Suspicions are mounting that Israeli secret service agents from the Mossad were the "pirates" who stopped a Russian shipment of missiles to Iran before being arrested by Russian officials. Israel National News first published details of the episode last week.
Russia’s official account states that the Russian “Arctic Sea” ship flew the Maltese flag and carried lumber. Pirates captured the vessel on July 24, and it disappeared for several weeks until a Russian warship identified it near Cape Verde in the Atlantic Ocean off Africa’s western coast. Last week, Moscow accused eight men on the ship for piracy. The Russians claim that the men impersonated police officers when they pirated the ship near the Swedish shore.
Admiral Tarmo Kouts, a European Union expert on piracy issues and former commander of the Estonian armed forces, was quoted in the Estonian Postimees newspaper, and subsequently published by TIME Magazine Monday, said that “the official versions are not realistic.”
Russian political commentator Yulya Latynina agrees with Kouts in his denial of the official accounts. “The most likely explanation is that the Israelis intercepted this cargo, which had been meant for Syria or Iran,” the radio host of Echo of Moscow said. “They will now use the incident as a bargaining chip with Russia over weapons sales in the region, while allowing Russia to save face by taking its empty ship back home,” Latynina added.
The Russian version raises numerous questions: Why did the pirates attack the Arctic Sea if it was “only” carrying lumber, worth much less than the cargo on other ships in the area? Why didn’t the ship send a distress signal? Is there any connection to the visit of President Shimon Peres to Russia a day after identifying the ship?
The Prime Minister’s Office and the General Security Services (Shin Bet) declined to comment to Israel’s involvement in the incident. However, an August 18 statement by the office of President Peres noted that during the meeting between Peres and Russia’s President Dmitri Medvedev, the two “discussed the sale of Russian weapons and military hardware to countries hostile to Israel, including Iran.
President Peres stressed that the sale of these weapons could damage the delicate balance of power in the region and stressed that Israel has concrete proof of Russian weapons being transferred to terrorist organization by Iran and Syria, especially to Hamas and Hizbullah.