When Israel recruited Nazi war criminals

Israel had its very own Operation Paperclip.

Nazi war criminals Otto Skorzeny and Walter Rauff were recruited by Israel after the war. (Wikimedia Commons)

At the end of World War II, the US recruited a large number of senior Nazis.

The founder of West German spy agency the BND, Reinhard Gehlen, for example, was a major war criminal, the head of Nazi intelligence in its war of aggression against the Soviet Union. He was later recruited by the CIA.

It’s a story I’ve written about before in my series about Operation Gladio, NATO’s secret anti-communist “stay behind” armies, which were packed by Nazis. There was also Operation Paperclip, the secret US recruitment of senior Nazi scientists to work on the US space programme and in academic institutions in America.

But less well known is the fact that Israel also recruited several senior Nazi war criminals. It’s a hidden part of history, one that needs to be told.