Review by Booklist Review
The Mossad, founded in 1951, is Israel's secret intelligence agency. To prepare this revised and updated edition of a book first published in 1995, Thomas spent more than two years interviewing more than 100 people either directly employed by or working indirectly for Israeli and other intelligence services. Thomas posits that perhaps the personal motives that drove some interviewees to break their silence include a need to secure their own place in history or a desire to justify their actions. The same can be said for those who agreed to be indentified. Thomas believes that the paramount reason for them to talk was a real and genuine fear that an organization they had served with pride was increasingly endangered from within and that the only way to save it was to reveal what it had achieved in the past and what it is doing today. The author of 40 books has written a meticulous account of this spy organization, and any library that did not purchase the first edition of this important title should consider this enhanced version. --George Cohen Copyright 2006 Booklist
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
Among the world's most respected and feared intelligence services, the Israeli Mossad encompasses shadowy networks of katsas (case officers) often operating undercover, from Washington to Tehran to Beijing. The third update of this well-received book adds expanded sections on postinvasion Iraq, the black market in nuclear material, and other topics, tying up several loose ends from the earlier editions. Large portions remain unchanged, however, giving the book an uneven quality, as some chapters were written in 1994, some in 1999, some in 2004 and some last summer. Thomas's engrossing stories about assassinations, target surveillance and other skullduggery keep the pages turning, but the serious student of the Middle East may be put off by some purple prose, for example, about Saddam in incarceration: "His shaggy salt-and-pepper beard is trimmed once a week, enhancing his sharp, penetrating eyes.... But he will have an opportunity to state his case-more than he had ever allowed those he murdered." Skeptics will wonder what ulterior motives inspired Thomas's many tight-lipped sources to open up to him and will question their information, particularly regarding the more incredible conspiracy theories he writes about. Overall, however, Thomas provides a rare and valuable glimpse at the inner workings of a very secretive organization. (Jan.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Review by Library Journal Review
The Mossad is one of Israels elite security agencies, responsible mainly for operations outside the countrys borders. Its reputation (somewhat tarnished in recent years) for efficiency and daring combined with more than a touch of ruthlessness still evokes fear in Israels perceived enemies. Thomas, a prolific author of fiction and nonfiction on espionage and international security, has pieced together a book based largely on interviews with people both inside and outside the Mossad, as well as from other international intelligence agencies. Each chapter examines a particular action, operation, or political crisis and offers an entertaining and heavily anecdotal account. While the book is neither as scholarly in approach as Ian Black and Benny Morriss Israels Secret Wars: A History of Israels Intelligence Service (LJ 6/1/91) nor as controversial as ex-Mossad agent Victor Ostrovsky and Claire Hoys By Way of Deception (LJ 11/15/90), Thomas has a winner here. Recommended for academic and larger public libraries, especially those collecting in Israeli politics or international intelligence.Stephen W. Green, Auraria Lib., Denver (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Review by Kirkus Book Review
Forget (largely) about the ``history'' part; this is an anecdote-rich, if sometimes factually questionable, series of tales about the extraordinary derring-do of Israel's vaunted elite foreign intelligence service. Prolific British journalist Thomas (Enslaved, 1991; Chaos Under Heaven: The Shocking Story Behind China's Search for Democracy, 1991; etc.), whose 38th book this is, spent over 100 hours interviewing Mossad heads and agents, as well as others whose lives have been affected by the agency, including Yasir Arafat (a frequent assassination target before the 1993 Oslo agreement). To his credit, he delves into the organization's more significant bungled operations, including the mid-1970s killing of an innocent Arab waiter in Norway who was thought to be one of the PLO perpetrators of the 1972 Munich massacre of Israel's Olympic team. Thomas also provides readers with a good sense of how the Mossad trains its operatives in the field and of how extensively Israeli agents have infiltrated even the most apparently inaccessible parts of the Arab world. (It was a Mossad case officer in the Iraqi desert who, days before the 1991 Gulf War began, discovered that Baghdad had far more SCUD missiles in advanced positions than the CIA knew.) For the most part, though, Thomas contributes to the mythologizing of the Mossad by portraying an endlessly resourceful, often ruthless service that seems straight out of a James Bond film. How many of his tales are true? As Thomas doesn't document, aside from a short list of 'primary interviewees' and other sources, it's hard to say. Nor does he build credibility by getting certain basic facts wrong or by occasionally offering hyperventilating prose. In short, this fun read, while containing much juicy ready-for-film-adaptation material, should be approached with a skeptical eye by readers interested in serious history.
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Review by Booklist Review
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
Review by Library Journal Review
Review by Kirkus Book Review
