Historical Dictionary of Israeli Intelligence

group and converted to Christianity. He found a job driving a taxi

part-time. Among the faithful in the prayer group was a Colombian,

Oscar Guerrero. A free-lance journalist, Guerrero had fallen on hard

times and had taken up house painting and listening to Bible read-

ings. Vanunu told his new friend about his past job at the Dimona re-

actor and even showed him the secret photographs. Guerrero urged

Vanunu to publish them for money, hoping to make some money for

himself as well.

Guerrero approached the Sydney Morning Herald, but the newspa-

per was reluctant to pay anything for the photographs or the story. Then

Guerrero offered this material to theAgenewspaper in Melbourne, not

realizing it was in the same group as the Sydney Morning Herald. Re-

jected again, he decided to try the London papers. He put together all

the money he had, borrowed from Vanunu’s dwindling reserves, and

booked a flight to London. There he approached the Daily Mirror,

which rejected the offer. According to one version of the story, the pub-

lisher of the Daily Mirror, Robert Maxwell, was some kind of Mossad

agent with the status of “Mr. Fixit,” opening the right doors for Israel

and the Mossad at the right time. The foreign editor of the newspaper,

Nicholas Davies, was allegedly a Mossad agent as well. The two sup-

posedly decided to alert the Mossad to Vanunu. However, there is no

confirmation that these two men were Mossad agents. Be that as it may,

at that point Guerrero concluded a deal with the Sunday Times.

The Sunday Timesplanned to fly Vanunu to London, interview him

at length, and publish his story in detail. The arrangement was that af-

ter the story had been printed, Vanunu would get a £250,000 advance

on a book about Israel’s nuclear capability that he would write with one

of the newspaper’s staff. Guerrero’s cut would be 10 percent. Vanunu

flew to London and was put up in various hotel rooms. By this time the

story was on course for publication, although the Sunday Timeswas

still a long way from printing anything. British intelligence somehow

became aware of the Israeli problem with Vanunu and even proposed

help, but they requested the Mossad not to abduct Vanunu from British

soil, which would embarrass Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher.

Sunday Timesjournalists were tailed by Mossad agents, but none led

their “shadows” to Vanunu’s hotel. Finally Davies telephoned the editor

of the Sunday Times, a friend, and learned the name of the hotel where

Vanunu was staying. Thus the Mossad became aware of Vanunu’s

whereabouts, and a plan was put into action. To avoid problems with the

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