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The Israeli Military Intelligence (), often abbreviated to Aman (), is the central, overarching
military intelligence Military intelligence is a military discipline that uses information collection and analysis List of intelligence gathering disciplines, approaches to provide guidance and direction to assist Commanding officer, commanders in decision making pr ...
body of the
Israel Defense Forces The Israel Defense Forces (IDF; , ), alternatively referred to by the Hebrew-language acronym (), is the national military of the State of Israel. It consists of three service branches: the Israeli Ground Forces, the Israeli Air Force, and ...
(IDF). Aman was created in 1950, when the Intelligence Department was spun off from the IDF's
General Staff A military staff or general staff (also referred to as army staff, navy staff, or air staff within the individual services) is a group of officers, Enlisted rank, enlisted, and civilian staff who serve the commanding officer, commander of a ...
. The Intelligence Department was composed largely of former members of the
Haganah Haganah ( , ) was the main Zionist political violence, Zionist paramilitary organization that operated for the Yishuv in the Mandatory Palestine, British Mandate for Palestine. It was founded in 1920 to defend the Yishuv's presence in the reg ...
Intelligence Service. Aman is an independent service, and not part of the ground forces,
Navy A navy, naval force, military maritime fleet, war navy, or maritime force is the military branch, branch of a nation's armed forces principally designated for naval warfare, naval and amphibious warfare; namely, lake-borne, riverine, littoral z ...
or the
Air Force An air force in the broadest sense is the national military branch that primarily conducts aerial warfare. More specifically, it is the branch of a nation's armed services that is responsible for aerial warfare as distinct from an army aviati ...
. It is one of the main entities and the largest component of the Israeli Intelligence Community, along with
Mossad The Institute for Intelligence and Special Operations (), popularly known as Mossad ( , ), is the national intelligence agency of the Israel, State of Israel. It is one of the main entities in the Israeli Intelligence Community, along with M ...
and
Shin Bet The Israel Security Agency (ISA; , (GSS); ), better known by the Hebrew acronyms, acronyms Shabak (; ; ) or Shin Bet (from the abbreviation of , "Security Service"), is Israel's internal Security agency, security service. Its motto is "''Magen ...
. It includes the cyber warfare branch
Unit 8200 Unit 8200 (, ''Yehida shmone matayim'' "Unit eight two-hundred") is an Israeli Intelligence Corps unit of the Israel Defense Forces responsible for clandestine operation, collecting signal intelligence (SIGINT) and code decryption, counteri ...
, the human intelligence Unit 504, the secret technology Unit 81, and the training course Havatzalot Program. Its special operations unit is General Staff Reconnaissance Unit ( Sayeret Matkal).


Roles and jurisdiction

The IDF's Intelligence Corps (), abbreviated as Haman () and headed by a brigadier general, has been detached from Aman since the
Yom Kippur War The Yom Kippur War, also known as the Ramadan War, the October War, the 1973 Arab–Israeli War, or the Fourth Arab–Israeli War, was fought from 6 to 25 October 1973 between Israel and a coalition of Arab world, Arab states led by Egypt and S ...
, but remains under its jurisdiction. In April 2000, the Combat Intelligence Collection Corps () was founded. Abbreviated as Modash (), it is the newest IDF corps, and the IDF's fifth land corps. It was designed to fulfill some of Aman's former combat intelligence functions, and is headed by a Brigadier General. Although it falls under the operational jurisdiction of the GOC Army Headquarters, it also falls under Aman's professional jurisdiction.


History

During the founding of the state of Israel, the
Haganah Haganah ( , ) was the main Zionist political violence, Zionist paramilitary organization that operated for the Yishuv in the Mandatory Palestine, British Mandate for Palestine. It was founded in 1920 to defend the Yishuv's presence in the reg ...
military organization was primarily responsible for gathering intelligence, or one of its elite units, the Scherut Jediot (secret service), or Shai. Prime Minister
David Ben-Gurion David Ben-Gurion ( ; ; born David Grün; 16 October 1886 – 1 December 1973) was the primary List of national founders, national founder and first Prime Minister of Israel, prime minister of the State of Israel. As head of the Jewish Agency ...
commissioned the Shai in the late 1940s to create a secret service structure for Israel. Shai member Re’uwen Schiloach established it based on four independent services: Aman and Schin Bet, the foreign intelligence service Machleket Hacheker, and the Institute for Illegal Immigration Mossad le-Alija Bet (defunct in March 1952). In mid-1949 Shiloah created the Committee of Secret Service chiefs as a super-ordinate body. From 1963 the international secret service was officially called ''"Institute for Intelligence Service and Special Tasks"'' (ha-Mosad le-Modi'in u-le-Tafkidim Mejuhadim), short
Mossad The Institute for Intelligence and Special Operations (), popularly known as Mossad ( , ), is the national intelligence agency of the Israel, State of Israel. It is one of the main entities in the Israeli Intelligence Community, along with M ...
. An offshoot of the Department of Defense was the lesser-known Lakam technology intelligence agency. The existence of which was long considered a state secret. It was used to obtain scientific and technological information. In the 1980s, the Lakam lost much of its previous importance. One of the biggest defeats of the Israeli secret services was caused by the Aman in the 1950s. Defense Minister Pinhas Lavon had to resign as part of the so-called Lavon affair. Aman-led " Operation Susannah" was intended to attack western facilities in Egypt by Israeli agents and saboteurs. The aim was to disrupt the good ties between the United States and the Egyptian head of state,
Gamal Abdel Nasser Gamal Abdel Nasser Hussein (15 January 1918 – 28 September 1970) was an Egyptian military officer and revolutionary who served as the second president of Egypt from 1954 until his death in 1970. Nasser led the Egyptian revolution of 1952 a ...
. Egypt’s State Security interrogated the perpetrators and were given sensitive information from the Israeli Military Intelligence. The US should believe that the Egyptian state is powerless against religious organizations. Egypt managed to uncover the agent circle. Ten members were sentenced in a show trial in January 1955, two of them to death. Lavon resigned a month later, then Binyamin Gibli, then Aman's director, two weeks later. Ultimately, the Head of State Ben-Gurion resigned in 1963 after being worn down by ongoing discussions.


Units

Aman consists of the following subordinate and professionally subordinate units:


Staff units

* Intelligence Corps


Collection units

* Camp 1391 (IDF black site) *
Unit 8200 Unit 8200 (, ''Yehida shmone matayim'' "Unit eight two-hundred") is an Israeli Intelligence Corps unit of the Israel Defense Forces responsible for clandestine operation, collecting signal intelligence (SIGINT) and code decryption, counteri ...
(Signal Intelligence) * Unit 9900 (Visual Intelligence) * Unit 504 (Human Intelligence)


Research

* Research Department


Information security

* Information Security Department * Military Censor art of Aman, but an entirely independent unit, not subordinate to any military or political level, only to parliamentary and judicial oversight/sup>


Special Operations Division

* Unit 81 (Secret technology) * General Staff Reconnaissance Unit (Special Forces Intelligence Unit) *


Other units

* Supervision Department * External Relations Department * Ro'im Rachok * Havatzalot Program


Professionally subordinate units

* Air Intelligence Group: the intelligence unit of the Israeli Air Force * Naval Intelligence Division: the intelligence unit of the
Israeli Navy The Israeli Navy (, ''Ḥeil HaYam HaYisraeli'', ; ) is the Israel Defense Forces#Arms, naval warfare service arm of the Israel Defense Forces, operating primarily in the Mediterranean Sea theater as well as the Gulf of Eilat and the Red Sea th ...
* Combat Intelligence Collection Corps: the intelligence unit of GOC Army Headquarters *The intelligence units of the Regional Commands: Central, Northern, Southern and
Home Front Home front is an English language term with analogues in other languages. It is commonly used to describe the civilian populace of the nation at war as an active support system for their military. Civilians are traditionally uninvolved in com ...
Commands * Center for Consciousness Operations: a psychological warfare unit of the
Operations Directorate The Israeli Operations Directorate (, ''Agaf HaMivtza'im'', abbreviated as ( ''Agam'') is the Operations (military staff), operations branch in the Israeli General Staff, General Staff of the Israel Defense Forces. It was established in 1999, al ...


List of directors

The head of Aman is the senior intelligence officer in the IDF and engages in intelligence decision and policy-making at the same level as the heads of the Shabak and the
Mossad The Institute for Intelligence and Special Operations (), popularly known as Mossad ( , ), is the national intelligence agency of the Israel, State of Israel. It is one of the main entities in the Israeli Intelligence Community, along with M ...
: together, they form the three highest-ranking, co-equal heads of the Israeli Intelligence Community, focusing on the military, domestic (including the
Palestinian territories The occupied Palestinian territories, also referred to as the Palestinian territories, consist of the West Bank (including East Jerusalem) and the Gaza Strip—two regions of the former Mandate for Palestine, British Mandate for Palestine ...
), and foreign intelligence fronts respectively. In June 2005, then-IDF's Chief of Staff,
Lieutenant General Lieutenant general (Lt Gen, LTG and similar) is a military rank used in many countries. The rank traces its origins to the Middle Ages, where the title of lieutenant general was held by the second-in-command on the battlefield, who was norma ...
Dan Halutz, in a move viewed as surprising, announced that Major General Aharon Zeevi-Farkash would be replaced by Major General Amos Yadlin. Yadlin, who had been serving as the IDF's
military attaché A military attaché or defence attaché (DA),Defence Attachés
''Geneva C ...
in Washington, D.C., was a combat pilot, former head of the air force's Air Intelligence Directorate, and Halutz's deputy. Yadlin was appointed as Aman Director in January 2006, with Zeevi-Farkash having served an extended term. In November 2010, Yadlin was replaced by Major General Aviv Kochavi. * 1948–1949: Isser Be'eri * 1949–1950: Colonel Chaim Herzog * 1950–1955: Colonel Binyamin Gibli * 1955–1959: Major General Yehoshafat Harkabi * 1959–1962: Major General Chaim Herzog * 1962–1963: Major General Meir Amit * 1964–1972: Major General Aharon Yariv * 1972–1974: Major General Eli Zeira * 1974–1978: Major General Shlomo Gazit * 1979–1983: Major General Yehoshua Sagi * 1983–1985: Major General
Ehud Barak Ehud Barak ( ; born Ehud Brog; 12 February 1942) is an Israeli former general and politician who served as the Prime Minister of Israel, prime minister from 1999 to 2001. He was leader of the Israeli Labor Party, Labor Party between 1997 and 20 ...
* 1986–1991: Major General Amnon Lipkin-Shahak * 1991–1995: Major General Uri Sagi * 1995–1998: Major General
Moshe Ya'alon Moshe "Bogie" Ya'alon (; born Moshe Smilansky; 24 June 1950) is an Israeli politician and former Chief of Staff of the Israel Defense Forces, who also served as Israel's Defense Minister under Benjamin Netanyahu from 2013 until his resignation ...
* 1998–2001: Major General * 2001–2006: Major General Aharon Zeevi-Farkash * 2006–2010: Major General Amos Yadlin * 2010–2014: Major General Aviv Kochavi * 2014–2018: Major General Herzi Halevi * 2018–2021: Major General * 2021–2024: Major General Aharon Haliva * 2024–: Major General Shlomi Binder


See also

* Israeli security forces * Israeli Intelligence Community Other military intelligence agencies * Defence Intelligence Agency (India) * Strategic Intelligence Agency (Indonesia) * Glavnoye Razvedyvatel'noye Upravleniye (GRU – Russian Military Intelligence) * Defence Intelligence and the Intelligence Corps (UK) * Direction du Renseignement Militaire (France) *
Defense Intelligence Agency The Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) is an intelligence agency and combat support agency of the United States Department of Defense (DoD) specializing in military intelligence. A component of the Department of Defense and the United States In ...
(US)


References


External links


GlobalSecurity.org on Aman (1996)
*[https://web.archive.org/web/20080513121838/http://www.jafi.org.il/education/juice/service/week11.html "Israeli Intelligence and the Yom Kippur War of 1973," By Doron Geller, JUICE, The Jewish Agency for Israel, Education Dept.]
The "Yom Kippur War: the IDF version," by Amir Oren, for ''Haaretz''"Intelligence service under scrutiny," by Dan Baron, for the Jewish Telegraphic Agency
{{Authority control Israeli intelligence agencies Military intelligence agencies Israel Defense Forces directorates Military units and formations established in 1950