Israel's Secret Yearslong Bid to Recruit Ahmadinejad
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- Israel ran a yearslong secret operation to groom former Iranian president Ahmadinejad as an intelligence asset, according to reporting on the previously undisclosed effort.
- The cultivation campaign culminated in a dramatic attempt to move Ahmadinejad to an Israeli safe house in the early days of "the war," but the extraction plan fell apart before it could be executed.
Why it matters: Israel invested years trying to turn Ahmadinejad — a former head of state with deep ties to Iran's regime — into a recruited source, only for the wartime extraction plan to collapse, potentially squandering the entire yearslong groundwork at a moment when intelligence on Iran is most critical.
