Mossad did not anticipate New Delhi attack, newspeper reports

JTA

JERUSALEM — Mossad chief Tamir Pardo led a team of Israeli security forces on a visit to India last week, but did not appear to anticipate an attack in the capital, an Indian newspaper reported.

The high-level security team did discuss the threat of revenge strikes against Israeli targets, and the embassy in New Delhi was on high alert, but the team “who last week interacted with their Delhi counterparts did not apprehend that Iran’s alleged proxies could strike in India,” the Times of India reported Thursday.

It is not known what the Mossad team and their Indian counterparts in New Delhi discussed.

The team felt that Israeli citizens were safer in India than in Turkey, countries in East Asia and South America, the newspaper reported.

The newspaper cited unnamed sources telling of a letter from Israel’s embassy to New Delhi police detailing the possible targeting of Israeli interests around the world by Hezbollah or Iran, but which did not mention any Indian sites specifically.

The article also quoted Indian intelligence forces as saying that they were concerned about the increased use of “sticky” or magnetic bombs, which were used in the region for the first time in Monday’s attack.

Meanwhile, Thailand’s police chief said that Tuesday’s explosions in the capital were meant to target Jews.

“I can tell you that the target was specific and aimed at Israeli diplomatic staff,” police chief Gen. Prewpan Dhamapong told a Thai television station late Wednesday, the Associated Press reported.

He also said that the bomb that exploded was the same as ones placed the previous day on diplomatic vehicles associated with the Israeli embassies in India and Georgia.