Tel Aviv, March 24: Israel will replace a Mossad officer expelled by Britain over the Tel Aviv’s alleged forgery of passports used in the assassination of a top officer militant, Israeli public radio said on Wednesday.
Britain announced on Tuesday that it was declaring the diplomat non grata after its investigation found that Israel stole the identities of 12 British citizens to make the fake passports.
Public radio and other Israeli media said the diplomat was an officer in the notorious Mossad spy agency and would be replaced “soon” by another intelligence officer.
Israeli Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman said he was “very disappointed” by the expulsion, but a senior official said Tel Aviv would not retaliate.
British Foreign Secretary David Miliband said there were “compelling reasons” to believe that Israel was behind the forgeries used by the team which murdered Mahmud al-Mabhuh in Dubai in January.
“I’ve asked that a member of the embassy of Israel be withdrawn from the UK as a result of this affair and this is taking place,” he told parliament.
The British Foreign Office declined to specify the position of the expelled diplomat, but reports in the Times and Telegraph newspapers said the person was a senior Mossad agent, without citing sources.
The person was believed to be the Israeli spy agency’s station chief in London, the papers reported.
The murder of Mabhuh has been widely blamed on Israel, which has declined to comment on the affair in line with longstanding assassination policy.
The suspects used the identities of 12 Britons, as well as Australian, French, German and Irish nationals. Interpol has issued arrest notices for 27 suspects wanted by Dubai in connection with the killing.
Many of the forged passports bore the names of Israelis of dual nationality who appear to have been the victims of identity theft.
“The government takes this matter extremely seriously. Such misuse of British passports is intolerable,” Miliband said.
Hamas hailed the expulsion and said it hoped Israeli leaders would eventually be brought to trial over the case.
Also Tuesday, a French prosecutor announced an investigation into the use of four fake French passports in the Mossad hit.
And in Berlin, a spokesman from the federal prosecutor’s office said a probe had been launched more than a month ago into a fake German passport used in the murder.
British Prime Minister Gordon Brown’s spokesman said the Israeli diplomat had technically been “asked to withdraw” from Britain, adding that he had been given two weeks to leave.
The announcement came after Israeli ambassador Ron Prosor was called in again to the Foreign Office on Monday, and briefed on the results of an investigation by Britain’s Serious Organised Crime Agency (SOCA).
Miliband said SOCA had established that 12 British passport holders identified by Dubai police were “wholly innocent victims of identity theft”.
The passports were copied “when handed over for inspection to individuals linked to Israel, either in Israel or in other countries”, he said.
“Given that this was a very sophisticated operation in which high-quality forgeries were made, the government judges it is highly likely that the forgeries were made by a state intelligence service,” he said.
Miliband met Lieberman in Brussels on Monday and asked for a formal pledge that in future “the state of Israel would never be party to the misuse of British passports in such a way”, he said.
Lieberman said in a statement that while he wanted to maintain cordial relations with London, “no proof of Israeli involvement in this affair has been provided to us.”
Meanwhile a senior Israeli official said that the priority was to “calm things down”.
“We have no intention of expelling a British diplomat in response to London’s decision,” the official said, asking not to be identified.
The Foreign Office has amended its official travel advice for Israel, warning British visitors about the risk to their passports and identities.
Relations between Britain and Israel were strained even before the passport row, notably after a London court issued an arrest warrant for former Israeli foreign minister Tzipi Livni, for allegedly committing war crimes.
Livni reportedly cancelled a trip to Britain in December for fear of being arrested under the warrant, issued over her role in Israel’s 22-day war against the Gaza Strip launched at the end of 2008.
Israel is also embroiled in a separate row with another ally, the US, after the Tel Aviv announced plans for the construction of new illegal settler units in Israeli-occupied Palestinian east Jerusalem while American Vice President Joe Biden was visiting the country.
—Agencies