The 14th May 1988 issue of Middle East International carries an interesting article on the rise (but not yet fall) of a former high-ranking MOSSAD officer who, like Edwin Wilson, has turned his previous clandestine experience into profit through shady arms dealing.
Mike Harari, leader of MOSSAD’s Munich revenge hit-squad exposed in 1973 after the Lillehammer bungle, resurfaced in Panama in the late 1970s as security advisor to General Noriega’s predecessor, General Torrijos. After Noriega came to power, Harari quickly assumed a position of great influence, training Noriega’s bodyguard and advising on all aspects of interrogation and security techniques.
In appreciation of his services, General Noriega decorated him and appointed him Panama’s honorary consul in Israel in early 1987. So influential is Harari that Eduardo Herrera, Panama’s recently dismissed ambassador in Israel, blames him for his dismissal and cashiering from the Panamanian military in April.
Harari used his position to become kingpin in Israeli trade with Panama – trade not only in commercial goods but also in US intelligence intercepted in Panama. Allegations have also been made that US high technology found its way to Israel through Harari’s network.
Harari’s main contact in the US is a figure often mentioned in the Contra investigations, former CIA agent Felix Rodriguez, who ran the secret Contra resupply effort from Ilopango airbase in El Salvador. Rodriguez’s close colleague on the Contra operation, the CIA’s Donald Gregg, was the Reagan administration’s prime channel to Israel on matters regarding the Contras.
Former Noriega aide, Jose Blandon, testifying to Senator John Kerry’s subcommittee on Narcotics, Terrorism and International Operations, has alleged that Harari and his network ran a two-way trade system: arms from Poland and Czechoslovakia into Panama for the Contras, and, on the return trip, narcotics from Colombia via Panama to the US.
In the article ‘The Israeli Connection’, Jane Hunter also chronicles the links between General Noriega and Israel – a little-known aspect of the Noriega/Contra story.
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Middle East International, 21 Collingham Road, London SW5 ONU – £1.50 per issue.
On MOSSAD’s 1973 assassination operations see The Hit Team, David Tinnin (Futura, London 1977) and Vengeance, George Jonas (Collins, London 1984). The Jonas book, however, should be read with caution. There are still unresolved questions about the veracity of sections of it.