Report: Dozens of U.S. spies captured in Lebanon and Iran

[bemildred]

Xposted in LBN.

Dozens of spies working for the CIA were captured recently in Lebanon and Iran, current and former U.S. officials told The Associated Press and ABC News on Monday.

The CIA’s operations in Lebanon have been badly damaged after Hezbollah identified and captured a number of the U.S. spies, officials told The Associated Press.

Hezbollah’s longtime leader, Sheik Hassan Nasrallah, boasted on television in June that he had rooted out at least two CIA spies who had infiltrated the ranks of Hezbollah, which the U.S. considers a terrorist group closely allied with Iran. Though the U.S. Embassy in Lebanon officially denied the accusation, current and former officials concede that it happened and the damage has spread even further.

According to a report by ABC News, there were two distinct espionage rings targeting Iran and Hezbollah in which spies were recruited by the CIA.

http://www.haaretz.com/news/middle-east/report-dozens-of-u-s-spies-captured-in-lebanon-and-iran-1.396840

[BlueToTheBone]

1. oh no. n/t

[Scurrilous]

2. Terror of the CIA: Hezbollah's 'spy combat unit'

Arrest of CIA agents in Iran, Lebanon is testimony to progress made by terror group in counterintelligence. Thanks to funds from Tehran and latest technology, they can now identify, eliminate 'traitors'

http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-4151279,00.html

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"The report published on Monday, claiming that Iran and the Hezbollah have arrested 12 CIA agents in the last year is yet another testimony to the fact that the CIA's toughest adversaries, like Hezbollah and Iran, have for years been improving their ability to hunt spies, relying on patience and guile to exploit counterintelligence holes.

In 2007, for instance, when Ali-Reza Asgari, a brigadier general in the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps of Iran, disappeared in Turkey, it was assumed that he was either killed or defected. In response, the Iranian government began a painstaking review of foreign travel by its citizens, particularly to places like Turkey where Iranians don't need a visa and could meet with foreign intelligence services.

It didn't take long, a Western intelligence official told the AP, before the US, Britain and Israel began losing contact with some of their Iranian spies.

The State Department last year described Hezbollah as "the most technically capable terrorist group in the world," and the Defense Department estimates it receives between $100 million and $200 million per year in funding from Iran.

Backed by Iran, Hezbollah has built a professional counterintelligence apparatus that Nasrallah — whom the US government designated an international terrorist a decade ago — proudly describes as the "spy combat unit." US intelligence officials believe the unit, which is considered formidable and ruthless, went operational in about 2004."