Israel’s intelligence agency, the Mossad, has many spectacular victories to its credit in nearly 80 years of covert operations, earning a unique reputation.

But even former operatives admit that the agency’s history is spotty and many failures have embarrassed Israel, frustrated allies and led to accusations of systematic flouting of international law.

Israel has not officially commented on the simultaneous explosion of thousands of beepers and walkie-talkies used by Hezbollah operatives in Lebanon, which killed 37 people and injured around 3,000 others. The majority of experts believe that the Mossad was responsible for these attacks.

At the same time, the Mossad may have provided the information that led to the July assassinations of Ismail Haniya, the political leader of Hamas who was killed by a bomb in a bedroom of a government hostel in Tehran, and Fouad Shukr, the founder of Hezbollah, who died in Beirut after receiving a message inviting him to move to an apartment that was then hit by a missile.

Operation Finale: Kidnapping and Condemnation of Adolf Eichmann (1960)

On May 11, 1960, Nazi war criminal Adolf Eichmann was captured by a group of Israeli spies after years in hiding in Argentina, ending a long-running manhunt.

Ten days later, drugged and dressed as a crew member of the Israeli airline El Al, he was smuggled into Israel by Mossad agents and put on trial.

The architect of the Nazis’ “Final Solution,” which exterminated six million European Jews during World War II, Eichmann was tried and hanged in 1962, aged 56.

Operation Entebbe (1976)

Operation Entebbe or Operation Lightning was regarded as one of Israel’s most successful military missions.

The Mossad provided intelligence, while the Israeli military conducted the operation.

Two members of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine and two German accomplices hijack the plane and take it to Uganda instead of Paris.

The Israeli commandos who attempted the airport rescue 100 Israeli hostages.

Three hostages, the hijackers, several Ugandan soldiers, and commander-in-chief Yonatan Netanyahu (brother of Israel’s current prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu) die in the raid.

Wrath of God: Revenge after the Munich Olympics murders

In 1972, the Palestinian militant group Black September killed two members of Israel’s Olympic team at the Munich Olympics and captured nine men.

He later killed all the hostages during a failed rescue attempt by the West German police.

In the years that followed, Mossad’s goal was to eliminate the perpetrators of the attack one by one, including mastermind Mahmoud Hamsari.

Xamsari was eventually killed by an explosive device planted inside the telephone in his Paris apartment.

Operation “Moses”: evacuation of Ethiopian Jews (1984-1985)

In the early 1980s, the Mossad – acting on instructions from Prime Minister Menachem Begin – smuggled more than 7,000 Jews out of Ethiopia, crossing them into Israel via Sudan, using a fake diving resort as a cover.

In particular, a group of Mossad agents created a resort on the Red Sea coast of Sudan, which they used as a base.

By day, they disguised themselves as hotel staff and by night, they smuggled Jews from neighboring Ethiopia by air and sea.

This operation went on for at least five years, and by the time the Sudanese authorities found out what was going on, the Mossad agents had escaped.