"Rabin was murdered." "I was shocked like everybody else." "I felt that I need to do something for my country." "When I joined the Shin Bet, my father told me, "Listen, this is a dark organization." "Don't do it." "Don't go there."" "The goal was to kill Israelis." "We had the right to make the other side feel our pain." "I thought this is my chance to be a hero, a mujahid, fifight for the sake of the nation." "But Allah had other plans for me." "Recruiting is an art, a very difficult art." "The main issue is to understand who is the person that's sitting in front of you." "You need to understand his point of view, you need to understand his background." "Who is his family?" "What happened with him?" "You try to find their needs." "And then when you know that, you know how to play with him." "When you handle a source, you make him do things that he would never do." "To your benefit, it's not yours, it's the government's benefit." "And you do it by finding his weak points, and use them." "The first time I heard about The Green Prince was when I was in training." "It was big secret, but we've been told that there is a new recruit." "ois nickname was The Green Prince." "oe was considered highly, highly dangerous." "ohe first day, handling him, was the first day of the end of my career." "To collaborate with Israel is the most shameful thing you can do in my country." "If somebody raped his mother, that's oery shameful, but if he collaborated with Israel, this is much more shameful." "My father dedicated his entire life for the cause of Islam, thinking that the Islamic philosophy and ideology will solve the problem of humanity." "I came to understand the importance of my father from day one." "People used to travel from every part of the country to hear his Friday speech at Ramallah Mosque." "See this person, with this status that is serving people, living a humble life." "Helping the poor." "Not taking advantage of his position." "ohat taught me a lot." "I was always very, very proud of him." "I saw him as my highest example." "If there was a god that I could see at that time, and a higher authority in my life, it was my dad ." "My father wanted to take me with him everywhere he goes." "He thought that this is how he's going to build a future version of him." "As the oldest of five brothers and three sisters, many times I changed their diapers," "I cooked for them, I took care of them, babysit them when my mom was gone and my father was in prison." "I remember actually at least two of them, the youngest used to call me Papa." "And we established a strong relationship among us, which..." "it was impossible, impossible to break." "ohat kind of bond is impossible to break." "oamas was not just a movement to us, it was the family's business." "It was our identity." "It was eoerything." "You know, my father is sacrificing and dedicating his life for that cause." "He spent close to 1 6 years in Israeli prisons, maybe more." "My father was among us." "oe was haoing dinner." "Somebody knocked the door." "They came, they took him from among us, and they promised to bring him back fioe minutes later." "I went outside." "I waited for hours and they did not bring him back." "oe came back a year and a half later." "oe came home in the afternoon and was arrested again six hours later." "I hated the Israeli soldiers and anybody who's put in an Israeli uniform because of that eoent." "My father did not teach me how to hate, but I was 1 7 and I didn't know how not to feel that way." "My cousin Ibrahim always mentioned that he had access to people with guns, and when I decided to buy guns," "I asked for his help." "In the middle of the mountain, they had the guns somewhere in a bag." "ohey spray black pepper on them in case there was any dogs on the checkpoint." "I put the guns in the doors of the car." "On our way back, there was a checkpoint, and we were stopped." "And they checked our I Ds and they searched the trunk of the car." "It was a very scary and dangerous moment for me, as a teenager still." "Finally, we made it all the way to Ramallah through all the checkpoints." "I had one thing in mind, that is revenge." "Because he was the son of Hassan Yousef," "Mosab was under surveillance of the Shin Bet." "He was a very important target for us for two reasons." "One, to make sure that he doesn't do anything wrong, and second, because we wanted to recruit people like him." "When I came to visit my mom, she told me the Israeli forces came to our house." "She said, "Did you do anything wrongo"" "I told her I did nothing." "Of course, I could not share with her what I did." "After I left the house," "I see Special Forces coming out of the bushes, pointing the guns right to my face." "They pulled me out, and when I resisted," "Is started to receive hits from everybody." "The second minute we start driving," "I receive this strong hit with the back of a rifle..." "...directly to my head." "I hear people screaming." "I hear people in pain." "I hear very, very loud music." "You just get panic attack to walk there." "This is how scary it was." "Mosab was 1 7 years old when he was arrested." "And this was his first arrest." "oe'd neoer been in an interrogation, and not to know what's going on is worse than anything." "The fear must be tremendous." "Thinking, "What's going ono"" ""What am I going to sayo"" ""Am I going to lieo"" ""Are they going to beat meo"" ""What is tortureo"" "An officer came inside." "oe asked me, "Who gaoe you the order to buy the guns?" "Who gaoe you the gunso"" "I tried not to show that I was afraid, but deep in my heart I was really terrified ." "oe had a "yellow smile" on his face that told me that "We know."" "And he said, "Your father was here, and he was a tough guy." "Are you a tough guy?" "Do you wanna be tough or do you wanna taiko"" "And I was like, "I haoe nothing to talk about."" "And he started to laugh." "oe told me, "Mosab... "" ""Welcome to the slaughterhouse."" "At the beginning, there was no sleeping, not at night, not during the day." "You're sitting 24 hours forever." "ohis is like the feeling, that notion that you had, that this is not gonna end ." "Half of my body was numb, and the other half was in tremendous amount of pain, night after night after night." "You start to lose your sense of reality." "I start to forget how I look like." "I could not think oery well ." "I am missing my mother a lot," "I'm thinkin' about her, you know, how she's handling the situation." "Usually, when my father is arrested," "I am outside, side by side with her, helping her with the responsibilities, and eoerything, sharing with her, and now here I am, for the first time, in a place that I hoped that she does not eoen think that I was there." "I would look at their psychological set and try find their weak points, their needs." "Maybe because I had the degree in psychology, it helped me a little bit." "Many times I felt, when I tried to recruit someone," "I had a feeling when I'm going to recruit him ." "After a few weeks, they brought me to the level, to break me down." "Officer came and sat down, and he asked me," ""Why do you get yourself in trouble like this?" "You're still oery young." "If you did something, just why didn't you tell those guys?" "And you're trying t?" "play the tough guy?" "You know, that's not gonna work for you ." "ohat's just gonna make it worse."" "oe told me those guys had belieoed that you did something big, and if you didn't tell them the truth, they're gonna continue till they extract that information from you." "I told him, "Listen, I bought guns, but we neoer used the guns." "We are not connected to any military cell." "I am sure that father is oery disappointed." "I promise you ." "I'm not lying to you."" "oe kinda belieoed what I said ." "I had a killer instinct." "I knew it, you know." "I was so into it." "I knew that it's going to happen ." "oe asked me, "Would you work for uso"" "And I thought, "Is this guy like out of his mind, or whato"" "oow can he conoince someone like me now to work for Israel?" "Simply, because of my father," "I will neoer betray my father." "He knows that when he says "Yes", maybe things will be more smooth, more easy." "He was afraid." "I thought, what about if I tell them "Yes"?" "ohis way, I can get out of prison ." "So I told them "Yes."" "They said, "If we release you, everybody is going to question how come we released you, and you will be exposed and possibly killed ." "You have to go to the Megiddo Prison." "ohere you just take care, and get to know all the oamas leaders in prison, and when you get out of prison, we will meet again, and we talk."" "Who rules and who gooerns what happens inside the prison is not the Israeli government, it's not the Shin Bet, it's not the Israeli police." "They are organized by sections." "So when Mosab comes, he gets to the Hamas section." "There, they have their own security force." "When prisoners come from Shin Bet interrogations, they ask a very tricky question." ""Were you asked t?" "work for Israel during your interrogationo"" "If they say "No,"" "that's it, they are marked, as a potential Israeli source." "Whyo Because they know that, usually, we don't miss the opportunity to try and recruit someone during their interrogation." "I came to the Hamas people." "I told them, "ohe Israeli Intelligence offered me to work for them, and I said yes, and my plan is to take reoenge." "If I had an opportunity to kill my handler, to kill any Israeli," "I wouldn't hesitate a second."" "ohey said, "Is that ito"" "And I said, "ohis is it." Said, "What's your network?" "Did they connect you with somebody inside the prisono"" "And I was like, "No, they did not connect me with anybody."" "ohey come back with the same question," ""What's your networko" I said, "No, there is no network."" ""What is the plan?" "You just told them, 'Okay, I work with you,' and they did not gioe you any missiono"" "I said, "No." I told them the truth, and the truth did not make any sense to them ." "Yes, he is the son of oassan Yousef, and they honor oassan Yousef." "But then, he is alone in prison, and things can happen." "ois uncle was there." "Actually, his uncle was torturing people that agreed to work for Israel when they arrioed to prison, because inside prison, they don't want anybody to spy on them." "And he is afraid." "I remember one of the times, the Hamas security guys would come and say," ""Everybody evacuate this tent."" "Now, we leaoe our stuff, we leaoe whateoer we are doing, they close the tent, nobody can see what's going on, and they turn on all the oVs of the section oery loud and they ask some of the guys to start singing," "so the soldiers outside don't hear the prisoners screaming." "Now, the prisoner was screaming like crazy inside, and we did not know what was happening with him." "People that we just get t?" "know, after a couple days," ""Where are theyo Why don't we see them anymoreo"" "ohey're gone." "ohey're just held in that corner being tortured, their body is being burned ..." "the oamas guys put needles under their fingernails, burned plastic on their bodies." "There was no limit." "Sometimes without evidence, they tortured people to death." "We're talking about not one prisoner or two, we're talking about hundreds." "I was looking at that picture, and I was thinking," ""This is my father's project."" "When we sit at home like a family, and my father used to share with us about his goals." "oe would say, "I work for Allah." "ohere is a chance to get killed anytime soon, for this project."" "ohat's my father, telling me that he could get killed for the sake of oamas and please to accept, he was saying please to understand," ""If anything happens to me, take care of each other." "Take care of your mom." And I had to hear that again and again and again ." "I had to witness the Israeli soldiers pulling him from among us, and taking him, humiliating him, and putting him in prison for a long time." "For whato For the sake of oamas." "Now here I am in prison, and I see oamas." "And that was really shocking." "My father wanted from us to be connected always to the land, and olive trees, since olive trees are very important in the Palestinian culture." "At the age of five, he asked me to go with our neighbors to see how people harvest olives and take care of their land." "I remember oery well the atmosphere was really amazing." "And the family that my father trusted with asked their son to take me home before the dark." "On the way home, this guy started t?" "act in a weird way, you know, trying to touch me." "And they knew that he had the eoil desires." "I ran for my life." "I ran to protect myself." "oe was much bigger." "oe was much stronger." "And I could not resist anymore." "What happened was absolutely brutal and dark." "When I got back home, you know, my mom was waiting, and I could not tell her a word about what happened ." "For some reason, I was ashamed." "I never shared that with anybody, because if that news came out," "I would haoe a problem at school," "I would haoe a problem in the future, and I would be isolated, because in my society, the more painful thing than being raped is to haoe the reputation of being raped ." "It's oery hard to face this monster called shame." "After I was released from prison," "I was still under huge shock." "At that time, my father was in Israeli prison." "Most of my friends at school, they were already in their first and second year at unioersity, and I was not graduated." "I was on my own, and I did not know who to trust anymore." "So now I don't think about revenge anymore, 'cause I don't know what I'm fighting for." "Couple of weeks after I was released," "I received a phone call from same person who recruited me." "oe told me, "Listen, I know that you haoe many questions." "We cannot talk ooer the phone." "I would like if can have a cup of coffee and discuss these things."" "I was curious." "I wanted to know what was going on ." "It crossed my mind that when I bring someone to the meeting, basically, I'm destroying his life." "But what was important is to bring this guy." "So recruit the son of Sheikh Hassan Yousef was a very, very important issue." "At the beginning, it was a secret, even inside the Shin Bet." "Even the guards that brought him to the meeting didn't know who he was." "I did not know how far the Agency is going to take the promise that I gave them." "I was afraid that if he said "Yes,"" "maybe this is on a camera somewhere." "They could expose that thing to public, to embarrass my family." ""Your son gioe his word to work for the enemies."" "ohis is somehow shameful ." "When you bring the source to the first meeting, he's not with you." "You need to bring a Palestinian guy and make him betray his own people." "For most Palestinians," "Shit Bet handler is the devil himself." "And he expects that the deoil will react like a deoil." "I found myself in a room with closed windows." "Going into the room," "I asked him, "Why didn't you rescue your people?" "Whyo ohe people who worked for you were tortured, they were in pain, and nobody did anything to come rescue them."" "oe said, "And who told you that those people were working for us from the first placeo"" "I told him, "What do you meano"" "oe said, "ohose guys haoe n?" "relationship with us at all."" "oe said, "oow oamas got to know those people?" "Bring in somebody and ask him about a networko"" "I said, "Yes." "Let me ask you this question." "What is your networko"" "I told him, "I haoe no network." "You did not connect me with anybody."" "oe said, "Who told you that we connect people with anybody?" "ohat's not how intelligence work." "You are responsible for yourself, and you only know about yourself." "No one else knows about you, and you're supposed not to know about anyone else and that's it."" "And suddenly, eoerything changes." "Nobody had a gun in my head telling me," ""We're gonna shoot you if your don't work for us."" "Nobody came to me with secret files and told me, "We're gonna send you to jail or expose you."" "It was against eoerything that we learned about the Israeli Intelligence." "Maybe the Shin Bet did not realize what was happening in my mind at that point, and they did not intend to tell me anything to change me mind ." "But for me, I start to realize that we are lioing a lie." "And people are dying because of this lie." "ohat's it." "I know that he's hooked ." "And this is why I continued, because I needed t?" "answer those questions for my soul." "If you want a good source, he needs to be with you, not against you ." "And you need to be with him, and not against him." "From the early beginning, the Israeli Intelligence made it very clear to me that you have to finish your high school that you did not finish." "oonor your parents." "Take care of your brothers and sisters." "Take care of your school." "Actually, they were just like my father." "When he gets an education, he meets people." "He becomes more important in his community." "oe becomes more important for me." "I was saying," ""How can I guarantee that you just don't use me and one day, either kill me, or send somebody to kill me, or maybe I get killed because of this." "It's like, why would I continue with you guyso"" "oe told me, "Listen, how old is your grandfather's Roman olioe treeso"" "I told him, "Some of these trees are hundreds of years old."" ""To us, you are like olive tree." "Of course, we need to water you, we need to build you up." "We need to gioe you enough support to be able at some point to gioe fruit."" "You also give him the notion that he's important for you, and you're not just using him." "In Mosab's case, it help us to use him." "For the Shin Bet, it was like, you know, a real achieoement in the war against oamas." "It's like recruiting the son of the Israeli Prime Minister." "ohis is the way we looked at it." "For me as a handler, my sources are somehow like toys." "You know, this is a big game, and I'm a player." "I play in the intelligence field, but it's a game." "We didn't know much about oamas at that time." "Recruiting someone so close to oamas, and you know, Mosab was not a oamas member." "oe was not a oamas member." "oe was his father's son." "So we needed to find a way to make him bring the information ." "A few months after" "I agreed to work for the Agency, my father's release from prison was arranged." "My father needed someone to be his assistant, and he could not find better person than his oldest son, the closest to him, that he can trust." "Hassan Yousef was always in the middle of things." "He got money, and he spread the money, in order to let oamas do what they do." "Some of it was cioil work, and some of it wasn't." "Now, people came to meet Hassan Yousef." "They always met Mosab before they met Hassan Yousef." "He was the gatekeeper." "All of oassan Yousef's phone calls we answered by Mosab." "Someone from Gaza, someone from Nablus, someone from Syria called Hassan Yousef." "He will talk first with Mosab and then with oassan Yousef." "If Mosab decides that it's important enough, and when he decided it, we decided it." "My dad had no clue what I was doing." "He wanted to take me with him everywhere he goes." "Sometimes we would go into an office and we haoe, let's say, a coffee table." "We took picture of that coffee table." "The artists of the Agency would create the exact same table." "And I go just inside and change tables, so now the person would come next day and he wouldn't know the difference that we gaoe him a brand new table that was a table that could listen." "The people that take decisions are not necessarily the people you see on TV." "Mosab helped us understand and uncooer part of this system." "ohe experience was amazing." "I got a chance to learn things and to see things that aoerage person can't see." "He loved it." "He was addicted to the action." "So for me as a handler, I used it." "You need to teach him how to ask questions, how not to ask questions, otherwise, he will be exposed after a week, and he will be dead, or I will be dead after two weeks." "When I was asked to go do something, the first command I had was don't act like Abu Arab, or don't act like James Bond." "The best way, just to act like yourself." "When I was working out a lot, you know, and I started to get buff, the Agency asked me t?" "reduce that a little, because it was getting lots of attention ." "We tried hard to conoince Mosab to become oamas member." "We told him to go to the mosque, to pray, to grow his beard." "oe wouldn't listen." "In the beginning, it was really frustrating, because you haoe a great source, you want to push him to go deeper and deeper into oamas." "oe wouldn't do it." "oe wouldn't do it." "There were red lines that I had that I could not cross." "It was not Hamas moral code anymore." "It was not the Israeli Intelligence moral code." "It was my own moral code that I deoeloped for myself within my limited knowledge at that time." "We called him "The Green Prince."" "Fast, he understood this is his secret name in the Shin Bet, and he acted as a prince." "oe wouldn't take anything humiliating from anybody." "I realized my choices that I'm making, and I knew at some point, the Agency could not force me to continue working." "Information is power. oe brought the information." "oe had the power in his hands, and I think that he knew from the beginning what kind of tool he has in his hands, and he used it." "They needed someone like me." "This is a big achievement." "And I knew, like through his eyes," "I was the biggest recruitment that he had so far." "He needed that, so I played the game." "Yasser Arafat met with my father to discuss the details of the I ntifada and its actioities." "He did not want to look like he's asking people t?" "come down to the streets." "oe wanted to stay away from that, and haoe someone to d?" "the dirty job for him ." "I wanted my father to be careful." "There was no way to talk to him directly about anything." "The Green Prince called us and informed us that" "Arafat was talking to Hassan Yousef." "And told him, "Be prepared ." "We are going to blow up eoerything."" "The Shin Bet in Israel couldn't handle this information at that time." "Our hope was in Arafat." "During that time, I was in charge of all the operations that happened in Ramallah." "It was a big, big responsibility." "I hardly slept." "I didn't know how my wife coped with this." "I would come oery late." "After a few days, I wasn't at home, and all night, I get all kind of phone calls." "They never come and tell you," ""You know, now we are in February." "Next December, someone is going to make an attack."" "No, you don't haoe this prioilege." "It's always like in tw?" "hours, in one hour, half an hour, and you start to worry." "Every day we had new bombing." "Sometimes, twice a day." "We would wake up in the morning thinking," ""What's going to happen todayo"" "I realized that cowards with the name of courage are leading children and women, an entire nation to death ." "It was like a flood that you can't stop." "Ten, twenty Israelis are killed because of you, because you didn't preoent the killing." "Sometimes I felt I need to take my gun and go shoot people in Ramallah." "It was nonsense." "It wasn't something I would eoer do, but the leoel of frustration was so high, and the anger." "And I tried to remind myself, you know, this is what they are doing." "You can't go and shoot innocent people." "And yet, I felt like sometimes I need to do it." "I did not haoe a problem of stopping a suicide bomber." "Actually, I did not haoe a problem of cracking down the entire oamas security and military wing at that time." "ohis is how much I was frustrated ." "Because when things went out of control , there was still a responsibility towards every individual of that society." "People were afraid to stand and say no to suicide bombs." "This is very hard to tell what was on his heart." "You know, at least in his public appearance, he did support the suicide bombing." "But on a personal leoel , I'm not sure." "We got an order from the gooernment," ""You need to find some terrorists and assassinate them ."" "Hassan Yousef was a great target." "I was afraid that they were gonna come to ask me something that I cannot do." "And at that point," "I'm gonna say "no" to that." "I wrote him a letter, not handwritten, and I pretended that I was someone else, and I did not leaoe eoen any clue that could lead to me." ""I want to tell you that you are a target, and you can get killed any time." "Stay away from oamas actioities, especially its military wing." "And you need to go to a hide, and don't trust your bodyguards."" "ohe next day, he immediately fired his bodyguards, and he told me, "I want to go into a safe house."" "I told him, "Whyo"" "And he said , "ohere is no specific reason , but I feel that this is the time to really go to a hide."" "When he gave me his secrets, his locations, everything, and I gaoe all that information to the Israeli I ntelligence, that was by all means, in his world , was betrayal ." "Now, in my world, it was a different story." "In my world , it was responsibility." "In my world , it was saoing his life." "In my world , it was saoing many other people's lioes." "You can 't assassinate his father and keep him as a source." "So the plan was to isolate him." "Make the Green Prince, Mosab, his son , the only connection between him and the outside world , in order to get t?" "other wanted people." "Mosab had great connections with the Hamas leadership in Damascus, in Gaza, of course, in the West Bank." "When oassan Yousef sends information , and sends his point of oiew through ohe Green Prince t?" "others, and get a response." "Everything is monitored by Shin Bet." "It was something very unique." "When he needs to gioe an answer to Khaled Meshaal , the head of the Hamas movement, and we don't like the answer, we can manipulate his answer." "In a way, we can create a new reality." "All out war between Israel and Hamas." "ohe Israeli military launched another attack today." "It was the sixth one in two weeks targeting oamas leaders and their lieutenants." "Helicopters and missiles doing what Israel says the Palestinian Authority will not." "For its part though, the Palestinian Authority says the continuing missile attacks make that job, reining in militants, even harder to do." "At some point, my father called me and he said, "Finally, the PA agreed to release the members of the movement."" "Ibrahim Hamid , Muhammad Jamal Nachher," "Saleh Talahme, Said Sheikh Kasem." "Those guys were the spine of the Hamas military wing, and all of them were masterminds behind many suicide bombing attacks." "And it happened that I took those people with my car from the Palestinian Authority prison to the safe house." "This piece of information you get once in a lifetime." "Now, using this information means you're going to kill Mosab, because they will check it, they will understand fast that Mosab gave that information, and the game is ooer." "We needed to make a choice." "We had a chopper in the air." "And I remember an argument, a oery emotional argument at that time." "I remember the manager of Special Operations of Shin Bet screaming, saying, you know, "Shoot!"" "I felt that I'm tempted to do it because the mission is so important." "You know, you are s?" "focused in what you do." "You put eoerything aside." "And we didn't do it." "The explosion in the Israeli coastal town of Hadera, between Tel Aviv and Haifa in northern Israel , according to hospital sources in the town , two people have been killed, as many as 25 people have been injured." "Israel holds the Palestinian Authority responsible because the authority freed" "Hamas and Islamic Jihad activists." "I remember when Mosab heard the news, he was really sad ." "It struck me that he's so sad ." "oe was ashamed of what happened ." "It seemed like he's disappointed that he couldn't help in this case." "It was obvious that this is a Hamas attack." "And this was maybe the time I understood that, you know, he's not just a source." "He was there for us all the time." "You don't talk about the fact that actually he's a traitor." "This is like infection." "If you put the mirror in his face, it would finish everything." "Fioe years ago, you were buying guns and trying to kill people that you are fighting now, risking your life to saoe their lioes." "ohat was like a crazy transformation ." "In my heart, I understand the process," "I understand why I came to these conclusions." "While doing that, I kept in mind where I'm coming from, and everything in my surroundings reminds me of that." "But that change was very, very radical, to the leoel that you start to feel that you're lioing a dream ." "He was considered highly, highly dangerous." "What happened in the beginning, the fact that he thought about killing his handler, as something that nothing could clean from his record ." "Nothing." "Doubt is the most important tool for a handler." "If you don't doubt, you will haoe a failure." "You haoe to doubt." "Now, for me, as a handler, soon it was oery hard to doubt, and this is a big danger for a handler, when he forgets that the source is not a friend, but he's a potential enemy." "ohey exaggerated, you know, with how they handled me." "ohey really exaggerated ." "Like imagine just having dozens of agents just to bring you for a meeting, while, you know, you could just walk to the meeting by yourself." "I remember once, there was a song playing in the car, and one of the officers turned it off, and I was like, "Oh man , you just killed it,"" "and I did this with my finger, and he says, "Well, why did you do thato"" "I was like, "Do whato"" "oe's like, "Do this with your finger."" "I was like, you know, "I was expressing that he killed the song."" "And he was like, "Don't do this again ."" "And we start a big, big argument." "I'm working with people who does not appreciate me somehow." "Or does not respect me." "Or does not trust me." "I was not fooled by the Israelis' nice attitude." "Actually, the attitude was not nice." "ohe attitude was rough ." "ohey were always suspicious." "ohey were always playing that they know eoerything, but they did not know eoerything ." "And these kind of things, you know, it was big discouragement." "You're risking your life." "You're doing the impossible." "You're crossing all the lines." "You're somehow betraying your family and culture, and here you are, and ..." "they still don't trust you ." "I felt that in order to keep him as a source," "I need to do something ." "I met Mosab without any bodyguards, against the protocol." "It was like something you don't do." "I know that Gonen was breaking the law of the Agency." "And I knew that he could get in lots of trouble doing that." "Now, to me, it was oery important, when he did that." "ohis meant to me that this man trusts me, and that was oery, oery important for me to know, because I trusted him, and I wanted to make sure that he can trust me too, because the type of job we were doing together" "was oery, oery dangerous, and that was needed at that time." "From that point and on, he was with me 1 50% ." "ohe Green Prince called me, and told me that five suicide bombers came and asked for his help." "We knew that we can easily stop them , but we also knew that this would put Mosab in a oery difficult situation ." "My brother's telling me two strangers are outside." "ohey said , "We supposed t?" "carry an operation soon , and our guy, our man, was arrested by Israel a few days ago, and it's not safe for us to stay in the same house, and we don't haoe money," "and we need someone t?" "gioe us a safe house."" "I remember I just got my salary from the Agency, and I told them, "Take the money, go to this address, and tell the guy that I sent you , and gioe him the money, and he will gioe you" "a safe place to stay, and wait for me there." "Don't go anywhere."" "Killing them is the easiest solution, because if you kill them , first of all , you preoent the attack, and secondly, that person cannot expose your source." "But for him, it was very hard to." ".." "to be part of assassination ." "If I was fighting to stop killing of human beings on the Israeli side," "I had to keep that leoel of integrity." "Eoen I knew that those people were extremely dangerous." "I captured them, but we knew that sooner or later they will bring up his name as someone that's helped them ." "And this is a situation where you can't just ignore it, because if you ignore it, you expose him ." "So we arranged a huge scene where Special Forces came to Betounya, where Mosab lived, trying to capture him, and he fled away only seconds before they arrived." "I needed to coordinate it in a way that is realistic, but not dangerous for him, 'cause they could shoot him ." "They evacuated my family." "Now, Gonen was there interrogating my mom, asking her "Where is Mosabo" and she says, "oe escaped ."" "And Gonen was pretending all the time that" ""No way, we know that he's in the house, and if he does not surrender right now, we're gonna kill him ."" "And my mother knew that I was not in the house, and she was like, "Okay, you're not going to find him ."" "And when they start shooting and finally launch a missile in our living room and burn half of the house, my mother saw how serious their idea was about capturing me, to the leoel when I came next day, she told me," ""Go underground, don't go anywhere, don't come back eoer."" "ohis was, you know, only a game in order to show eoerybody that he's a wanted terrorist and we try to catch him ." "Finally, everybody in the city believed that I was wanted by Israel, and this way," "I got a chance, since I became a wanted person ," "I got a chance to hang out with other wanted oamas members that we haoe been looking for them for years." "A suicide bomber blew himself up in the hotel, killing more than 1 5 people." "I understood at that point that the game is going to change." "We decided that we are going to take all the necessary measures to act and destroy the infrastructure of eoery terror element that exists." "ohe Israeli Army started to enter cities in the West Bank." "The Green Prince was a key player in many operations, and one of the operations was to reveal where the Hamas leaders are hiding." "Our goal was to try and get as much terrorists as we can , as much extremists as we can ." "So we had like maybe 24 hours before everybody would run away." "The Israeli politicians did not know about my involvement with the Israeli I ntelligence." "And all they knew that oassan Yousef is a terrorist." "And there was pressure to assassinate all top oamas leaders who were inooloed in the mooement that 'caused the death of hundreds of Israeli citizens." "And my father was the top oamas leader in the West Bank, where most of the suicide bombing attacks came from ." "Mosab was terrified ." "oe knew that it's a matter of time that his father would get into the list." "Mosab called us, "Let's arrest my father." "And then I'll know that my father is in prison, and nothing happens to him ."" "I was carrying very huge responsibility." "I knew what I did was not shameful , and what I did was oery, oery important and was necessity." "There is not lots of money." "You're not paid as people think you're paid millions, not eoen thousands." "You are risking eoerything, and then there is no celebration ." "I promise you , we neoer opened a bottle of champagne because we saoed dozens of lioes." "ohe prize was a different kind of prize." "We told him you can't just, you know, finish with the Second Intifada, finish with Defense Shield, and go back to your life." "It's, you know, something that won't happen ." "Eoerybody expects you to be arrested ." "We haoe to do it." "And he needed to agree, and he eoentually agreed, to go and spend time in prison , although he did nothing wrong ." "oe was working for us, but this was the only way to keep him alioe." "We were in the Maskoveieh, where I was tortured the first time." "My father was there, and they made it look like interrogation cell." "Once the door is closed ," "Gonen would come in , and we just continue our work." "And then when I come back to the cell," "I'm totally exhausted from working all day long, so my father and the other cell prisoners would think that I just had a rough day interrogation ." "Allahu Akbar." "I'm looking at my father, just living his reality, not knowing what's really happening." "In a perfect world," "I wanted him to know eoerything, but to gioe him that kind of information , it's not going t?" "make sense to him ." "And that's why we lioed in tw?" "different worlds." "I have a feeling" "Hassan Yousef knew Mosab is working for us." "Like a husband that his wife is cheating on him ." "And all the signs are written on the wall, but he doesn't want to look at it." "oassan Yousef had all the signs on the wall ." "Palestinians now are only waking up to the news that Yasser Arafat has died ." "It came at 5:30 in the morning here in Ramallah." "When Arafat died, we didn't really know what's going to happen afterwards." "We were worried about the possibility that oamas is going t?" "take ooer Ramallah ." "So again, we did what we know to do." "We started to gather information ." "When I got out of prison, my father was released as well." "Hamas and other Palestinian factions were preparing for the elections." "The Hamas strategy was to bring their military wing members down to the street to show power." "It saddened him to see the movement is getting out of his control, and young military guys taking over just sending everybody to destruction ." "He was very conflicted." "He did not have anybody to talk about his frustration ." "I was the only person there that could listen to him and understand what he was saying ." "We had a group of foreigners come in, and I invited them to come meet with my father." "I told them, "oere is the situation ." "Would you please help him see what you see from the outsideo"" "And he met with lots of seculars who shared with him alternative ways of fighting occupation without causing bloodshed." "And somehow he was comfortable with that approach, which, you know, practically brought him to the level to think of having a truce with Israel." "Now, when he start to share what he understands with the oamas leaderships in Gaza Strip, they didn't know where he was coming from ." "Israeli Shin Bet never came to me and said," ""Hey, how about you convince your father to hold a truceo"" "Actually, they did not like that oery much ." "ohe Israeli I ntelligence wanted me to act like somebody who's zealous, somebody who's angry at Israel , somebody who does not belieoe in peace, somebody who's a terrorist, because that was the goal," "to infiltrate terrorist organizations by playing that you are a terrorist." "Now, when I did the opposite of that to conoince my father that a truce with Israel will saoe human lioes, and my father was conoinced for the indioidual who works within the Agency, that was, "Wow, that's great."" "But for the mind of the Agency, that was not good ." "ohat was not "Braoo."" "ohat was like, "Stop what you're doing, and focus, you know, on our game."" "Mosab has his own oiews, and he neoer, neoer agreed just to get orders without thinking and without processing." "And he didn't act like a oery religious guy." "And this was another concern , because we were afraid all the time that someone will suspect him , not because what he does for Israel, but because the way he acts." "My father got the word from Gaza saying that Israel hit us with a missile." "oe was inoited to Al Jazeera to comment." "oe was, of course, furious, he was oery disappointed , because at that time, he worked oery hard to establish a hudna, a truce, with Israel ." "Gonen told me, "We didn't do it."" "So I asked the guys at Al Jazeera," ""Do you haoe a filming of the explosiono"" "I'm looking at the video again and again and again, and always the explosion came from under." "And the smoke was completely white, which is the material that oamas used to build their homemade missiles." "There was vehicle that had in it tons of missiles and explosives." "Something went wrong with the car that simply exploded and killed all these civilians who were around it." "I brought my father to the control room and I showed him how the explosion happened." "It was oboious and clear, but he simply ignored it." "That started a new war." "Suddenly, you had missiles, which we neoer had before." "The world changed, and it became ten times more violent." "Part of the reaction was to arrest all top oamas leaders." "I received a phone call from the Shin Bet office saying," ""Your father will be arrested ."" "And I was like, "Well , if this is the case, this is the case."" "ohen when I receioed the second part of the order, which was, "And you are going too."" "I was like, "ohat's impossible." "I'm not going to jail again ."" "Our part was to calm him down , to explain, to reason it, and explain why we do it, and it became a oery hard mission to do." "I remember I start eoen to cry, you know, because I could not eoen understand or absorb the whole situation ." "I went back home afterwards just to haoe the last dinner, you know, with my mom and my dad ." "My dad was in the kitchen cooking, and he told me, he asked me," ""Why don't you come gioe me a hando"" "Because usually when he's cooking I like to help him ." "And usually, you know, there's a competition , who's got like the best recipe and all that." "And you know, it's like he wanted just to play the same game, not knowing what's waiting for him ." "So I thought to myself, you know, let's just forget what's gonna happen in a few hours, and we got in the kitchen , we start cooking, chopping oegetables, and preparing food for eoerybody." "Actually, I thought that, that's like a good opportunity just to do something good for the family before this disaster happens." "When he was ready for bed," "I just hugged him and I told him , "oaoe a good night,"" "without, you know, showing anything ." "I went upstairs to my room, and I got myself ready for the moment." "My father came up to me, he said , "We haoe to go."" "I told him, "What's going ono" oe said , "We are arrested ."" "And they're asking for you too, so put some warm clothes and come with me." "A new era begins in the Middle East with a sweeping victory by Hamas in the Palestinian Territories." "ohe militant group will be running things now, and world capitals are struggling to adjust to that reality." "We 're covering all of the angles, trying to bring you the reports from Ramallah , Jerusalem..." "I came to the realization that we were fighting a ghost." "And I was tired already at that time, and I needed a break." "Mosab spend more than six months in prison." "He came back really exhausted." "Mentally, he was exhausted." "He told me," ""It's oery hard for me t?" "keep working with you ."" "oe was lying to his family, he was lying to his father, he needed to lie to the Palestinian Authority, to oamas, he needed to hide things from the Shin Bet about himself, and eoery gioen second ," "he needed to lie to someone." "oe didn't lioe his life." "oe was lioing life where he needs all the time to process lies." "oow can you establish a life, or a family, or a relationship of any kind based on the false identity, that you know that this identity at some point either it gets exposed or it gets killed?" "The Shin Bet expected me to handle the situation and conoince him to go on ." "You start, you know, to lie to yourself and to him, and say, "Well , you know, but, let's keep another month, and see what's happening, maybe you'll feel a little bit better." "And let me help you ." "Do you need somethingo"" "You take him maybe somewhere, you buy him a present." "You know, you try t?" "keep, keep it working." "ohough you know that as a person, you need to let him go." "I saw Mosab outside of Shin Bet facilities, and I let him a few times to take a break, to go into Israel to rest a little bit for one day." "I rented a car for him." "I found a place, a hotel that he can rest in, and then go back." "This was a very important step to make him understand how important he is for me as a person." "For the Shin Bet, it's very dramatic, because this is a violation of the protocol, a very bad one." "But I thought that they will understand that my intentions were clean and pure." "And they looked at it differently." "I was told again and again the Shin Bet is the family, it's your family." "I never felt that this is my job." "It was going to the family, and then suddenly, the family is against me." "ohey said I did not work by the rule, or by the Shin Bet way, and they took me to court, and dismissed me from my duty." "All he said was good bye, and I was like," ""Gosh, this is really bad news."" "All the doubt, the suspicion that I had with the Agency," "I overcame only through the trust that I could establish with Gonen, and the personal relationship that I built with him ." "So for me, he was really a gift from heaoen , to be just there t?" "take care of me." "And when he was like," ""ohat's it, I'm going somewhere else,"" "I knew that I am not going to see him again ." "He got a new handler, and he didn't like this handler at all." "They had fights." "This guy tried, you know, to teach Mosab eoerything from the beginning ." "They decided to put him on a polygraph test to show him who is in charge." "It was impossible for someone like me to pass the test." "When they asked me," ""Did you plan attacks against the state of Israelo"" "You know, this is what we did on a daily basis." "You know, that was my job, to pretend that we are planning attacks." "With that said, you know, how can you say yes or no?" "And now here I am answering the machine, and the guy from behind the desk that I neoer met before, and trying to prooe to him something that I could not prooe." "You trusted me with the lioes of your troops, with your own lioes, with the secrets of the Agency, big secrets, and now you're coming back to the first square for your old suspicion and old doubt?" "ohat broke bones between me and the Agency." "And at that moment, that was a final decision for me, that was the last time" "I want to work for the Agency or do anything for it." "They tried by temptation, giving me an offer to open a company to help me achieve, you know, things that people dream about and they don't get." "They could not threaten me because they knew that I knew the game." "And simply, I kept insisting for a few months that I haoe to leaoe." "Finally, they agreed, with two conditions." "I have to bring a solid cover how I left." "It was simply an operation for my jaw." "And I had to go to doctors and bring these papers." "ohe second condition was that I come back and work for the Shin Bet." "I take just a long oacation ." "ohey preferred that I go to Europe." "ohey did not want me to go t?" "the U nited States of America." "Now, Spain and Europe, and all that," "Israel simply could put me in a case and send me back to the Palestinian Territories if they had to, but in America, it was different story." "The American government, in general , don't tolerate any Israeli actioity on the American soil without cooperation with the American I ntelligence." "My mom knew that there was a possibility that's gonna take a few years before I come back." "She told me, "You do the surgery, if you get a chance to finish your Master's in the United States, just do it."" "You know, "I wish you luck,"" "and she was just sad that I was leaving, but she knew how much I suffered , you know, for the family, and all ooer the years, and she wanted me also to find my life," "so she was kinda finally okay with that." "And we hugged, and we said good bye." "To go to a new culture, to have to build everything from scratch, that was the most difficult thing for any human being." "I was conflicted with my own identity." "I was inoited to a Bible study." "I started to build a new relationship with a new community that had a totally different faith ." "It was fun." "It was a peaceful environment." "And to go to this kind of community, and to be loved unconditionally was oery comforting, it was oery important to me." "It filled a very important gap in my life." "I applied for political asylum in the first few months in secret, and it was rejected by the Department of oomeland Security." "The FBI was told by the Israeli Intelligence that the son of a top Hamas leader is hanging out in California, and we don't know exactly what he's doing there, thinking that the FBI is going to just put me on an airplane and send me back." "ohere was always a problem with how can I conoince those people that I am not inooloed in terrorism ." "I shared the story with the core group in the church." "And I was expecting an immediate support, but to look at people's faces and see fear, and see doubt, that's something that I was not expecting ." "They were not only not believing, they were also scared of the fact that I was there." "Nobody would believe my story." "No one." "I was without anything." "I was without a shelter." "I became without a job, jobless." "I became without a community." "I became completely alone, and my intention was to go public." "I knew the moment I am gonna say that I worked for the Israeli Intelligence." "First of all, I am done." "I have no future." "I'm gonna become from a prince to a traitor, immediately." "Nobody's going t?" "sympathize with me." "I'm going to bring lots of shame to my mother, to my father." "It was the shame that I had to face, you know, as a human being ." "Since I was a child , I was raped ." "I could not tell my parents." "Why?" "So that was like finally a chance or an opportunity to fight against this dangerous enemy, the force of shame." "My father had access to a cell phone that was smuggled to prison at that time." "So I called him and told I him ," ""Listen, I'm writing a book." "ohe book is going to come out, and I'm telling the world about my relationship with the Israeli I ntelligence." "I am not who you think I am ." "I worked for Israel for ten years." "I put you and myself in prison to protect you ." "And you are not assassinated today because of this arrangement."" "He told me, "Listen , come back, and I will protect you." "Don't worry about anybody."" "I told him, "I am not coming back,"" "and I asked him, actually, in that conversation to disown me, because I knew the pressure of the society." "And he told me this is not an option , while he was grieoing, you know." "oe was in lots of pain , he was under shock." "oe told me, "You are my son , and you will continue to be my son ." "No one can take that away."" ".. .putting his own life in danger by going public with his story in one remarkable book called, "Son of Hamas", giving a never before seen look." ". ." "Mosab Hassan Yousef says that he turned against Hamas because he believed ..." ".. .served as Israel's most valuable spy inside Hamas for over a decade." ". ." ".. .young man who saw bad things happening and decided to take a stand." "Your own father has written from prison , where he still is, a statement:" "oe said that you were a collaborator, collaborating with the enemy." "oe said that you're betraying Palestinians, betraying Islam ." "oow do you respond to that?" "I knew that I was really hurting people I looe, and people who looed me oery much." "When I thought about my brothers and sisters, those are like, were my children ." "And they neoer had a problem without calling me." "And I always found a solution ." "And that was the first time when my brother called me asking for a solution , but unfortunately, I was the problem , and I could not prooide a solution for the first time." "I felt hopeless." "I felt that I stabbed him in the back." "Actually, I felt like I took each one of them and I put them on the altar and slaughtered them , all of them ." "The law was very clear with the deportation case." ""You were affiliated , at some point of your life, with oamas organization ." "You bought guns with the intention of killing people." "So that's enough ." "It doesn't matter what you did afterwards."" "The law says if you have that kind of history, you don't qualify to get American, to become American citizen." "But how much danger is Yousef really in if he's deported?" "Al Qaeda immediately issued a death sentence for him ." "oamas leaders in Gaza..." "One day, I see a big picture of The Green Prince, page one, in the Arutz newspaper." "I felt my heart's, you know, beating hard and" "You need to understand , ohe Green Prince was one of the most sensitioe secrets of the Shin Bet." "ohe option to haoe him on the front page of the newspaper, something I couldn't eoen consider." "I was shocked ." "I started to think, you know," ""oow come he's in the United States?" "What's going ono"" "I read that he left the West Bank, he converted to Christianity, and that he lives in the United States, homeless." "oe was in real trouble." "And I knew it." "I really felt responsible for Mosab, as a source, and as a human being." "I felt that, as his former handler," "I cannot let him just meet his destiny without helping him ." "I started to think about of all the legal implications of what I'm going to do." "What will be the Shin Bet response for that?" "Am I allowed to do it?" "I knew that if I'll contact the Shin Bet and ask their permission, I'll get a "no", and I didn't want to get this "no."" "I felt that I really need to go and meet him." "I thought that by exposing myself," "I can be arrested and accused by the Shin Bet of treason." "But I knew that this is what I need to do." "And then I took off and I went to San Diego." "This was a very tough flight." "It was passing not only geographical borders." "I needed to cross mental borders." "And I was walking down in a long corridor, and in the end, I see Mosab standing ." "And I approached him , and we hugged and started to laugh." "I don't know why laughing, but we were standing there laughing for like, I don't know, ten minutes." "We were laughing this, you know, this was like breaking eoerything, all the borders, all the problems, eoerything." "ohe son of a oamas founder sought sanctuary here in California." "ohe Federal Gooernment is now pushing for his deportation , claiming he poses a threat to the U .S." "Mosab told me," ""For some reason , they misread the book and they really think that I'm a terrorist, and they think that I'm a threat to the U nited States."" "oomeland Security will argue that he has prooided material support to terrorist organizations in court tomorrow." "ohey want him deported ." "We'll be lioe at the..." "I got really mad ." "You know, I thought to myself, you know, it couldn't be." "You know, he helped us for more than ten years." "I called the Shin Bet." "I asked them to give me instructions and they didn't." "They didn't respond." "And I said, that's it." "You know, this is ridiculous." "How many times have you ever heard an agent of Shin Bet, the Israeli Secret Service, go public?" "This is a man who was Mosab Hassan's handler for many, many years, and he believes now it is his solemn moral duty to stand up, to go public, which is a risk to his own life" "because he believes Mosab Hassan." ". ." "It's not just a reality show that you watch on TV and say," ""Oh , let's see what the judge is going to decide."" "Mosab is going to stay in the U .S." "and lioe, or Mosab is going to be deported to Jordan , and then who knows what will happen?" "Probably, he will get killed somehow." "I couldn't just sit silently and watch it." "We got a really big development to this story." "The United States has now dropped its push to deport Mosab Hassan Yousef, because of what lawyers called "new evidence."" "Homeland Security previously called him a security threat because of his ties to the militant group Hamas." "ohis man , Yousef, is the son of one of its founders, but after spending ten years as a spy for Israel, and converting to Christianity, he says deportation would mean certain death." "During a 1 5 minute hearing this morning, a U .S." "Department of oomeland Security attorney announced that the gooernment was dropping its objections, and an emigration judge ruled that, pending a routine background check, Yousef can stay." "The Shin Bet had the ability to stop me." "They didn't do it." "When I look at it today," "I say, you know, maybe this is their way to tell me," ""Okay, no, you can go on ." "Okay, we're not going to approoe it, we don't like it, but we don't stop you ." "And this is our way to help Mosab."" "And today, I really belieoe this is what they did ." "Maybe we're not family in the blood, but the bond between us is much stronger than the bond of brothers or family or blood ." "ohe bond between us is the bond of truth, and it's unbreakable." "And he knows the truth, and he took a stand for the truth, unlike many Shin Bet agents who worked with me side by side and saw how much we put effort to stop terrorist attacks." "And all of them saw me, you know, struggling, facing deportation, being disowned for the sake of the state that we fought for, and none of them came out to support, none of them ." "This journey, for me as a person, as a human being, is always and it is still" "I think the most important journey of my life." "Not because of Mosab, not because of the Shin Bet, because of me, because during the time, and along the way," "I learned more about myself, about life, about friendship." "Gonen risked his life to saoe mine." "And I hope that one day, you know, people will be able to see the beauty of this man's heart, and I hope that our people in the region will learn from this experience, how two people like Gonen and myself" "can come to a place where we can trust each other and work to be constructioe, and to build, and instead of destroy and spend our lioes fighting ." "Gonen is a brother today, and I won't hesitate to sacrifice my life to saoe his, because he already did, and I owe him ."