Book Review: Mossad

Mossad: The Greatest Missions of the Israeli Secret Service

Book by Michael Bar-Zohar and Nissim Mishal

The Mossad is widely recognized today as the best intelligence service in the world. It is also the most enigmatic, shrouded in secrecy. This book unveils the defining and most dangerous operations that have shaped Israel and the world at large from the agency's more than sixty-year history, among them: the capture of Adolf Eichmann, the eradication of Black September, the destruction of the Syrian nuclear facility, and the elimination of key Iranian nuclear scientists.

Through intensive research and exclusive interviews with Israeli leaders and Mossad agents, authors Michael Bar-Zohar and Nissim Mishal re-create these missions in riveting detail, vividly bringing to life the heroic operatives who risked everything in the face of unimaginable danger. In the words of Shimon Peres, president of Israel, this gripping, white-knuckle read "tells what should have been known and isn't--that Israel's hidden force is as formidable as its recognized physical strength."

To lay it all on the table, I wasn't sure before starting this book if I'd even bother to read through more than one story because the book is quite intimidating in its size. But then I opened the first chapter, titled “ King of Shadows,” and was swept right up into the world of high-stake Mossad operations, led at the hands of the "legendary fighter," Meir Dagan. 

This is a nonfiction book written like a spy novel. The organization of the book is by the covert mission which makes it very easy to pick up and read a chapter at a time and put back down. I usually wanted to read the next though!