian walk-ins, something about this one felt different. The urgency, the personal involvement of the MI chief, and the quality of the intelligence that the source had already provided—all this pointed to someone in a whole different league.

  And then, alongside all these professional questions, there was one other pressing matter that Meir just couldn’t get out of his mind: Passover. The Seder was just a week away, and his wife, Gita, would never forgive him if he wasn’t home to run it. But he had to put the thought out of his mind, because now the chief of IAF Intelligence was talking. He told Meir that because a large part of the information delivered by the source concerned the Egyptian air force and related to procurement requests to the Soviet Union, a representative of IAF Intelligence would join him.

  The path from Yariv’s office to Mossad headquarters was one that Meir had walked countless times since joining MI-Research. He left IDF headquarters and headed north until he reached the guard booth at the campus exit, at the corner of King Saul Boulevard in Tel Aviv. He then turned right, and within five minutes he reached the corner of King Saul and Dafna. The gray office building on the corner was, at the time, one of the tallest buildings in Tel Aviv. Known as the Hadar-Dafna Building, very few people knew it housed the Mossad headquarters. Meir went around to the right side of the building, down a few steps, and then pressed the button on the intercom. The guard knew him, and in any event had been warned he was coming. The chief of MI-Research Branch 6 left his officer’s ID at security, took a visitor’s tag in exchange, and entered the narrow elevator that took him up to Zamir’s office.

  There were four people sitting in the Mossad chief’s office. Meir knew Zamir from the time he’d spent as an intelligence officer in the IDF Southern Command, when Zamir was its commander. During the early 1960s, relations among officers in the command were close and informal, and Meir and his wife had been hosted more than once in Zamir’s home. The second man, Rehaviah Vardi, was known to him as well; Meir had served under Vardi’s command in the intelligence-gathering division of Military Intelligence. Capt. Yoav Dayagi was a research officer in IAF Intelligence, responsible for the Egyptian air force, and Meir worked with him on a daily basis. The fourth man was Nahik Navot, Zvi Zamir’s chief of staff.

  After a few pleasantries, Vardi began briefing the two military men, Meir and Dayagi. He didn’t reveal everything, but from what little he told it was clear that this new source was incredibly well placed. He told them about how the Angel had contacted the Israeli embassy, how the opportunity had been very nearly lost, and how the meeting with Dubi went down in the London hotel. Vardi hesitated. “This is not an ordinary source,” he added cautiously. “It’s not an army officer or a diplomat. We’ve had those in the past, and will have them again in the future. This source sits very close to the president, both because of his position and because of his family connections.” He would not elaborate further, but he assured them that prior to meeting the Angel, Dubi would let them in on the details, including his identity. The IDF men completely understood Vardi’s behavior. It was a basic principle in both MI and the Mossad that information was given on a strict need-to-know basis. They were about to operate in a foreign country, and, even if it was an ally, the possibility of their being arrested and interrogated was always there. The less they knew, the less damage would result.

  Zamir concluded the meeting with a few operative instructions. They would leave on the Monday-morning El Al flight to Heathrow. On Navot’s desk outside, there waited an envelope for each of them, containing a passport, plane tickets, and cash for expenses in London. The meeting was expected to take place shortly after they arrived, but there could be last-minute changes. If their stay was extended and they needed more cash, they would get it from the Mossad’s London station.

  This last bit didn’t sit well with Meir. In the past, trips to London to meet Mossad sources required a stay of two or three days at most. This time felt different, and Passover loomed. When he was about to leave, he turned to Zamir. “Zvika,” he said, “if I’m not back for the Seder, Gita will have my head.”

  “You take care of the Angel,” Zamir said, smiling. “I’ll take care of Gita.”

  Meir and Dayagi headed back to their respective offices and shut themselves in. Each of them now had to plow through the thick dossiers they had received, which included countless pieces of intelligence collected from both human and technical sources, copied documents, and intelligence reports from allied governments. On the basis of all these, they put together their lists of questions to ask the Angel. Although they were very pressed for time, their task was made much simpler by their own considerable familiarity with the subject and the fact that in the archives of MI-Research Branch 6 and IAF Intelligence there were numerous folders filled with concrete questions for other sources and for other intelligence agencies that the Israeli intelligence community had cooperated with for many years.

  Meir reached his home in Holon in the evening hours. He packed a small suitcase, hoping he wouldn’t be gone for more than a few days. He shared that hope with his wife. The next morning a Mossad car picked him up from his home. Dayagi was already in the car. Two hours later they had taken their seats aboard a Boeing 707 bound for London.

  HEATHROW AIRPORT WAS relatively empty at midday on a Monday, and the line at immigration was not long. Meir Meir had an uncomfortable feeling when he presented his passport to the officer. It was the fourth time he had entered Britain with a doctored, Mossad-provided passport, and every time he worried that the immigrations officer might start asking questions. But British immigrations officers at the time were generally polite and unsuspecting; international terrorism had yet to strike the United Kingdom. The officer stamped the passport. Two minutes later, Meir was through. Dayagi was waiting for him, and the two picked up their bags and headed for the airport�
�s message board. Before there were cell phones and pagers, many airports offered large boards where people could leave messages. They scanned the board, which was arranged according to the last name of the intended recipient, and saw the message bearing the name that appeared in Meir’s passport. A Mossad agent had been there not long before and had left a handwritten note. Following its instructions, they found a cab that took them to an address in central London. The ride took less than an hour. They paid the fare, walked two hundred yards, and knocked on the door.

  A tall man in his mid-thirties answered. Good-looking, slim, with brown hair and blue eyes, soft-spoken. Dubi had been expecting them. He invited them in and immediately got to work making coffee. Once the men had mugs in their hands, he started telling the story of the Angel in riveting detail.

  Meir had never heard of Ashraf Marwan, or of his father, the high-ranking officer. Later on he would explain that although he had carefully studied the names and details of most of the senior officers in the Egyptian military, including division commanders, the Republican Guard had simply never interested him. The top priority for Branch 6 was to know about the Egyptian fighting forces that the IDF might face in the next war. But the Republican Guards were assigned to protect sensitive facilities in Cairo and the regime as a whole, and to provide security for the president’s travels, and these were of little interest to Military Intelligence. Nor were the private lives of Nasser and Sadat of much interest to Meir, who saw them as little more than the subject of gossip. He was much more eager to know what Nasser had thought of the Soviets than of his son-in-law. And yet, Meir knew enough about Egyptian culture and norms to appreciate the importance of someone like Marwan. Even if his official position in the President’s Office was a relatively minor one, he would still be able to get his hands on documents that no other source in Egypt would dream of seeing. Meir was very impressed indeed.

  At the same time, Marwan’s sudden approach to the Mossad made Meir cautious. The idea that an Egyptian so well connected, at home in the corridors of power with his whole life ahead of him, would take so dramatic a step as calling the embassy and trying to get a meeting with the Israeli Mukhabarat—all this was a little hard to swallow. True, he had seen a few cases like this over the years, but Marwan’s profile was different. True, the Mossad had thoroughly checked out the new source. And yet, as the senior professional who would work with him, he felt duty-bound to verify his reliability—with a microscope, if necessary. He had already met with other potential Mossad recruits and had experience with verification, and he knew Egypt well. He thought himself up to the task.

  He was less excited about Dubi’s next piece of news. First of all, the meeting with Marwan wasn’t set for the following day, as originally planned. The man had indeed arrived in London, Dubi explained, but then he had suddenly gone off to Rome for a few days. “We do not have good control over his actions,” he added. “He knows that we will do everything necessary to keep him on board. So we can’t tell him what to do.” To this he added another problem. Marwan had informed him the day before that under no circumstances was he willing to meet with any Israeli other than his own handler. Dubi explained that it would take some time and effort to build Marwan’s full confidence in the Mossad’s willingness to protect his safety. He was constantly afraid for his life, and every additional Israeli he revealed himself to could potentially turn him over to the Egyptians. So when Dubi had told him that in the next meeting they would be joined by two Israeli experts on the Egyptian army and air force, he had flatly refused.

  This was not a new problem. Marwan’s refusal to meet anyone other than Dubi was just the latest in a string of determined refusals facing handlers across the Mossad, and for any operatives already suspected of being double agents, it only increased the suspicion. Marwan knew that the Israelis had no alternative, that he held some very good cards in his hand. He played them not just to increase his payments but also to maximize his own safety.

  In this delicate game between handler and operative, however, the Mossad held a few cards of its own. Dubi had already won Marwan’s trust. As with many agents and handlers, theirs was a relationship in which the agent had no choice but to put full faith in the handler; Marwan was, in a crucial sense, entirely dependent on Dubi’s judgment. Moreover, the Mossad had paid Marwan handsomely. The customer had every right to make demands in exchange for his payments. Finally, from the moment Marwan had begun selling his country’s secrets to Israeli intelligence, he knew he couldn’t afford to seem less than fully useful to the only people on earth who knew what he was up to. Despite all this, however, Dubi still had to emphasize to Meir and Dayagi that if Marwan didn’t budge, Dubi would have to continue meeting with him alone—and the IDF would have to deal with it. The Angel was too valuable an asset to risk losing.

  This was a big problem, and the solution was still not in the offing. But again, Meir had a different problem on his mind. The orders from Israel, Dubi informed them, were for Dayagi and Meir to stay in London until Marwan returned. The chance that this would happen before Passover was slim and fading. Though this was upsetting, there was an upside. For as long as they were in London, Dubi said, they could do what they wanted, within the budgets at their disposal. Their only obligation was to check in by telephone twice a day, at 9:00 a.m. and at 5:00 p.m., using a public phone. The person answering their call would let them know if anything had changed.

  And so, Lt. Col. Meir Meir and Capt. Yoav Dayagi spent the next two weeks in London, waiting. They studied the footpaths of Hyde Park and St. James Park, the quiet cul-de-sacs of Mayfair and Belgravia, the nightclubs cropping up just then at Kings Road and the Chinese restaurants in Soho near Piccadilly Circus. The guards at the British Museum and the Tate Gallery knew their faces well. Every morning and every afternoon they would call the number Dubi had given them and discover that nothing had changed. Every few days they would call home from a pay phone and exchange a few hurried words with their loved ones. That was all they could afford. Friday arrived, and so did Passover. True to his word, Zvi Zamir called Gita to tell her that all was well with her husband but that he would not be home for the Seder.

  And then, early in the third week of April, the voice at the other end of the line had something different to say. “The meeting is on. Today.”

  DUBI HAD MET with Marwan the night before. The Egyptian had just come back from Rome, where he’d met with senior members of the Libyan regime of Col. Muammar Gaddafi. In Rome they discussed the creation of a company that would enable Egypt to circumvent the arms embargo that the United States and Britain had slapped on Libya. Dubi now told him that the two Israeli intelligence officers were in London and waiting to meet him. Marwan’s response, predictably, was again categorical refusal. As it was, he explained, he was very concerned that Egyptian intelligence would soon be on to him; widening the circle would only increase the risk. But Dubi held firm, employing every maneuver he had learned to pressure Marwan. In the end, they reached a compromise. Marwan would meet one, but not both, of the officers. The obvious choice was Meir Meir, the senior of the two, and whose responsibilities were far broader. Dayagi, and with him IAF Intelligence, were left out of the intimate circle of Israelis who would meet Marwan.

  The next day Dubi sat with Meir, walking him through the plan for the evening. He was to go to an upscale building in the Mayfair district. He would tell the guard there his name—the one on the passport the Mossad had supplied. The guard would hand him a key. To the left he would see an elevator, which he would take to the fourth floor, and then find the apartment matching the number on the key. Once inside, he was to wait in the bedroom. Dubi and Marwan would arrive together and talk in the living room. When the time was right, Dubi would invite Meir to join them.

  Everything went as planned, much to Meir’s relief. The guard was expecting him, and the key worked. The apartment was impressive. But Meir didn’t spend too much time studying it. He headed for the bedroom, closed the door behind him
, and sat on a chair by the bed. Half an hour later, he heard the front door open. He recognized Dubi’s voice; there was another man with him. Dubi poured his guest a drink. Meir couldn’t hear their words, but he could tell they were speaking English. A few minutes went by, and Dubi knocked on the bedroom door, asking Meir to join them.

  MEIR ALREADY KNEW what Marwan looked like from his photographs. But there was something the photos hadn’t really captured. His first impression of Marwan was that he was young and arrogant. He sat back, stretched out languorously on the armchair, a lit cigarette in one hand and a scotch in the other. When Meir extended his hand and offered his best English “How do you do?” Marwan deigned to shake it but didn’t think of getting up. Meir would later recall that Marwan had acted as if a very large roach had wandered into the room. But Meir was a veteran intelligence officer. Unfazed, he sat down in the armchair next to Marwan’s. Dubi, who until that moment had been standing, took a seat by the dining-room table, pulled out a writing tablet and pen, and waited for Marwan and Meir to speak. During the entire conversation, he scarcely opened his mouth, instead just writing down everything that was exchanged between the two.

  The commander of MI-Research Branch 6 had decided in advance that he would start in with the heaviest, highest-priority questions. He did this for two reasons: first, to maximize the efficiency of the meeting, extracting the best, most detailed information possible; and second, to give Marwan the impression that his questioner was an expert who knew Egypt well and understood military affairs, and who therefore should be taken seriously. The most pressing question facing Israel at that moment concerned the possibility that Egypt would shift from a static posture of attrition to an active, aggressive assault. From everything they knew about Egypt’s war plans, the attrition had been meant as an initial phase of war, “softening” Israel’s defenses to create the best conditions for Egypt to cross the canal and try to take back the Sinai. Meir’s first question to Marwan, therefore, concerned Egypt’s war aims. Marwan answered confidently, but his answer echoed what was already being said in the Egyptian media: that the goal was to retake the Sinai. When Meir asked how Egypt planned to do so, Marwan answered, “We will build bridges and pontoons across the canal, and we’ll cross.”