2 suspected of spying for Israel’s Mossad arrested

suspected of spying for the Israeli intelligence service Mossad were detained in a joint operation by the National Intelligence Organization (MİT) and Istanbul police, Turkish authorities said Friday.

Since January, Turkish authorities have detained or arrested and charged dozens of people suspected of having ties to Israel’s Mossad intelligence agency. Six people were charged last month.

Turkish and Israeli leaders have traded public barbs since Israel’s war on the Palestinian resistance group Hamas began in October. Türkiye has warned Israel of “serious consequences” if it tries to hunt down Hamas members living outside the Palestinian territories, including in Türkiye.

Interior Minister Ali Yerlikaya said on X police had detained eight people believed to be collecting and selling information to Mossad about targeted individuals and companies in Türkiye. Of those, two had been arrested and six released on parole, he said.

“We will never allow espionage activities that are carried out within our country’s borders against our people’s national unity and solidarity. We are in pursuit,” he said.

A Turkish security official said the raids, carried out in Istanbul, targeted Ahmet Ersin Tumlucalı, a Turkish private detective, and his wife who were believed to have been involved with Mossad from 2011-2020.

The official said Tumlucalı regularly met in person with two Mossad operatives, code-named “Jorg Neubach” and “Gavin Alto,” in Vienna, Zurich, Munich, Frankfurt and Berlin, and used private communication channels to keep in touch with them.

The detective “earned significant income” from this and formed a network of nine people, the official said. Members of the network had confessed and the detective and his wife had been arrested, the person added.

Under Mossad’s instructions, Tumlucalı conducted research and reconnaissance on the agency’s targets he followed in Türkiye, as well as Georgia, Germany and Middle Eastern countries. He supplied Mossad with official documents of commercial taxis, trucks and lorries from Middle Eastern countries to be used in its operations.

According to the official, Tumlucalı was initially suspicious of Neubach when he first contacted him, saying he lived in Austria but did not know any German.