Between foreign reports, public confirmation by former head of the Military Intelligence Directorate Tamir Hayman, and The Jerusalem Post’s own Western sources, it has been known now for some time that the Mossad sought to replace supreme leader Ali Khamenei with former president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.
The New York Times had previous, more speculative reports on the issue, which were eventually confirmed by Hayman to the Public Broadcasting Service. That created space for the Post to receive confirmation, although Israeli journalists often cannot publish all that they know.
Hayman had told PBS: “Regarding Ahmadinejad, there was a sequence of special operations, very, very unique that was supposed to happen. And Ahmadinejad was a part of that sequence. The rest of the operations are not fully disclosed to the public, except for the Kurdish invasion.”
Questioned why the plan to replace Khamenei with Ahmadinejad had failed, Hayman replied: “Because the centerpiece of all the sequence should have been set off with the Kurdish invasion. According to what was published, [Turkish President Recep Tayyip] Erdogan, who really considered the Kurds as a strategic threat to the stability of Turkey, convinced [US President Donald] Trump that it was a bad idea to give the Kurds a state. Backing the Kurds goes against the interest of Turkey, and I think that had something to do with the decision of Trump to cancel this operation.”
Hayman has been used before to grandfather in sensitive information about Iran, which Israeli authorities had previously kept under wraps, according to foreign reports. They include the 2022 public admission by Hayman of a concrete role played by Israeli intelligence in the assassination of Qasem Soleimani, commander of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps’ Quds Force.
Mossad's Ahmadinejad recruit attempt involved striking residence, evacuating him
But the latest exposure by the Times of the tactics used by the Mossad to recruit Ahmadinejad, including its picking him up mid-war under the cover of an attack around his residence, and his walking away from the operation after being unhappy about the circumstances of the war, has not come from Israeli sources.
Whether the leaking of the story is revenge for the Israeli leak of its attempt to assist Trump in avoiding his aircraft being targeted by Iranians, or to push back against Israel’s opposing Trump’s sale of F-35s to Turkey, or whether the leak occurred earlier, to otherwise humble Israel and put it in its place as it tries to pressure the US to take a harder stance on Iran, the leaker’s message to Israel and the Mossad is clear: We don’t trust you, so back off.
Leakers seek to silence Israel on Iran
The Trump administration, or parts of it, still has close ties to top Israeli officials. However, many of these Israeli officials, including some from the political echelon and the Mossad, have made enemies since the Iran war fell off a cliff. They have alienated US Vice President JD Vance, many of the non-generals in the Pentagon, probably some in the CIA, and certainly anyone affiliated with former National Intelligence director Tulsi Gabbard or special envoys Jared Kushner or Steve Witkoff with their inflated expectations.
There are also, doubtless, Turkish officials who helped block the move and are happy to share whatever they know.
While Israeli defense officials can make a viable argument for the latest war having worked out for some of Israel’s interests, pushing off the nuclear and ballistic-missile threats and weakening the Iranian military for years, the Trump administration and the United States increasingly see it as a failure.
The economic harm to the US has been devastating, the political harm to Trump will be lasting, and nearly five months after starting the war, there still is not a stable situation in the Strait of Hormuz, the basic nuclear-weapons goals are nowhere close to getting nailed down, although those goals still very well may be reached at some later point if Trump has the patience to see them through.
Clandestine funds sent to aides, Ahmadinejad-Mossad meetings leaked
So, while for the Times and the average reader of spy novels, the latest leaks about wild meetings with Israeli officials and Mossad agents in Guatemala, Hungary, and elsewhere, with Ahmadinejad managing to lose his minders multiple times, and clandestine funds being sent to his aides, are spellbinding and mind-twistingly fun reading, for the leakers, this is all about slam-dunking the Mossad and Israel into silence.
Look at how far your fancy tricks and plots did not get you when it really mattered in bringing about regime change, the leakers are telling their Israeli counterparts. Stop talking about regime change, and stop trying to rock the boat with Iran and with Lebanon, they are saying. Remember that we are your last friend in the world, Vance himself said in a far more public fashion.
All of this means that while it is exciting to hear how the Mossad got as far as it did in recruiting Ahmadinejad, once Israel’s greatest hater, a man who many times called to wipe Israel off the map and went out of his way to host Holocaust-denial conferences, the end of this story for Israel is not a good one like it was with Soleimani and other operations.
The end and purpose of this latest story for the American public is to seal into its consciousness that, however brilliant the Mossad may be with its exploding beepers and other operations, at the higher-stakes geopolitical level that the US and Iran are now playing, it should remain on the sidelines with Israel.