A report published by the German newspaper Koelner Stadtanzeiger revealed that German Federal Intelligence Service (BND) provided the Israeli Mossad espionage agency with German passports, which were used for carrying out missions in the Middle East.
The paper quoted a former senior official in the German intelligence service as saying that Mossad agents used German passports for undercover operations in Middle Eastern countries, which he did not name.
The BND spokesman confirmed that his organization is cooperating with the Mossad, but refrained from any response to the reported information that the organization supplied the Mossad with passports
The Mossad and the German intelligence service have been cooperating since the 1950s, and according to previous reports published on the matter, the German intelligence service had supplied the Mossad with passports and other documents.
The report came in the wake of two affairs in which Mossad agents arrested for using forged passports in carrying out the failed assassination attempt of Hamas leader Khald Mashal in Jordan in 1996, in which the agents used Canadian passports.
The second attempt was r in 2004 when the Mossad agents tried to get hold of a local passport in New Zealand.
However, according to the report, the German intelligence service provided the passports of its own will and as part of the cooperation between Israel and Germany, in contrast to the previous incidents in which the Mossad agents tried to get hold of the passports illegally and without the authorization of the countries involved.
