Shabtai Shavit

Shabtai Shavit was born on July 17, 1939, in Nesher, near Haifa, in pre-state Israel.[1] His father was a school principal, and his mother taught nursery school.[1] As a child, he learned Arabic from Arabs from a nearby village who came to pick olives in his family’s yard.[1]

Shavit graduated from Hebrew Reali School and served in the Israel Defense Forces’ Sayeret Matkal after the unit’s establishment.[1] He studied Middle East studies at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, earning a bachelor’s degree, and later obtained a master’s degree in public administration from Harvard University.[1] His subsequent autobiographical writing included memories of his time in the United States as a graduate student and at the CIA.[3]

Shavit joined the Mossad in 1964, beginning a career that included operational assignments and senior command positions in Israel and abroad.[1] He initially worked as an officer in Tzomet, the agency’s human-intelligence collection wing, with assignments in Iran; he also worked in Kurdistan.[4] His service ultimately lasted 32 years, including seven as director.[1]

In a 2018 interview, Shavit recalled living undercover in Iran with his wife for two and a half years beginning in 1966, posing as a Persian.[5] Their eldest daughter was born during that posting.[5] His wife, Yael, also served as a covert agent.[1] His experience in Iran preceded the Islamic Revolution of 1979 and later formed part of the background to his public discussion of Iranian strategy and Israeli security.[6]

Shavit later described his understanding of the intelligence warnings before the Yom Kippur War through a personal recollection of October 5, 1973.[4] He said that, after returning home before the fast, he asked his wife to prepare his military backpack because he expected to join the war the following morning.[4] He attributed that expectation to a substantial body of warning reports received from Mossad sources during the preceding week, none of which, he said, had come from Ashraf Marwan.[4] In his account, the Mossad passed all the information it collected to Military Intelligence, whereas Military Intelligence shared its research and assessments with the Mossad selectively.[4]

From 1978 to 1979, Shavit served as military governor of Israel’s Southern regional command.[1] He headed the Mossad’s Caesarea special-operations division from 1980 to 1985, before becoming deputy to director Nahum Admoni.[1] His deputy directorship ran from 1986 to 1989.[1] He then succeeded Admoni as director, becoming the second head of the agency, after Admoni, to have risen through its own ranks.[1]

Appointed in 1989, Shavit served as the Mossad’s seventh director until 1996.[1] His identity was not publicly disclosed while he held office, and he was publicly identified as chief only after leaving the post.[1] This made him the last director whose name remained classified throughout his tenure.[1]

His leadership coincided with the breakup of the Soviet Union and the Eastern European bloc, the end of the Cold War, and a changing international environment that included China’s opening to the world, the growing economic influence of East Asian countries, and globalization.[1] Shavit adapted the Mossad’s organizational structure, deployment, and operational doctrine to these developments.[1] The agency broadened its relations with Eastern European countries after the Cold War and expanded its ties with China and other East Asian countries.[4]

In the Middle East, Iraq’s invasion of Kuwait and the resulting United States-led coalition brought the first Gulf War into the center of the agency’s work.[1] The Mossad expanded its attention to Iraq and Iran in response to the invasion and the emergence of Iranian nuclear-development efforts.[4] Shavit’s years in office also encompassed Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir’s leadership during the Gulf War, the Oslo Accords, the peace agreement with Jordan, and the assassination of Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin.[3][7]

In his later recollections, Shavit said that the agency had long regarded Syria as Israel’s principal threat, assigning Iraq and Iran a lower priority.[5] He recalled receiving information in 1991 about Iranian missile capabilities, including a planned range of 1,300 kilometers for the Shahab-3.[5] He said this led him to conclude that the missiles could threaten Israel as well as targets nearer Iran.[5]

Shavit also oversaw an examination of the Mossad’s internal culture, values, and manpower dilemmas after taking office.[1] That process resulted in the formulation of an organizational credo and definitions of the agency’s values and culture.[1] Alongside operational and diplomatic changes, the review addressed the organization’s own understanding of its professional character and human-resources questions.[4]

His tenure included the bombings of Israel’s embassy in Buenos Aires and the AMIA Jewish community center, attacks that were blamed on Hezbollah.[7] Operations abroad widely attributed to the Mossad during his tenure included the killings of Palestinian Islamic Jihad leader Fathi Shiqaqi in Malta in 1995 and PLO intelligence aide Atef Bseiso in Paris in 1992.[2] Reflecting on his operational career in a 2017 interview, Shavit acknowledged that intelligence work involved mistakes as well as action, but said, “I don’t have a heavy conscience about even one thing I was involved in.”[8]

The Mossad under Shavit participated in the negotiations that led to Israel’s 1994 peace agreement with Jordan, building on many years of covert relations between the two countries.[1] Shavit worked to expand the agency’s covert regional relationships and its ties with Muslim-majority countries beyond the region.[4] The agreement established full diplomatic relations between Israel and Jordan and ended a state of war that had lasted nearly half a century.[2] On the day after the treaty was signed, King Hussein telephoned Shavit at home to thank him for his role.[1]

Following the Oslo Accords, the agency also pursued opportunities to strengthen relations with Muslim-majority countries in the region and farther afield.[4] One example of Shavit’s involvement in secret diplomacy was the arrangement of Rabin’s 1993 meeting with Indonesian president Suharto, following Rabin’s visit to China.[9] Shavit recalled that advance disclosure of the Jakarta stop could have prevented the Israeli aircraft from landing, making secrecy a condition of the visit.[9]

The aircraft’s cover itinerary ran from Shanghai through Azerbaijan and Nairobi to Tel Aviv, while journalists accompanying Rabin were informed of the Jakarta destination only during the flight.[9] Shavit recalled that the plane waited briefly over Jakarta for landing clearance, after which Mossad personnel entered the aircraft.[9] The meeting took place at Suharto’s home, lasted about an hour and a half, and included Shavit as Rabin’s only additional participant.[9] The visit was arranged for a Friday, with the party needing to reach Singapore before the Sabbath.[9]

During Shavit’s directorship, the Mossad helped bring more than 16,000 Ethiopian Jews to Israel.[4] His accounts of the agency’s rescue work also reached back to a 1982 operation in Sudan, before he became director.[4] He described Mossad personnel establishing a resort on Sudanese soil and presenting it as a holiday village that hosted divers.[4] Rescue operations were scheduled for periods when the resort had no guests.[4]

After leaving the Mossad, Shavit became chief executive of Maccabi Health Services, a position he held for approximately five years.[10] A photograph dated September 19, 1996, identifies him as Maccabi’s new general manager.[11] In a 2009 interview, he said that membership increased from 900,000 to 1.5 million during his time there.[12]

Shavit described Maccabi as a transition from the “bubble” of intelligence service to a school for real life.[12] He said that he eventually left because more than half his working time was consumed by lobbying government bodies and dealing with budget disputes.[12] He subsequently entered business and became involved in security-related technology companies.[12]

After the September 11 attacks, Shavit founded Athena to provide integrated security solutions for governments, public bodies, and private-sector clients.[12] He described the company’s approach as tailoring its solutions to each client’s requirements.[12] He chaired Athena Human & Technology Integrated Solutions Ltd. and also worked with the New York City Fire Department on a task force concerned with preparedness against terrorism.[10]

Shavit remained involved in Israeli public security through advisory work for the National Security Council and the Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee’s intelligence subcommittee.[10] He served as a special adviser to the investigative commission on intelligence established after the 2003 Iraq campaign, whose report appeared in 2004.[13] For many years, he was also president of the Mossad retirees’ association.[4]

He chaired the board of the International Institute for Counter-Terrorism, continuing in that role until 2023.[10] At its 16th International Conference in September 2016, he emphasized international cooperation to prevent terrorists from acquiring and using non-conventional weapons.[14] He urged participants to learn from one another and called for “common wisdom to prevail.”[14]

In a 2007 presentation to the Institute for Contemporary Affairs, Shavit argued that assessing international terrorist organizations required a different approach from assessing sovereign states.[15] He characterized such organizations as transnational and lacking the conventional hierarchies, uniforms, reporting systems, recruiting centers, and training camps associated with state forces.[15] In his analysis, conventional wars occupied limited intervals, whereas the struggle against terrorism was continuous, with threats changing location, strategy, methods, and capabilities even as intelligence organizations tried to assess them.[15]

Shavit placed particular importance on human intelligence, saying, “Human intelligence is the only form of intelligence where you can ask questions and get answers.”[15] He nevertheless emphasized the difficulty of penetrating small groups held together by family ties and religious culture.[15] Discussing the saying that 95 percent of intelligence came from open sources, he warned that media and other publicly available material could be shaped by the “spin” of politicians, businesspeople, and other interested parties.[15] In his view, access to abundant information did not eliminate the analyst’s problem of understanding the interests behind it.[15]

He advocated pre-emption rather than reaction as the principal doctrine for fighting terrorism.[15] This recommendation rested on his characterization of the conflict as ongoing, the threat as permanent, and the adversary’s intention as annihilation.[15] He argued that waiting for an attack before acting was neither strategically sound nor morally necessary.[15]

Iran occupied a substantial place in Shavit’s public assessments of security.[5][6] In his 2007 presentation, he asked whether an Iran possessing nuclear capability would act pragmatically or messianically and whether it would use that capability.[15] He argued that uncertainty about intentions did not absolve intelligence officers of preparing for the worst-case scenario, including possible Iranian nuclear use.[15]

Shavit also stressed Israel’s responsibility for its own survival, expressing distrust of relying entirely on outside assurances about restraining Tehran.[16] He stated, “When we're talking about my fate, my existence, my survival, I don't let any outside actor to handle it.”[16] In June 2015, he warned that Iran would exploit the Obama administration’s desire for a nuclear agreement to extract concessions, exhaust American patience, and weaken international vigilance concerning its nuclear program.[17]

His recommendations also included engagement with allies and caution about military action.[5][18] In a 2018 interview, he argued that Israeli leaders should have worked with the Obama administration during the nuclear negotiations, while also preparing an independent capability in case Israel was left alone.[5] He suggested that domestic opposition and economic inequality in Iran might create potential for internal upheaval.[5]

In another 2018 interview, Shavit opposed an Israeli preemptive strike on Iranian nuclear facilities except as a last resort.[18] He said such action would be justified when the intelligence community reached complete consensus that Iran was ready to attack Israel.[18] He warned of potentially severe consequences, including missile retaliation and attacks by Iranian proxies, and urged consideration of possible partners if military action became necessary.[18]

By 2020, Shavit argued that Israel could not practically prevent Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons but could deter it from using them.[6] He described deterrence as requiring a credible capacity to impose a prohibitive cost and regarded an independently pursued Iranian nuclear capability as the worst-case scenario.[6] These were his own strategic assessments and recommendations rather than statements of Israeli government policy.[6]

Shavit’s contribution to the peace agreement with Jordan formed a prominent part of his public legacy, alongside his adaptation of the Mossad to the international changes accompanying the end of the Cold War.[1] His leadership combined expansion of covert diplomatic relationships with changes to the agency’s organization, operational doctrine, and internal values.[1][4] His later work extended into healthcare administration, security technology, counterterrorism research, and advice to parliamentary and national-security bodies.[10]

His book Head of the Mossad: In Pursuit of a Safe and Secure Israel appeared in Hebrew in 2018, followed by an English edition published by the University of Notre Dame Press in 2020.[6][3] The 387-page English volume lists Rami Tal as editor and Ariel Rodal-Spieler as translator.[3] It combines autobiographical material with discussion of intelligence, national security, diplomacy, and wars.[3]

Shavit described the book as focused largely on doctrine and assessments rather than on operational memoir, and its manuscript underwent security vetting.[6] It nevertheless discusses operations he directed and includes anecdotes about his family and colleagues, as well as his experiences in the United States.[3] Its consideration of intelligence’s future role in Israel addresses Islamist terrorism and Iran, connecting his retrospective account of service with his later strategic thinking.[3]

Shavit died on September 5, 2023, aged 84, while traveling in Sicily with his wife and a group of Israelis near Mount Etna.[1][4] He suffered a heart attack, underwent resuscitation efforts, and was taken to a local hospital, where he was pronounced dead.[4] He was survived by his wife, Yael, and three children.[1]

Shavit became a public critic of Benjamin Netanyahu and participated in debates over diplomacy, intelligence practice, and the government’s judicial-overhaul plan.[2][18] His November 24, 2014, opinion article carried the title “Former Mossad Chief: For the First Time, I Fear For the Future of Zionism.”[19] In a 2017 interview, he criticized the bilateral Oslo negotiating method as an overall failure despite some limited achievements, saying, “there are no wars, but also no peace.”[8] He advocated a long-term multilateral settlement involving the United States and Arab states, with negotiations initially conducted secretly.[8]

In 2018, he criticized Netanyahu’s public presentation of Mossad intelligence about Iran, calling its use for political purposes “vulgar.”[18] He contrasted that approach with Rabin’s instruction that intelligence officials should not consider political factors, arguing that intelligence should be “sterile and completely clean.”[18] In March 2023, Shavit joined hundreds of former Mossad employees opposing the judicial-overhaul plan; the signatories held Netanyahu directly responsible for potential damage to national security.[2] His positions on Iran, pre-emption, deterrence, and negotiations remained personal political and strategic judgments, rather than official policy.[6][15]