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Dozens of Alleged Israeli Agents Arrested in Turkish Anti-Espionage Operation
Pro-Hamas demonstrators in Istanbul, Turkey, carry a banner calling for Israel’s elimination. Photo: Reuters/Dilara Senkaya
Turkish media outlets carried lurid headlines about supposed Israeli espionage on Tuesday after Ankara’s intelligence services announced a wave of arrests targeting an alleged Mossad network operating in the country.
While key details of the operation’s scope were divulged, there was near silence on other significant matters, such as the identities of those arrested and the Hamas-linked targets they allegedly chose.
According to a statement issued by the Turkish National Intelligence Organization (MIT), 33 suspects out of a total of 46 were detained in a nationwide operation, while another 13 reportedly remain at large. Officials raided several addresses in Istanbul, Ankara and other cities, including the largely Kurdish city of Diyarbakir in the southeast of Turkey.
Turkish authorities said those arrested had been planning the “kidnap” of pro-Hamas figures residing in Turkey. No information was supplied on how these suspects were apparently groomed by Mossad, Israel’s intelligence service, although one outlet, Aydinlik, claimed somewhat improbably that the contacts had been initiated on “social media.”
In addition to the arrests, nearly 150,000 Euros and $24,000 were seized in cash, along with firearms.
Media coverage of the arrests stressed the comments of Ronen Bar, the head of Israel’s Shin Bet security service, that were recorded at a meeting in early December and then published by Israeli news outlets. Bar pledged that Israel would target Hamas operatives in “every location, in Gaza, in the West Bank, in Lebanon, in Turkey, in Qatar, everyone.”
An unnamed Turkish official quoted by the Reuters news agency claimed that “necessary warnings were made to the interlocutors based on the news of Israeli officials’ statements, and it was expressed to Israel that [such an act] would have serious consequences.”
Long hostile to Israel, the regime of Turkey’s Islamist President, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, has upped its harsh rhetoric in the wake of the Oct. 7 pogrom carried out by Hamas terrorists in southern Israel.
Erdogan himself stated in a Dec. 4 speech that Israel’s military response in Gaza would eventually pose a threat to Turkey’s “own security and territorial integrity.”
“We know very well that those who occupy Gaza today will set their sights on other places tomorrow,” Erdogan told a meeting of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC). “As a matter of fact, they do not even feel the need to hide these intentions anymore. Gaza butcher Netanyahu himself revealed in front of the cameras that the issue is not Gaza or Ramallah but that he is pursuing expansionist goals.”
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Israeli Strike on Tehran Kills Bodyguard of Slain Hezbollah Chief
Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi lays a wreath as he visits the burial site of former Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah, on the outskirts of Beirut, Lebanon, June 3, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Mohamed Azakir
A member of Lebanese armed group Hezbollah was killed in an Israeli air strike on Tehran alongside a member of an Iran-aligned Iraqi armed group, a senior Lebanese security source told Reuters and the Iraqi group said on Saturday.
The source identified the Hezbollah member as Abu Ali Khalil, who had served as a bodyguard for Hezbollah’s slain chief Hassan Nasrallah. The source said Khalil had been on a religious pilgrimage to Iraq when he met up with a member of the Kataeb Sayyed Al-Shuhada group.
They traveled together to Tehran and were both killed in an Israeli strike there, along with Khalil’s son, the senior security source said. Hezbollah has not joined in Iran’s air strikes against Israel from Lebanon.
Kataeb Sayyed Al-Shuhada published a statement confirming that both the head of its security unit and Khalil had been killed in an Israeli strike.
Nasrallah was killed in an Israeli aerial attack on Beirut’s southern suburbs in September.
Israel and Iran have been trading strikes for nine consecutive days since Israel launched attacks on Iran, saying Tehran was on the verge of developing nuclear weapons. Iran has said it does not seek nuclear weapons.
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Hamas Financial Officer and Commander Eliminated by IDF in the Gaza Strip
Israeli soldiers operate during a ground operation in the southern Gaza Strip, amid the Israel-Hamas conflict, July 3, 2024. Photo: Ohad Zwigenberg/Pool via REUTERS
i24 News – The Israeli Defense Forces (IDF), in cooperation with the General Security Service (Shin Bet), announced on Friday the killing of Ibrahim Abu Shamala, a senior financial official in Hamas’ military wing.
The operation took place on June 17th in the central Gaza Strip.
Abu Shamala held several key positions, including financial officer for Hamas’ military wing and assistant to Marwan Issa, the deputy commander of Hamas’ military wing until his elimination in March 2024.
He was responsible for managing all the financial resources of Hamas’ military wing in Gaza, overseeing the planning and execution of the group’s war budget. This involved handling and smuggling millions of dollars into the Gaza Strip to fund Hamas’ military operations.
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Report: Wary of Assassination by Israel, Khamenei Names 3 Potential Successors
Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei waves during a meeting in Tehran, Iran, May 20, 2025. Photo: Office of the Iranian Supreme Leader/WANA (West Asia News Agency)/Handout via REUTERS
i24 News – Iran’s supreme leader Ali Khamenei named three senior clerics as candidates to succeed him should he be killed, the New York Times reported on Saturday citing unnamed Iranian officials. It is understood the Ayatollah fears he could be assassinated in the coming days.
Khamenei reportedly mostly speaks with his commanders through a trusted aide now, suspending electronic communications.
Khamenei has designated three senior religious figures as candidates to replace him as well as choosing successors in the military chain of command in the likely event that additional senior officials be eliminated.
Earlier on Saturday Israel confirmed the elimination of Saeed Izadi and Bhanam Shahriari.
Shahriari, head of Iran’s Quds Force Weapons Transfer Unit, responsible for arming Hamas, Hezbollah, and the Houthis, was killed in an Israeli airstrike over 1,000 km from Israel in western Iran.
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