The Israeli Mossad was behind the assassination of Syrian missile scientist Dr. Aziz Asber, the New York Times reported on Monday, citing a senior Middle East intelligence source.
Asber was martyred in an explosion in his car along with his driver several minutes after leaving his home in Hama on Saturday night.
After watching him for months, the Mossad planted a bomb in his car, according to the report by David M. Halbfinger and Ronen Bergman.
The source quoted by the Times, a member of an intelligence agency in the Middle East that was updated on the operation, said this was the fourth time over the past three years that the Zionist entity had eliminated a weapons scientist at a foreign nation.
By Israeli law, only the prime minister can authorize an assassination operation by the Mossad. Spokespeople for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Avigdor Lieberman declined to respond to the Times report.
Some six months ago, Lieberman noted that “there are hundreds of explosions and assassinations in the Middle East every day, and every time they try to pin it on Israel.”
Dr. Asber reportedly worked on the development of medium- and long-range missiles as well as building a solid-fuel plant for missiles and rockets.
He headed Sector 4, a top-secret unit at the Scientific Studies and Research Center in Masyaf developing rockets and ballistic missiles, where he was working on retrofitting the Syrian SM600 Tishreen to turn them into precision-guided missiles with the help of Iran’s Quds Force Commander Qassem Suleimani, the report said.
Source: Israeli media
