logo
episode-header-image
Feb 2016
9m 3s

The Attempt to Kill Khaled Meshaal

Bbc World Service
About this episode

In 1997 Israeli secret agents tried to kill a Hamas leader, Khaled Meshaal, in Jordan. But they botched their assassination attempt and a diplomatic scandal followed. In February 1998 the head of Israel's secret service, Mossad, was forced to step down after an official inquiry into what went wrong. Hear from Mishka ben David, a former Mossad agent, who played a part in the events in Jordan.

Photo: Khaled Meshaal in 2003. Credit: Anwar Amro/AFP/Getty Images.

Up next
May 2023
Mallory on Everest
In 1999 the body of the legendary British mountaineer, George Mallory, was found on Mount Everest. Mallory disappeared on the mountain in 1924 after making a final push for the summit with his fellow climber Andrew Irvine. They were never seen again. Farhana Haider has been speak ... Show More
10m 6s
Feb 2020
Chairman Mao's Little Red Book
In 1966, the collected thoughts of China's communist leader became an unexpected best-seller around the world. A compendium of pithy advice and political instructions from Mao Zedong, it was soon to be found on student bookshelves everywhere.(Photo: Front cover of Mao's Little Re ... Show More
8m 58s
Dec 2016
Russia's 'Dog Man'
In November 1994, the Russian conceptual artist Oleg Kulik posed in front of an art gallery in central Moscow, naked, pretending to be a guard dog and attacking passers by. It was his way of highlighting the fact since the collapse of the USSR three years earlier, Russians had lo ... Show More
9 m
Recommended Episodes
Nov 2019
The Man With the Antidote
On this episode, the Israeli Mossad operative Mishka Ben-David is sent to the Jordanian capital of Amman to help assassinate Khaled Mashal, the political leader of the Palestinian Islamic group Hamas. But the mission doesn’t go quite as planned. Check out I Spy's merch by going t ... Show More
32m 30s
May 2021
The killing of Osama Bin Laden
It is 10 years since the al-Qaeda leader was killed. We look at the US special forces operation that finally tracked him down to a city in northern Pakistan, the 1979 siege of the Grand Mosque in Mecca, one of the events that shaped his world view; we talk to a Western-based jour ... Show More
49m 33s
Sep 2021
The killing of Ahmed Shah Massoud
On the 9th of September 2001 the Afghan fighter Ahmed Shah Massoud who led the opposition to Taliban rule, was killed by a suicide bomber. Just two days later, Al Qaeda carried out their attacks in the USA. In 2011 Louise Hidalgo spoke one of Ahmed Shah Massoud's friends who was ... Show More
9m 58s
Sep 2023
Israeli and Palestinian history
Max Pearson presents a collection of this week's Witness History episodes from the BBC World Service. It's thirty years since the Oslo Accords were signed. This agreement in 1993 aimed to bring about peace between the Israelis and Palestinians. So this week, we're bringing you st ... Show More
51m 7s
Nov 2023
Hamas’s Bloody Arithmetic
To much of the outside world, Hamas’s decision to murder hundreds of Israelis and trigger a war that has since killed many thousands of its own people looks like a historic miscalculation — one that could soon result in the destruction of Hamas itself.Hamas’s leaders, however, sa ... Show More
34m 30s
Oct 2022
The release of Gilad Shalit
On 18 October 2011, Israeli solider Gilad Shalit was freed after spending over five years in captivity in Gaza. His release was part of a controversial prisoner exchange which saw more than 1,000 Palestinian prisoners freed from Israeli jails. Alex Collins talks to Israeli spy, D ... Show More
8m 57s
May 2022
Remembering Shireen Abu Akleh: A Beloved Palestinian-American Journalist Killed by Israeli Soldiers
Shireen Abu Akleh was a trailblazing Palestinian journalist who spent decades covering Israel’s brutal military occupation of Palestine. On Wednesday, Israeli soldiers fatally shot her in the face while she was reporting on the Israeli military’s invasion of a home in the Palesti ... Show More
21m 19s
Sep 2020
Episode 2: The Mole
In 1981, the radical cleric Omar Abdel-Rahman -- known as The Blind Sheikh -- inspires the assassination of Egyptian president Anwar el-Sadat at a military ceremony. One of the soldiers present is Emad Salem. He swears revenge against the Sheikh. Cut to: 1990. Salem is retired fr ... Show More
44m 56s
Oct 2020
20th Anniversary of the 2nd Palestinian Intifada
This month marks the 20th anniversary of the start of the Second Palestinian intifada or uprising, an uprising sparked when Likud Party leader Ariel Sharon visited the Haram al-Sharif in Jerusalem under heavy guard to assert Jewish claims to the site. Party members and 1,000 Isra ... Show More
33m 34s
Nov 2023
The Arab- Israeli War: Yom Kippur War 1973
Also known as the October War and the Ramadan War, this conflict was initiated by Egypt and Syria on October 6, 1973, as a surprise attack on Israel during the Jewish holy day of Yom Kippur and the Muslim month of Ramadan. It was motivated by a desire among Arab states to regain ... Show More
39m 29s