Barak Ravid, the political commentator of the Walla website, spoke today (Thursday) with Nissim Mash’al, Guy Peleg and Judy Shalom Nir Mozes on 103FM about the video leaked last night on the Telegram channel linked to Iran – which contained personal details about Mossad chief David Barnea and his family.
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“It was a conscious operation against the head of the Mossad, the goal was not to obtain classified information but to try to embarrass it,” Ravid said.
The commentator said: “This is a very interesting event and perhaps also suitable for Purim, since the date when these materials came out is not by chance. They went out on Purim because it was the attempt of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards to convey a message to the head of the Mossad.
“How did it all turn out? On Tuesday at 19:30 in the evening, a new telegram channel was opened that did not exist until today, called ‘Open Hands’, which had almost no followers, they simply put some videos there along with a caption in Hebrew, English and Arabic, which said’ Gift for Purim to Mossad chief David Barnea, Happy holiday’.
“This is a two-minute video in which they tell how a team of hackers from all over the world, no one introduced themselves as Iranian – there was a British, Arab, Russian, but Iranians were not, and they describe how they started tracking the head of the Mossad in 2014 and broke into it. To the computer or to the phone and took out documents, there were documents of his wife, his ID photos, plane tickets.
“They also posted pictures of him and his videos a little embarrassing. In the end, this thing, should be seen in context and that it was an Iranian Revolutionary Guards consciousness operation against the head of the Mossad, to show him – ‘Are you gathering intelligence on us and blowing up bases with UAVs? Here we also come to you. ‘
“Honestly, beyond the fact that it’s interesting and a bit amusing, in the end it’s not amazing capabilities that the Iranians displayed.”
“The Mossad said it was old, when a force in the country says something is old, I immediately know that it is probably old, but not okay. They did not break into the phone of the head of the Mossad, probably a computer or his wife’s phone. “
Ravid said that this was not a significant security damage: “This was not the goal, the goal of the Iranians, the goal of the incident was not to obtain classified information, the goal was to try to embarrass him.”
Asked if the incident indicated a loosening of defense systems, Ravid replied: “In this case, the Iranians were several layers away from reaching the head of the Mossad directly. Among other things, because the way they managed to gain access to the phone or computer was through a subscription in the Hod Hasharon municipal library, which apparently had an account in the municipal library from the same phone or computer and it gave access into the same device. That’s how they got in. This, by the way, mainly shows that innocent talk for us has loopholes that call for a thief on the part of intelligence organizations. “
He concluded: “They said it was just the beginning and there would be more materials they would put out. It will be interesting to see. “