JERUSALEM (AP) — Israel’s spy chief resigned Tuesday over the botched assassination attempt against a Hamas leader in Jordan, a move Israel hoped would mend relations with its neighbor and restore some of the Mossad spy agency’s lost luster.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu accepted the reluctant resignation of Danny Yatom, who had been sharply criticized in several inquiries into the failed Sept. 25 attempt on Hamas political leader Khalid Maashal.
The resignation was welcomed in Israel, as well as in Jordan.
Yatom’s turn at the helm had been one of the less glorious for an organization that achieved worldwide fame for daring successes — such as kidnapping Nazi leader Adolf Eichmann for trial and landing an agent in the top echelons of Syria in the 1960s, and tracking down and executing Palestinian terrorists in the 1970s.
There was pressure on Yatom to step down from within the Mossad. The Yediot Ahronot daily said Tuesday that Yatom’s second-in-command refused to talk to his boss and that other senior Mossad officials had considered asking Netanyahu to fire Yatom.