other-side-of-deception-victor-ostrovsky

It took me several days to get used to being a free man again. I wasnever again going to be a puppet on a string, for anyone. I was goingto participate only in things that I knew would hurt the Mossad. Iknew now that the Mossad was a deadly machine without a purpose,and if Ephraim was not going to work with me the way I wanted, hecould go to hell and I would do it on my own. I made it clear that Iwould not cooperate in any more activities unless they were directlydetrimental to the success of the Mossad.He wanted to know whether I would continue to work with theEgyptians, and I told him I would not unless it was to pass on informationto them that could hurt the Mossad. I would, however, continuemy activities with the Jordanians, since I thought that it couldhelp bring about a peaceful solution to the conflict between Israel andJordan. If the Mossad succeeded in bringing down King Hussein, therewould never, ever be peace in the region. The fundamentalists wouldprevail, and that would be the end of that.I also said that I would be happy to provide information to theBritish and to make contact with the French. As it turned out, that didnot happen for some time.I contacted the Jordanians and arranged a meeting with Albert inOttawa. At first, he was reluctant to come, fearing a trap, but he eventuallyagreed and was supposed to arrive in Ottawa in mid-September.I contacted a local gallery owner, a Mr. Koyman, who had several galleriesin Ottawa, Toronto, and Montreal. I brought him some samplesof my work. He had them framed and began to sell them through hismain gallery in Ottawa, at the Rideau Center. At the same time, Iwrote in any official documents that I was a security adviser to foreigncountries. That was the truth; I'd started work on an analysis paper ofthe political situation in the Middle East and the significance of theTIIE OTHER 5II)F OF DEC EPTIOY / 20;' various political activities in the area, mainly analyzing what wasI behind the statements of Israeli politicians. This paper would allowthe Jordanians thereafter to plot their decision making on a realisticplcture of the political arena, and not on what some farfetched, overpaid,and one-sided American media analysts said. If you turned onvour teievision set at anv , given - time.,vou'd , hear them babble on andI1 on about how they saw the picture, while it was clear to anyone witha brain that they were feeding on one another.Albert came to Ottawa, and I gave him a two-week crash coursein how to analyze the analysts. In many Arab capitals, the leadersI were delivering a lot of rhetoric for internal consumption but at theI same time eating up what the so-called experts were saying aboutwhat other Arab leaders were saying. For some reason, they'd stoppedrelying on their own common sense.Albert was starting to press me for the Israeli spy ring that I'dpromised him, and he also had a request. His people were extremelyanxious because of the forthcoming change in government in Israel.Since the Israeli election about two years previously had been completelyindecisive, the two major parties (left-leaning Labor and rightleaningLikud) had agreed to a unity government in which their leaderswould share power in rotation.It was decided that Shimon Peres, then leader of the Labor Party,would be the prime minister for the first two-year term, and thatYitzhak Shamir, leader of the right-wing Likud Party, would be theforeign minister. Then after two years, Shamir would become primeminister, and Peres would be foreign minister. Yitzhak Rabin, thenumber two of the Labor Party at the time, was to be minister ofdefense for the full term. The time was approaching when Shamirwould become prime minister. They wanted me to come to Ammanand analyze what that would mean to them. They were happy with-.my written analysis, but for this occasion, they wanted me there.As far as they were concerned, there was no reason for me not towant to come. They'd treated me well when I was there, and they'dupheld their end of the bargain in every way. I agreed but said that Iwould need a few days to set the date. After all, what was the point incoming if I didn't have all the information needed for the analysis? I~lso wanted to get Ephraim to help me set up that spy ring we hadtalked about, or at least get a list of people and give the Jordaniansseveral operational options.After Albert left on September 30, Ephraim arrived. We had severalmeetings in his hotel room at the Holiday Inn. He said that thingswere getting a little turbulent back home and that he would have to