|
Mossad Looking for New Agents
TEL AVIV, July 19 (News Agencies) - The Israeli spy agency, the Mossad, is looking to hire new agents who are multi-lingual, willing to travel and have particularly daring personalities, the South African newspaper Business Day reported.
The newspaper reports that the notorious agency, formally known as the Institute for Intelligence and Special Assignments, is advertising in newspapers explicitly describing some of the jobs it hopes to fill.
Even though the agency has advertised before, it wasn't this precise in job descriptions. Ephraim Halevy, a British-born diplomat who now heads the Mossad, reportedly runs the advertising campaign.
In one advertisement, a slogan under an image of two big doors says, "The Mossad is opening up. Not for everyone. Not for many. Maybe for you."
In another instance the ad declares that you might just be the "quality material" for Mossad if you are over 27 years of age, with "daring sense and sensitivity" and can "exhilarate and move people."
According to Business Day, the agency is using these new recruitment tactics as it faces tough competition for manpower from Israel's high-tech industry. Most Israelis seem to be more concerned with money and lifestyles than they are with patriotism. The campaign reportedly attracted thousand of replies from potential recruits in the first week.
A campaign planner told Business Day, "Israeli society has become more open, even about its security establishment. Mossad knows it must open up, though it can't be stripped completely."
The agency's supposed opening up comes three years after several high-profile and widely reported bungle-ups which were a major source of embarrassment for the Israeli government.
In 1997, Mossad agents failed to assassinate Hamas leader Khaled Meshal in Amman, Jordan. The agents were arrested and returned to Israel in exchange for prominent Islamic leaders held in Israeli prisons.
Mossad agents operatives also bungled a routine wire tap in Bern, Switzerland.
In another instance, Mossad operatives were caught using Canadian passports, causing strains in relationships between the two countries.
And a veteran agent was put on trial for fabricating information that almost sparked a war with Syria.
|
