JERUSALEM – More than 24 years after Palestinian military leader Khalil Ibrahim Wazir was assassinated in Tunisia, Israel has acknowledged for the first time that its spy agency Mossad carried out the killing.

Wazir, one of the founders of the Fatah Party and a top aide to the late Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat, was viewed by Israel as a terrorist and by Palestinians as a freedom fighter.

After refusing for years to confirm publicly Israel’s role in the April 16, 1988, assassination, the nation’s military censors Thursday permitted the Israeli newspaper Yediot Aharonot to publish an interview with the commander who led the secret mission. The article had reportedly been suppressed by censors for more than a decade.

Wazir, also known as Abu Jihad, was believed to have been behind numerous strikes against Israelis, including a 1978 bus-hijacking attack that killed 38 Israelis, and to have helped organize the 1987 Palestinian uprising known as the first Intifada from his base in Tunisia.

The killing was condemned by the United States and international community and was widely believed to have been carried out by Israel.

According to the report, 26 Israeli commandos from the Israel Defense Forces reconnaissance unit Sayeret Matkal participated in the attack. The mission’s commander was Nahum Lev, who died in a 2000 motorcycle accident soon after giving an interview about the operation to Israeli journalist Ronen Bergman.

 

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