By Way of Deception

262 BY WAY OF DECEPTIONThe pieces were falling together nicely in Hamburg and Frankfurt,but Ghazi Hussein in Vienna was still a problem. Fortunately,however, he had called Salem when he got the arms order fromArafat. While he'd never admit it to Arafat, he told Salem he hadno contacts in this area of activity. Salem said he knew someonewho might be able to help. They both knew they shouldn't beliaising on this, but what could they do?* * *Mossad security was pulling its collective hair out. Here they were,in the midst of a big operation with the ever-treacherous PLO —and with no security at all. But apart from holding meetings inopen courtyards or cafés, and avoiding any closed-door meetingswith the PLO men, there wasn't much they could do under thecircumstances except complain a lot and send messages thatcondemned such unsecured activities, saying they would acceptno responsibility should anything go wrong.By the beginning of June, the plan had pretty well taken shape. Ittakes time to gather weapons, but while they were waiting,everyone was getting nervous. In late June, both Hussein inVienna and Salem in East Berlin notified Arafat that his requesthad been met and would be ready within two or three weeks.In the meantime, Major Aloony was becoming rather nervousabout the money he'd been expecting from the hash deal. Hehadn't heard from the contacts. Nor did he know who, or where,they were. The only contact Aloony had was the address andphone number of one of the Black Bloc men. But the leader was injail and his second-in-command had been told by the Mossadman posing as a friend to call everybody in the unit and tell themthat, in case anybody made inquiries, they were trading hash forarms. If they had any problems at all, or if anybody called aboutthem, they were to call him immediately.When Aloony finally called his contact, he was told the Black Blocleader was in jail, but another man was handling the deal. Asinstructed, Aloony's contact then telephoned