JERUSALEM: In a significant intelligence coup, Israel has recovered the full Syrian archive on legendary Mossad spy Eli Cohen—six decades after his execution in Damascus. The archive includes approximately 2,500 items such as documents, photographs, forged passports, handwritten notes, and personal belongings.
The Israeli Prime Minister’s Office announced on Sunday that the trove was brought back to Israel in a covert operation carried out by Mossad, Israel’s external intelligence agency, in cooperation with an unnamed foreign intelligence service. The announcement coincided with a ceremony marking 60 years since Cohen’s public hanging on May 18, 1965.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Mossad Director David Barnea presented the recovered materials to Cohen’s widow, Nadia Cohen, calling the mission a “historic” achievement. “The trove contains thousands of items that had been kept under tight security by Syrian intelligence for decades,” the Prime Minister’s Office stated.
Among the recovered items were:
- Cohen’s original will, written shortly before his execution
- Handwritten letters to his family
- Communications between him and Syrian officials
- Intelligence reports on Syrian military sites, including in Quneitra
- Personal items such as the keys to his Damascus apartment
- The official Syrian death sentence
- A letter authorizing a rabbi’s presence during his final hours
The archive also contains notes Syrian intelligence seized from his residence, detailing Mossad instructions and intelligence targets.
Eli Cohen operated in Syria from 1961 to 1965, developing close ties with top military and political figures before he was eventually exposed, arrested, and executed. His espionage work is widely credited with providing Israel critical intelligence ahead of the 1967 Six-Day War.
Cohen’s story was dramatized in the Netflix miniseries The Spy, in which actor Sacha Baron Cohen portrayed him.
