According to a probe conducted by Tunisian daily Dounia El Watan and also reported by Lebanese Al-Manar TV, the 20 January 2010 assassination of Hamas leader Mahmoud Mabhouh in Dubai would have required a far heftier team than the one already implicated by the United Arab Emirates.
Besides the killers, a reconnoitering team led by a former Tunisian security operative, Ahmad Bannour, was also involved.
Mr. Bannour is reportedly living in exile in France where he supposedly constituted an intelligence cell acting in the mutual interest of both the Israeli and French services.
Ahmed Bannour fled from Tunisia after his spying activities on behalf of the Israeli Mossad were discovered. Taking advantage of his responsabilities within the State apparatus, he had organized the bombing of the Fatah headquarters in Tunis on 1 October 1985 - which Yasser Arafat (a.k.a. Abou Ammar) escaped - followed, on 16 April 1988, by the assassination of another Palestinian leader, Khalif Wal-Wazir (a.k.a. Abou Jihad).
Under cover of a French company controlled by him, Ahmed Bannour apparently detailed two French "businessmen" plus a team of technicians to Dubai to negotiate an elevator contract. On this occasion, the blueprints of the hotel where Mahmoud Mabhouh supposedly booked in, including the hotel security system, allegedly fell into the hands of French intelligence agents.
Furthermore, Mr. Bannour’s French company has been subpoenaed in a case currently pending with the Lebanon Military Tribunal. It serves as a cover for the admission to Beirut of Tunisian and Egyption nationals operating for the Mossad. They were planning an attack against the radio of Sheik Hussein Fadlallah and the assassination of Hezbollah Secretary-General Sayed Hassan Nasrallah.
Reply from M. Ahmed Bennour When I exercised the functions of Tunisian Minister of the Interior from April 1980 to May 1984, no Palestinians were harassed and even less murdered. And the most senior Palestinian officials, dead or alive, know better than anyone my commitment to their cause and are aware of the extent of my contribution to the noble Palestinian cause. The head of security at the time of the Hammam Shatt attack of 1 October 1985, was Mr. Ben Ali. And this is an indisputable fact. All these factors combined enabled the Mossad squad to perpetrate their cowardly assassination of Abu Jihad leader undisturbed. According to a survey published by the aforementioned Maariv newspaper, the Mossad squad benefited from the complicity of some senior Tunisian officials at the time. Finally, cooperation between the Tunisian government and the Israeli secret service exist, but it didn’t start until what is shamefully called the "new era", that is after the November 1987 coup. During this period, an Israeli interest office was set up in Tunis. Since then, political, security, economic, trade and finance relations have continued to flourish and strengthen in the greatest secrecy and hidden from the view of public opinion, both Tunisian and Arab. Former Governor of Sousse (1972-1974) Former Minister of Defence (1974-1977) Former Minister of the Interior (1980-1984) Former Ambassador to Rome (1984-1986) |
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