You have commented 358 times on Rantburg.

Your Name
Your e-mail (optional)
Website (optional)
My Original Nic        Pic-a-Nic        Sorry. Comments have been closed on this article.
Bold Italic Underline Strike Bullet Blockquote Small Big Link Squish Foto Photo
Submit your comments on this article
Israel-Palestine-Jordan
Israel helped US track Qasem Soleimani using cell phone - report
2021-05-09
[JPost] "Can you hear me now? Look up"
Israel gave the US access to multiple cellphone numbers for former top Iranian official Qasem Soleimani to help enable his assassination in January 2020, Yahoo News reported on Saturday night. Soleimani was the former Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps’ elite Quds Force chief.
He was. Now he is merely the memory of a red mist.
The Jerusalem Post has previously reported that Israel’s role in the assassination was far greater than had been revealed.

For example, according to foreign reports, Israel was instrumental in keeping the idea of removing Soleimani from the playing board despite resistance by some of the US defense establishment as well as tactical assistance. Internal US debates are described in the Yahoo article.

Soleimani’s vehicle and a second accompanying vehicle were destroyed by US drones after he flew into Iraq from Damascus.

According to Yahoo News, "in the six hours before Soleimani boarded his flight from Damascus, the Iranian general switched cellphones three times, according to a US military official."

"In Tel Aviv, US Joint Special Operations Command liaisons worked with their Israeli counterparts to help track Soleimani’s cellphone patterns. The Israelis, who had access to Soleimani’s numbers, passed them off to the Americans, who traced Soleimani and his current phone to Baghdad," said the report.

In addition, at an earlier date, "Israeli intelligence at one point tipped off the CIA about a courier for Soleimani who would travel outside Iran to pick up clean phones for the Quds Force leader and his inner circle, recalled a former intelligence official.
Mossad sees you when you’re sleeping. They know when you’re awake. They know if you’ve been bad or good...
The CIA got wind that the courier would visit a specific market in a Gulf country to procure these devices, and sprang into action. The agency executed a complex supply chain compromise, installing spyware on a set of phones that were seeded into the marketplace used by Soleimani’s courier," said the report.
Just like in the movies. I’m impressed.
Further, "The gambit worked, said the former official, and the courier purchased at least one bugged phone that was then used by someone who was often in the same room as Soleimani. But because Soleimani and other Iranian leadership would often rotate their devices, and employ other measures to avoid being surveilled, successes of this sort were fleeting, said former officials," stated Yahoo.
Posted by:Frank G

#6   But how they must have got hard copies of the firms' ledgers, account numbers, transactions, the dirt on the officials etc is still talked about in some circles.

Remember when Israel literally emptied the Tehran warehouse containing the records of Iran’s nuclear bomb program, getting clean away before Iran noticed they were there? They were so slick that one might suspect they’d done such things before...
Posted by: trailing wife   2021-05-09 11:48  

#5  @ #3 - John Kerry pops up straight away.
Posted by: Clem   2021-05-09 08:48  

#4  Israel gave the US access to multiple cellphone numbers for former top Iranian official Qasem Soleimani to help enable his assassination in January 2020

So much bullshi*. Signals and vehicular tracking of High Profile Targets (HPT) in Iraq at that time required no external assistance. If you have a bank or lending institution, you can take it there.
Posted by: Besoeker   2021-05-09 07:44  

#3  Who in the Hell leaked this? The Biden people?
Posted by: Spike and Tenille5583   2021-05-09 07:39  

#2  Sometimes they tell us things about our west coast before we know them. It came in through the usual channel that there was a money laundering op based in Gujarat serving some moslem interests that were linked to Iran. When the requisite agencies tried to follow it up they were met with a wall of pol traitors, lawyers and accountants. When Tel Aviv saw no news of sneaky Iranians caught running a racket in India for weeks, a briefcase full of files was sent anonymously to the Liaison guy. It contained all the evidence needed to prosecute some shell cos, chartered accountant firms and dirt needed to bury two revenue service officials.

Unfortunately, the government still did not do much and instead began to beat about the diplomatic bush with Iran [showing our Israeli friends we just didn't deserve this kind of help]. But how they must have got hard copies of the firms' ledgers, account numbers, transactions, the dirt on the officials etc is still talked about in some circles.
Posted by: Dron66046   2021-05-09 03:53  

#1  Mossad sees you when you’re sleeping. They know when you’re awake. They know if you’ve been bad or good...

LOL
Posted by: Clem   2021-05-09 00:54  

00:00