ISA and Israel Police on Thursday morning announced the arrest of Refael and Lala Goliev, a 32-year-old couple from Lod, after the couple carried out acts of espionage on behalf of Iran.
During their interrogation, it became clear that Refael was enlisted by Alshaan Agayev, a 56-year-old Azeri, who is operating on behalf of Iranian parties.
As part of his activities, Refael tracked security sites in Israel, including the Mossad, and also followed an academic employed by the INSS, who Iran had marked for a physical attack. In addition, he was asked to locate a person who would serve as an assassin for the Iranian operator. Some of the activities were carried out by Rafael with the help of his wife Lala.
The State Prosecutor's Office filed an indictment against them on Thursday, with the Central District Court in Lod, charging them with operating in behalf of Iran.
The Golievs are charged with severe security crimes, aiding the enemy during wartime, and providing an enemy with information in order to harm State security. According to the ISA, Iran is working to enlist Israelis who hail from the Caucasus region.
According to the indictment, the Golievs have been in contact with two Iranian agents since 2021, and carried out many tasks for them at various times. Among these tasks was that of collecting intelligence for Iran, in order to help Iran in its war against Israel and harm the country's security.
The Golievs collected information by means of stills and video clips of strategic sites and national infrastructure. Among other sites, the couple documented the Mossad headquarters, the Moldavian Cosulate in Tel Aviv, locations near the Glilot compound, the electric company, the Haifa port, a factory in which Rafael worked, public bomb shelters in Tel Aviv, gravesites of October 7 massacre victims, and more. All of this was sent by the Golievs to their operators via Telegram and by means of a unique encryption app intended to prevent their activities from being discovered.
Rafael also acted to enlist additional operatives in order to create an organized, secret infrastructure which would carry out these tasks. He also followed an employee of the INSS, whose identity is not cleared for publication, and documented her home and car, after observing her for a period of several hours. Goliev received $600 for each day that he followed and documented her.
During this period, the operators told Goliev to ensure that their conversations would be kept secret and to act secretly in order to ensure he would not be discovered or caught. As part of this, the operators instructed him to purchase an operational phone, as well as high-quality cameras, a laptop computer, and to use an encryption program that they installed on his laptop for the purpose of passing information safely.
Rafael maintained contact with the operators for a extended period of time and even offered to help them, while receiving various payments in a way that led to the officers to hold an expectation of a long-term relationship.
According to the indictment, the couple received a sum total of $26,000. The imprisonment request notes that the couple carried out security crimes while the State of Israel is fighting one of its most difficult wars on multiple fronts, including against Iran. It also notes that they were aware of the fact that they were acting as agents for parties hostile to the State of Israel, but nevertheless continued to cooperate with those parties.
A senior ISA source said: "These events join a list of thwarted efforts revealed over the past weeks, in which Israeli citizens who acted as intelligence agents for Iran and carried out operations on their behalf were arrested. The investigations reveal, once again, the efforts of Iranian intelligence bodies to enlist and use Israeli citizens in order to advance espionage and terror activities against Israel."
A senior source in Israel Police said: "Israel Police, together with the ISA and other security bodies, will continue to act day and night to locate and thwart activities against the citizens of the State, and will act with a harsh hand ad no patience towards those criminals who have no conscience, who cooperate with the enemy and endanger the public and the State. The State of Israel's security bodies, including the ISA and Israel Police, will continue cooperation and efforts to locate Iranian operations and will act to bring to severe justice those who are involved in such activities."