Target Neutralized
Chapter 1
This is a story of a wanted man who was walking on the streets of a busy shopping area disguised as a common man was assassinated in daylight. Another target neutralized by meticulous planning and precision.
In order to stop the ongoing skirmishes across the borders and repeated terrorists attacks taking place in Israel, the Israel Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin and PLO chief Yasser Arafat signed Oslo accord in 1993 in Washington D.C supervised by America.
Oslo accord was a result of series of negotiations for attaining peace in the region. Most of the Israel population and opposition were opposed to this peace process as they believed that this would not stop the attacks by different terrorist Palestine organisations over Israel.
This accord was disliked by many extremist groups operating from Palestine and their objective was to free the areas captured by Israel. Fathi Shaqaqi was a leader of one such organization the Palestine Islamic Jihad or the PIJ.
Chapter 2
Fathi Shaqaqi was born in a refugee family in the slums of a refugee camp in Rafah in the southern Gaza strip. He studied at Birzeit University in West Bank and later studied medicine in Egypt. In 1981, he obtained his medical degree and opened his clinic in Gaza, and started his career as a medical practitioner.
During his college days, he was influenced by the Muslim brotherhood and believed that Palestine Liberation Organization could not stop Israel’s occupation and that an Islamist organization could achieve any political and military successes against Israel.
Later he founded the Palestine Islamic Jihad (PIJ) and recruited members across Palestine and Syria. Shaqaqi was arrested twice by Israeli police. First time in 1983, for publishing a magazine named Islamic Vanguard but released a year later.
He was arrested a second time in 1986 on the charges of spreading violence and later deported to southern Lebanon in 1988. Upon his release, he settled in Damascus in Syria under the protection of Syrian president Hafiz-Al-Assad.
Chapter 3
His organization PIJ continued on its warpath against the Israeli government. In 1994, Hani Abed brokered an alliance between PIJ and Hamas, another terrorist organization. Hamas chief bomb-maker Yahya Ayyash helped them by preparing three bombs.
Beit Lid junction is a strategic junction connecting Tel Aviv and Haifa. 22nd Jan 1995, was a quiet Sunday morning, soldiers had assembled there to join their military duties after a weekend.
A Palestine suicide bomber disguised in military uniform approaches a crowd of soldiers and detonates himself killing 21 Israeli soldiers. During the rescue operation, another suicide bomber explodes himself killing a civilian and injuring many others. It was the most gruesome attack on Israeli forces.
Israel Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin toured the explosion site and was close to a third bag containing the third bomb that was to be detonated by another suicide bomber, but he was unable to make it to the spot. The bag was later retrieved and analyzed.
Chapter 4
PIJ (Palestine Islamic Jihad) claimed responsibility for this attack. The next day Shaqaqi gave an interview to a magazine stating how the attack was carried out and more such attacks would be planned in the future. The Israel secret service Mossad was pressed into service to get this target neutralized before any further attacks.
The document to neutralize Shaqaqi was signed by the Prime Minister, and Mossad agents were busy gathering information about him. Shaqaqi was operating from Damascus in Syria, and launching an operation to execute him in Syria would destabilize the peace process between Israel and Syria.
Shaqaqi used to travel only to Islamic countries, and neutralizing him there was a tough task. The agents tap the phone conversation of Shaqaqi and within a couple of months have all the details regarding his routine.
They were waiting for the right opportunity, and it arrived sooner than they expected. Shaqaqi received a call from the personal assistant of Muammar Gaddafi, the dictator of Libya. He wanted Shaqaqi to attend an Islamic meeting in Tripoli. Gaddafi was one of the leaders who had provided funds to his organization, Shaqaqi agreed to attend the meeting.
Chapter 5
Mossad agents gathered the intelligence about Shaqaqi’s previous visits to Tripoli. They found that as Libya was facing sanctions, so he could not fly into the country directly. Shaqaqi used to take a flight to Malta, and check into the hotel Diplomat for a day. He either used ferry boats to enter Tripoli in Libya or take a land route via Tunisia.
During his way back, he used the same route halting at the same Diplomat hotel in Malta for a day. In the evening he used to go shopping and return to Damascus a day later. They laid the plan to execute him in Malta, and Mossad director-general Shabtai Shavit was personally leading the operation.
On 22nd October 1995, the plane carrying Shaqaqi lands at Malta airport. He was under surveillance by the agents deployed at the airport. A couple of the agents were also planted at the Diplomat hotel. He arrives at the airport disguised as Ibrahim Ali Al Shawesh a Libyan national.
Agents deployed at the airport at first were not able to recognize him but later on, closer examination revealed that they had their man. This time though Shaqaqi did not stay at the Diplomat hotel on his arrival and headed straight to the waiting ferry boat.
Chapter 6
Shaqaqi returned to Malta after his brief stay in Libya on 26th October 1995. During his return, he checks into the Diplomat hotel at Sliema waterfront. He carried his baggage to his room; the agents planted at the hotel soon provided the information about his arrival.
The agents checked out from the hotel and waited in a car waiting for him to get out. A few hours later, Shaqaqi steps out of the hotel strolling gingerly towards the waterfront. After spending twenty minutes, he heads to a shop nearby to purchase some shirts.
The agents in the car were keeping a close eye on his activities. One of the agents walked inside the store and followed his movements. About an hour later he steps out of the shop and was on the way to his hotel when a bike approaches him from behind and slows down as it approaches.
Two kidon agents in a bike appears before Shaqaqi, and the man sitting at the back shoots six times at him from a silencer pistol, two of the bullets directly hits him in the head. The bike then sped off. The agents in the car also made their way back. Shaqaqi was dead even before falling to the ground.
Chapter 7
Target neutralized was sent to the Mossad headquarters. Agents leave their bike after a couple of kilometres, and they were picked up by the agents present inside the car. They travelled straight to the harbour, where a ferry boat was waiting for them. The ferry boat fled and transferred them into an Israeli ship.
Shabtai Shavit was personally present on the ship to greet the agents after they completed a successful mission. It took Malta’s police three days to identify the assassinated person’s true identity. They confirmed that the deceased was not Ibrahim Ali Al Shawesh as his documents displayed but Fathi Shaqaqi.
It was later revealed during the investigation, that a Yamaha XT-600 E used in the assassination was brought in from Greece and had an old Malta Yamaha motorcycle number plate. The motorcycle was found abandoned at a place couple of kilometres away. The fuel used in the motorcycle was unleaded petrol that is not available in Malta.
The ship, waiting to pick the agents up was brought in Italian waters stating that some mechanical problems need repairs. The ship, returned a day later stating, that the mechanical problem had been fixed.
This was a well-planned and executed operation to neutralize the target who was the chief of a Palestine Islamic Jihad organization that was responsible for carrying out terrorist attacks and responsible for the death of many military personals.
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