Historical Dictionary of Israeli Intelligence

adherence to a mistaken Concept, namely, that Egypt would not

attempt a war without a strong air force, which was not available

in late 1973. Additionally, the senior echelons of the IDF assumed

there would be sufficient advance warning to preclude any sur-

prise. The commission also criticized the army’s state of alertness

before the war.

In the area of organization, the Agranat Commission recom-

mended, among other things, the elimination of MI’s monopoly on

the evaluation of intelligence and the establishment of so-called

pluralism in the various types of intelligence evaluations. As a con-

sequence of the interim report’s recommendation, a small research

department was set up in the Ministry for Foreign Affairs with the

aim of producing “independent political-strategic intelligence”

evaluations, and a large research department was established in the

Mossad. The commission also reiterated a recommendation made

by the Yadin-Sherf Commission (1963) that the government

should appoint an adviser to the prime minister on intelligence af-

fairs, who with a small, highly skilled staff would be able to assess

the assessors independently. This recommendation was not imple-

mented.

AHARONI, ZVI.Born in Germany as Herman Arendt, before World

War II Aharoni immigrated to Palestine and lived in a kibbutz. Dur-

ing the war he served in the British army as interrogator of prisoners

of war captured in the Middle East, and after the end of hostilities he

served in a similar position in liberated Europe. After the establish-

ment of the State of Israel in May 1948, Aharoni joined the Israeli

Security Agency(ISA) and served as an interrogator and head of the

ISA interrogation unit (1950–1960). In 1958 he attended the Reid

School in Chicago, where he studied interrogation techniques. Dur-

ing the operation for Eichmann’s Capturein 1960, Aharoni was

seconded to the Mossadand led the operation in Argentina. He also

attempted to trace the Nazi criminal Joseph Mengele, but the latter

died peacefully in Brazil in 1985.

AHITUV, AVRAHAM (1930– ). Born in Germany, Ahituv immi-

grated with his parents to Palestine in 1935 with a massive wave of

German-Jewish immigration. Ahituv joined the Israeli Security

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