Assassination of Mahmoud Al-Mabhouh

The assassination of Mahmoud al-Mabhouh (, ; 14 February 1961 – 19 January 2010) took place on 19 January 2010, in a hotel room in Dubai. Al-Mabhouh—a co-founder of the Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Brigades, the military wing of Hamas—was wanted by the Israeli government for the kidnapping and murder of two Israeli soldiers in 1989 as well as purchasing arms from Iran for use in Gaza; these have been cited as a possible motive for the assassination.
His assassination attracted international attention in part due to allegations that it was ordered by the Israeli government and carried out by Mossad agents holding fake or fraudulently obtained passports from several European countries and Australia.
The photographs of the 26 suspects and their aliases were subsequently placed on Interpol's most-wanted list. The Dubai police found that 12 of the suspects used British passports, along with six Irish, four French, one German, and three Australian passports. Interpol and the Dubai police believed that the suspects stole the identities of real people, mostly Israeli dual citizens. Two Palestinians, believed by Hamas to be former Fatah security officers and current employees of a senior Fatah official, were taken into custody in Dubai, on suspicions that one of them provided logistical assistance to the hit team. Despite Hamas's claim, Dubai would not comment on the incident or identify the two Palestinian suspects.
According to initial reports, Al-Mabhouh was drugged, then electrocuted and suffocated. Lt. Gen. Dhahi Khalfan Tamim of the Dubai Police Force said the suspects tracked Al-Mabhouh to Dubai from Damascus, Syria. They arrived from different European destinations and stayed at different hotels, presumably to avoid being detected and, with the exception of three of its members suspected of "helping to facilitate" who had left on a ferry for Iran several months before the assassination, departed after the assassination to different countries. Dubai's police chief said that he was "99% certain" that the assassination was the work of Israel's Mossad. On 1 March 2010, he stated that he was "sure" that all of the suspects are hiding in Israel.
He said that Dubai would ask for an arrest warrant to be issued for Meir Dagan, the head of Mossad, if it is confirmed that the Mossad is involved and responsible for the assassination. The Hamas leadership also holds Israel responsible, and has vowed revenge. Hamas, which is itself on the U.S. State Department list of Foreign Terrorist Organizations, European Union lists of terrorist organizations, and also considered a terrorist organization by the governments of Israel, and Japan, as is its military arm by the United Kingdom and Australia, requested that Israel be added by the EU to its list because of suspicions that Israel was involved in the assassination.
However, later in March, Dubai police chief said, "I am now completely sure that it was Mossad", and went on to say "I have presented the (Dubai) prosecutor with a request for the arrest of (Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin) Netanyahu and the head of Mossad" for the assassination. Khalfan would also suggest that a Hamas associate fed information to Mossad. This was denied by Hamas which blamed Fatah for helping the Mossad hit team.
In March 2010, the British foreign secretary, David Miliband, expelled an Israeli diplomat after the UK's Serious Organised Crime Agency discovered that Israel had forged copies of British passports. On 24 May, the Australian government expelled an Israeli diplomat after concluding that there was "no doubt Israel was behind the forgery of four Australian passports" related to the assassination. Similar action was taken by Ireland. Israel has refused to comment on the accusations that its security forces were behind the assassination.
On 30 September 2010, Dubai's police chief Dahi Khalfan said he received death threats from Israel's spy agency Mossad linked to his role in uncovering details of the assassination of al-Mabhouh, but whether such calls existed remains unconfirmed.
Sequence of events.
On 19 January 2010, al-Mabhouh was assassinated in his room in a hotel in Dubai, after being tracked by at least 29 suspects (26 suspects whose passport photos have been released, two arrested Palestinians, and another unnamed suspect), 26 of whom carried forged or fraudulently-obtained passports from various European nations.
"The Sunday Times" reported that al-Mabhouh's departure from Damascus to Dubai on Emirates Flight no. 912 at 10:05 on 19 January 2010 was tracked by an agent on the ground in Damascus. Salah Bardawil, a Hamas legislator, said al-Mabhouh put himself at risk by booking his trip online and informing family in Gaza of the telephone number of the hotel at which he would be staying on his trip.
Despite reports that al-Mabhouh traveled under a false passport with the fake name "Mahmoud Abdul Raouf Mohammed", Hamas and Dubai officials maintain that al-Mabhouh entered the country under his own identity at 15:15. Normally al-Mabhouh would have been protected by bodyguards, but their arrival was delayed because the guards could not get tickets for the same flight, as "There was no room for them on the flight," said Talal Nasser, a spokesman for Hamas in Damascus. "Therefore, he traveled alone, and the security guards were slated to join him the next day."
According to a 2018 article by "Le Monde" citing senior French intelligence officials, the Mossad ran the operation to kill Mabhouh out of Paris. The Mossad allegedly set up a makeshift command and control center in a hotel in the Bercy neighborhood of Paris equipped with computers and secure phones. Dubai's police chief, Lt Gen Dahi Khalfan Tamim, stated that al-Mabhouh was transiting in Dubai before traveling to China. Upon arrival in Dubai, al-Mabhouh took a taxi to the Al Bustan Rotana Hotel and settled into room 230. He had asked for a room with no balcony and sealed windows, so no one could enter other than through the door. He left the hotel between 16:30 and 17:00, roughly an hour after checking in. What he did during the next three to four hours remains unclear. Dubai's police chief said he did not meet anyone in the emirate and that he went shopping. Meanwhile, the hit squad broke into his room. At 20:24 al-Mabhouh came back to the room, and subsequently failed to answer a call from his wife half an hour later.
Hotel surveillance footage was released to the public showing the suspects, who had arrived on separate flights, meeting in the hotel. While the suspects apparently used personal encrypted communication devices among themselves to avoid surveillance, the suspects were alleged by Dubai police to have sent and received a number of SMS messages to telephone numbers in Austria. When al-Mabhouh arrived around 15:00, two suspects dressed in tennis attire followed him to determine which room he had checked into, as well as the number of the room immediately across the hall.
The information is alleged by the Dubai police to have been communicated to a third party, who then telephoned from a different hotel to book room 237. According to surveillance videos, the individual who checked into 237 did not enter the room, but appears to have given the room key to an accomplice in the lobby of the hotel, and immediately left Dubai, prior to the assassination. Al-Mabhouh, later, left the hotel and while several of the suspects kept watch, it is thought that (a) suspect(s) tried to gain entry to his room.
One of the lookout suspects could be seen on video delaying a tourist who exits the elevator on the second floor at this time, apparently to give other team members time to act. While another suspect distracted the tourist, it is claimed that four suspects entered the victim's hotel room and waited for him to return. The evidence for this is the fact that four men arrived by elevator and entered the hallway where the victim's room and the alleged perpetrator's rooms were located at this time, and the same four men immediately left after the assassination is supposed to have happened.
A readout of activity that took place on the hotel room's electronic door lock indicated that an attempt was made to reprogram al-Mabhouh's electronic door lock at this time. The investigators believe that the electronic lock on al-Mabhouh's door may have been reprogrammed and that the killers gained entry to his room this way. The locks in question, VingCard Locklink brand, can be accessed and reprogrammed directly at the hotel room door.
According to Dubai Police, he was dead by 21:00 that evening. On 20 January 2010, the following day, a hotel cleaner attempted to gain entry, but found that the door was latched from the inside. A member of hotel security was then called in to open the door. After the door was opened, al-Mabhouh's body was discovered on the bed. On the drawer next to the bed, the assassins had placed a small bottle of medicine to make it appear as if he had died of natural causes.
Investigation.
Cause of death.
Initially, Dubai authorities believed al-Mabhouh had died of natural causes. Fawzi Benomran, the Dubai police coroner, said, "It was meant to look like death from natural causes during sleep." It took 10 days for the Dubai police to come to the conclusion that al-Mabhouh was assassinated. Benomran described the determination of the exact cause of death as "one of the most challenging cases" his department faced.
The "Khaleej Times" quoted an unnamed senior police official as saying that four masked assailants had shocked al-Mabhouh's legs before using a pillow to suffocate him. Another story reported by Uzi Mahnaimi stated that a hit team murdered al-Mabhouh with a heart-attack inducing drug, then proceeded to take photographs of his documents before leaving.
Al-Mabhouh's family said that medical teams who examined his body determined that he died in his hotel room after being strangled and receiving a massive electric shock to the head, and that blood samples examined by a French laboratory confirms that electrocution was the cause of death. According to Reuters news agency, traces of poison were found in al Mabhouh's autopsy. Dubai authorities stated they were ruling the death a homicide and were working with the International Criminal Police Organization to investigate the incident.
Other news reports gave varying causes of death, including suffocation with a pillow and poisoning. In an international press conference General Tamim, the head of the investigation, said that the exact cause of death is yet to be concluded.
Moreover, on 1 March 2010, the Dubai Police stated that he was "first" drugged.
Major General Khamis Mattar al-Mazeina as the deputy commander of Dubai's police gave details of the death of al-Mabhouh after forensic tests. Al-Mabhouh was injected in his leg with succinylcholine, a quick-acting, depolarizing paralytic muscle relaxant. It causes almost-instant loss of motor skills, but does not induce loss of consciousness or anaesthesia. Then al-Mabhouh was suffocated. Al-Mazeina said, "The assassins used this method so that it would seem that his death was natural."
Suspects.
Dubai's police chief, Lt. Gen. Dahi Khalfan Tamim, announced his preliminary conclusions on 18 February that, "Our investigations reveal that Mossad is involved in the murder of al-Mabhouh ... It is 99% if not 100% that Mossad is standing behind the murder." After identifying the assumed names and photographs of 11 suspects, on 20 February 2010, he said his force had evidence directly incriminating the Mossad in the murder, adding that among the new evidence available were telephone communications between the suspected killers. On 24 February 2010, Dubai police identified 15 additional persons suspected of being involved in al-Mabhouh's assassination. According to journalist Uzi Mahnaimi, the decision to kill al-Mabhouh was authorized by Israel's Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, after being suggested by Meir Dagan, the head of the Mossad, at a meeting in early January 2010. Later in March, Dubai police chief said "I am now completely sure that it was Mossad," and furthermore went on to say "I have presented the (Dubai) prosecutor with a request for the arrest of (Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin) Netanyahu and the head of Mossad," for the murder of Mahmoud al-Mabhouh.
Dubai police said the assassins spent little time in the emirate, arriving less than a day before the assassination, killing al-Mabhouh between his arrival at 3:15 p.m. and 9 p.m. that night, and subsequently leaving the country before his discovery. The identities used by 11 of the suspects have been made public. The total number of suspects stands at 18, all of whom entered the country using fake or fraudulently obtained passports. Dubai police, who stated that their airport personnel were trained by Europeans to identify faked documents, said that the European passports used were not forgeries. British, Canadian, and Irish governments said the passports bearing their countries' names were, "either fraudulently obtained or [are] outright fakes." All the stolen passports are from countries that do not need visas for the UAE.
The names used on the British passports belong to suspects who live in Israel and hold dual citizenships. An analysis of the assassination in "The Jewish Chronicle" noted that this, "is the first real piece of information that could link Israel to the operation." According to Palestine Chronicle Post, Mossad is known to use the identities of Israelis with dual citizenship. In 1997, two Mossad agents traveled with Canadian passports of dual citizenship Israelis to Amman in a botched attempt on the life of Hamas leader Khaled Meshaal. According to former katsa Victor Ostrovsky, a Canadian citizen, the Mossad formerly asked permission to use the passports of Israelis with dual nationality, but "I believe at some point, they stopped asking."
A Jerusalem-based British citizen whose name was used on one of the passports told Reuters news agency that he has never been to Dubai and had no connection with the Mossad or the killing. He said that he did not "know how this happened or who chose my name or why". In addition, three other Israelis whose names appeared on the passports reported to the Israeli Channel 2 news that they did not understand the coincidence, and were not related at all to the suspects. In the wake of the revelation that passports of British citizens had figured prominently in the operation, the United Kingdom's Serious Organised Crime Agency (SOCA) launched its own investigation into the matter, and plans to interview the first round of British passport holders that had their identities stolen. The British Foreign Office also summoned the Israeli ambassador on 18 February to share information on the matter. The British government denied claims that Mossad had tipped off the UK that their passports would be used for an operation.
The photographs of 11 of the suspected killers were added to Interpol's most wanted list on 18 February, with a note specifying that they had been published since the identities adopted by the suspects were faked. Dubai airport officials carried out routine retinal scans on 11 of the suspects sought in the assassination when they entered the country and Dubai police said they would publish the scans through INTERPOL.
YNetnews said some hit squad members fled to Iran after the assassination.
Seventeen of the suspects used MasterCards branded by MetaBank of Storm Lake, Iowa but issued by Payoneer Inc which were used to buy their plane tickets in other countries before their arrival in Dubai. Other credit cards show ties to Britain's Nationwide Building Society, IDT Finance of Gilbraltar, and Germany's DZ Bank AG.
Payoneer is an Israeli start-up now based in New York with R&amp;D offices and a majority of its employees in Tel Aviv. CEO Yuval Tal, is a former member of the IDF Special Forces. Payoneer is held by three venture capital firms: Greylock Partners, Carmel Ventures, and Crossbar Capital. Greylock, which has offices in the U.S. and Herzliya, Israel, was established by Moshe Mor, a former military intelligence captain in the Israeli army. Carmel Ventures is an Israeli venture capital fund based in Herzliya. Crossbar Partners is run by Charlie Federman, who is also managing director of the BRM Group, a venture capital fund also in Herzliya that was co-founded by Nir Barkat, the former mayor of Jerusalem. Mossad HQ are located in Herzliya.
The "New York Post" originally reported that Tal has disappeared since his company was identified as the issuer of some of the killers' credit cards, with his Brooklyn neighbors telling the NYPD that he left the country. He reappeared a day later, however.
The Dubai Police has found the DNA of one person and some fingerprints of other persons which are suspected. The chief of Dubai Police Lieutenant General Dhahi Khalfan Tamim said that there are 648 hours of video films in which the 27 suspected persons are appearing and announced that the police has found the DNA of four suspected agents.
Arrests.
Two Palestinians, Ahmad Hasnin, an intelligence operative of the Fatah-controlled Palestinian Authority (PA), and Anwar Shekhaiber, an employee of the PA in Ramallah, were arrested in Jordan and handed over to Dubai as suspected accomplices to the assassination, suspected of giving logistical assistance such as providing car rentals and hotel bookings. Hamas claimed that their arrest was evidence linking the Palestinian Authority to the killing, while the Palestinian Authority retorted by accusing the arrested Palestinians of being members of Hamas.
The two men are reported to be related to one another and to have lived in Gaza until Hamas took over full control of the Strip in 2006. One went straight to Dubai, while the other joined him after first going to Ramallah, where he was sentenced to death by a Palestinian Authority court, a punishment generally handed down to Israeli collaborators. The recruitment of Ahmad Hasnin by the Mossad could have been done when he was imprisoned by Israel for a month in June 2007 for his involvement with Al Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades, the military wing for Fatah. He came to the UAE in 2008, according to a family source.
Dubai authorities said that one of the two Palestinians held in custody met a suspect in a suspicious place, time and manner, while the second is closely related to him and was found to have already been sentenced to death by one of the Palestinian parties. The second suspect is wanted by Hamas. They are both being held to ensure that no one comes to execute them.
A "Haaretz" report based on information from an unnamed Arab diplomatic source said that Dubai police had asked Syria to detain Mohammed Nasser and other Hamas men for questioning. According to media reports, Nasser was in Dubai in the days before al-Mabhouh's killing and was intimately familiar with his schedule and whereabouts.
Dubai Police chief Dahi Khalfan said on 3 March 2010 he requested for the Dubai prosecutor to issue arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and the head of Mossad, Meir Dagan for the murder.
He also announced Canada had arrested a suspect who "was among the preparatory group which arrived in the country and left it before the crime was committed." The suspect was reported to be one amongst a number of suspects for whom Interpol has issued red corner notices on behalf of the UAE. The following day, however, the Canadian embassy in the UAE denied this but said they were liaising with authorities back in Canada to verify the status of the arrest.
Alexander Verin/Uri Brodsky.
On 4 June 2010, Polish police arrested a man at Warsaw airport carrying a false passport with the name Uri Brodsky, who was wanted by German authorities. A European Arrest Warrant from Germany specified that Brodsky, also known as Alexander Verin (or Varin), was "suspected of being involved in illegally obtaining a [German] passport" for another man known as Michael Bodenheimer, who is alleged to have taken part in Mahmoud al-Mabhouh's murder. A Polish court approved Brodsky's extradition to Germany on 7 July, pending appeal. However, the extradition was approved on the basis that Brodsky would not face German charges of espionage – instead he would only face the lesser charge of falsely-obtaining documents. Brodsky was transferred to German custody on 12 August, released on €100,000 bail on 13 August, and flown back to Israel on 14 August. The German prosecutor indicated that Brodsky would not have to face trial after all, but instead that "the matter can now be dealt with by written proceedings," most likely resulting in a fine. At the end of 2010, Germany suspended the case of falsifying documents in lieu of a €60,000 fine; however, a German arrest warrant on the espionage charges remains in effect.
Arrest of a top suspect.
On 11 October 2010, "The National" of Abu Dhabi published an interview with Dubai's police chief Lt. Gen. Dahi Khalfan Tamim, in which he claims that a western country had arrested a top suspect of killing al-Mabhouh about two months earlier. The ambassador of the western country does not want to name the country and the name of the arrested suspect. Tamim expressed frustration at the lack of detail: "Why is it that every time an Israeli is involved in a crime, everyone goes mute? We want anyone who is dealing with this case to deal with it as a security case, and not to pay attention to any other consideration."
Reactions.
Palestinian.
The day following al-Mabhouh's death, Hamas' armed wing, the Al-Qassam Brigades, announced that he died of terminal cancer in a hospital in the United Arab Emirates.
On 29 January, Hamas' deputy politburo chief Moussa Abu Marzouk said, "Mossad agents are those who assassinated al-Mabhouh". Top Hamas official Mahmoud al-Zahar speculated that same day that it was possible that members of the entourage of Israeli infrastructure minister Uzi Landau, who were in the United Arab Emirates at the time for a renewable energy conference, were involved in his killing. Landau dismissed the claim, stating that his delegation was in Abu Dhabi, some 120 km from Dubai, and was escorted by an eight-man UAE security team at all times.
On 2 February, Hamas' representative in Lebanon Osama Hamdan said that Palestinian Authority security forces might have been involved in the death, stating that, "The Palestinian Authority security forces are pursuing [our] fighters and they have killed dozens of them since 1994." "Haaretz" reported that details from a preliminary Hamas investigation procured by the newspaper suggested that al-Mabhouh was assassinated by agents of an Arab government, and that al-Mabhouh was wanted by Egypt and Jordan. On 12 February, senior Hamas leader Khaled Mashaal rejected reports that Hamas blamed Arab states for al-Mabhouh's death, and said the Israeli Mossad was solely responsible.
On 19 February, Hamas representatives said that the two Palestinians arrested in Dubai, Ahmad Hassanain and Anwar Shheibar, are former members of Fatah's security forces and work at a construction company in Dubai owned by Mohammed Dahlan, a senior Fatah security official. A senior Hamas official told "Al-Hayat" newspaper that the two provided logistical aid to the Mossad hit team alleged to have carried out the murder, renting them cars and hotel rooms. The two were linked to a Gaza death cell under Dahlan's command, which worked to suppress dissidence among Palestinians. Dahlan and Fatah denied the charges.
European Union.
EU foreign ministers "strongly condemned" the use of forged European passports in the killing.
United Nations.
Philip Alston, the UN special rapporteur on extrajudicial killings was quoted by the "Los Angeles Times" as stating, "If a foreign intelligence agency was responsible for the killing of al-Mabhouh, the matter should clearly be classified as an extrajudicial execution. There is no legal justification for the cold-blooded murder of a man who, if alleged to have committed crimes, could have been arrested and charged."
In popular culture.
A 2010 Hebrew language novel titled "Dubai" and written by Yomi 'Eyni is set around the assassination. A 2013 spy action comedy film titled "Kidon" also revolves around the assassination. The 2015 Israeli TV series "False Flag" is also loosely based on the story of the assassination.