The following information on the Mossad and the Shabak (Shin Bet, General Security Service, Sherut ha-Bitachon ha-Klali) is taken from the Website of the Federation of American Scientists.

1) Shin Bet/General Security Service/Sherut ha-Bitachon ha-Klali [Shabak]

Shin Bet, the Israeli counter-intelligence and internal security service, is believed to have three operational departments and five support departments.

Arab Affairs Department is responsible for antiterrorist operations, political subversion, and maintenance of an index on Arab terrorists. Shin Bet detachments, known as HENZA, worked with Aman undercover detachments (known as Mista'arvim [Marauders]) to counter the uprising. This Department has also been active in countering the military wing of Hamas.

Non-Arab Affairs Department, formerly divided into communist and noncommunist sections, concerned itself with all other countries, including penetrating foreign intelligence services and diplomatic missions in Israel and interrogating immigrants from the Former Soviet Union and Eastern Europe. Protective Security Department is responsibile for protecting Israeli government buildings and embassies, defense industries, scientific installations, industrial plants, and the El Al national airline.

Shin Bet monitors the activities of and personalities in domestic right-wing fringe groups and subversive leftist movements. It is believed to have infiltrated agents into the ranks of the parties of the far left and had uncovered a number of foreign technicians spying for neighboring Arab countries or the Soviet Union. All foreigners, regardless of religion or nationality, are liable to come under surveillance through an extensive network of informants who regularly came into contact with visitors to Israel. Shin Bet's network of agents and informers in the occupied territories destroyed the PLO's effectiveness there after 1967, forcing the PLO to withdraw to bases in Jordan.

2) Mossad/The Institute for Intelligence and Special Tasks/ha-Mossad le-Modiin ule-Tafkidim Meyuhadim

Mossad has responsibility for human intelligence collection, covert action, and counterterrorism. Its focus is on Arab nations and organizations throughout the world. Mossad also is responsible for the clandestine movement of Jewish refugees out of Syria, Iran, and Ethiopia. Mossad agents are active in the former communist countries, in the West, and at the UN.

Mossad is headquartered in Tel Aviv. The staff of Mossad was estimated during the late 1980s to number between 1,500 to 2,000 personnel, with more recent estimates placing the staff at an estimated 1,200 personnel. The identity of the director of Mossad was traditionally a state secret, or at least not widely publicized, but in March 1996 the Government announced the appointment of Major General Danny Yatom as the replacement for Shabtai Shavit, who resigned in early 1996.

Formerly known as the Central Institute for Coordination and the Central Institute for Intelligence and Security, Mossad was formed on 1 April 1951. Mossad was established by then Prime Minister David Ben Gurion, who gave as Mossad's primary directive: "For our state which since its creation has been under siege by its enemies. Intelligence constitutes the first line of defence...we must learn well how to recognise what is going on around us."

Mossad has a total of eight departments, though some details of the internal organization of the agency remain obscure.

Collections Department is the largest, with responsibility for espionage operations, with offices abroad under both diplomatic and unofficial cover. The department consists of a number of desks which are responsible for specific geographical regions, directing case officers based at "stations" around the world, and the agents they control.

Political Action and Liaison Department conducts political activities and liaison with friendly foreign intelligence services and with nations with which Israel does not have normal diplomatic relations. In larger stations, such as Paris, Mossad customarily had under embassy cover two regional controllers: one to serve the Collections Department and the other the Political Action and Liaison Department.

Special Operations Division, also known as Metsada, conducts highly sensitive assassination, sabotage, paramilitary, and psychological warfare projects.

LAP (Lohamah Psichlogit) Department is responsible for psychological warfare, propaganda and deception operations.

Research Department is responsible for intelligence production, including daily situation reports, weekly summaries and detailed monthly reports. The Department is organized into 15 geographically specialized sections or "desks", including the USA, Canada and Western Europe, Latin America, Former Soviet Union, China, Africa, the Maghreb (Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia), Libya, Iraq, Jordan, Syria, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Iran. A "nuclear" desk is focused on special weapons related issues.

For more information on the activities of the Shabak and the Mossad, please consult the Federation of American Scientists (FAS) Website.

Information on forcible recruitment by Shabak or Mossad is limited among the sources consulted to the use of Palestinians collaborators by the Shaba. It was provided on 25 March 2001 by the Palestinian Human Rights Monitoring Group (PHRMG), an independent Palestinian human rights organization based in East Jerusalem.

The forced recruitment of Palestinian collaborators by the Israeli Shabak is still a very common practice. The PHRMG received numerous calls at the time of the second Camp David summit, just before the current intifada, by Palestinians that were being coerced into providing information to the Shabak. It seems that at the time, Israel was anticipating a withdrawal from the Palestinian territories, and was preparing an intelligence network of collaborators to replace the direct surveillance of its open military presence. Now, during this intifada, collaborators have also been widely used to gather information on "wanted" Palestinian activists, who were later sometimes assassinated by the Israeli security forces (army and undercover units). I copy below some excerpts of our regularly updated report on this issue:

The use of collaborators by Israel is nothing new. It has existed since the beginning of the occupation, in 1967. Some Palestinians may have collaborated voluntarily, thinking that they were helping Palestine, or to improve their social and family status. Indeed, collaborators were rather successful in obtaining services from Israel and were therefore used as middlemen by their compatriots. Money could also be the driving force behind some cases of collaboration. But collaboration is often the result of coercion. Israel uses the services provided in the occupied territories by the Civil Administration as leverage to force Palestinians into collaborating. In order to obtain an exit permit, family reunification, import licenses or any other documents or authorizations, Palestinians can be compelled to provide information or assistance to the Israeli Shabak. Sometimes, the Israeli authorities promise to reduce the sentence of detained Palestinians, or threaten to publicize statements obtained under duress, whereby detainees accept to collaborate with Israel. Palestinians also claim that Israel uses a method known as isqat, a form of sexual blackmail by which Palestinians are caught in "immoral" situations - allegedly lured by Israeli agents or other collaborators -, photographed, and then pressured to collaborate under the threat to publicize the photographs.

Israel is in breach of its conventional obligations for its methods of recruiting collaborators. Art. 31 of the (Fourth) Geneva Convention Relative to the Protection of Civilian Persons in Time of War of 12 August 1949 states clearly that:

"No physical or moral coercion shall be exercised against protected persons, in particular to obtain information from them or from third parties."

The PHRMG did not provide information on forced recruitment by the Mossad.

This Response was prepared after researching publicly accessible information currently available to the Research Directorate within time constraints. This Response is not, and does not purport to be, conclusive as to the merit of any particular claim to refugee status or asylum.

Federation of American Scientists(FAS), Washington. 9 August 1998. Intelligence Resource Program. "Shin Bet. General Security Service. Sherut ha-Bitachon ha-Klali." http://sun00781.dn.net/irp/world/israel/shin_bet/index.html [Accessed 13 Mar. 2001]

_____. 1 December 1997. Intelligence Resource Program. "Mossad. The Institute for Intelligence and Special Tasks ha-Mossad le-Modiin ule-Tafkidim Meyuhadim." http://sun00781.dn.net/irp/world/israel/mossad [Accessed 13 Mar. 2001]

The Palestinian Human Rights Monitoring Group (PHRMG), East Jerusalem. 25 March 2001. Correspondence