History is full of exciting stories about watches – some of the most incredible have been covered on this blog. Eli Cohen is a hero in Israel and the return of any of his possessions will be met with a lot of support. The Israeli spy’s wristwatch was recovered in an operation and has been returned to Israel.
Today, we’ll look at the story of Israeli spy Eli Cohen and find out how an operation led to this spy’s wristwatch being recovered from Syria.
The Story of Eli Cohen
Eli Cohen was born in Egypt in 1924 to parents who had moved from Aleppo, Syria in the decade prior. Many Jewish families moved from Egypt to Israel following the creation of the state but he chose to stay behind. He finally moved to Israel in 1956 due to persecution of Jews after the Suez Crisis and he joined the Israel Defence Force as a counter-intelligence agent in 1957.
He had attempted to join the Mossad due to a lack of satisfaction with his work but was rejected. It was when looking through a file of previously rejected candidates that his name was put forward as a perfect candidate for an operation in Syria. His job was to infiltrate the Syrian government under the identity of a Syrian businessman returning from Argentina. In 1961, after completing his training he moved to Argentina in preparation for his mission.
In 1962 Cohen travelled to Syria under the name Kamel Amin Thaabet and began to build relationships with Syrian politicians. At this time he allegedly built relationships with very high ranking Syrian officials who trusted him with important information and, on occasion, asked him for advice. Over the years he was in Syria he sent intelligence to Israel by radio, letters and also in person. The information he gathered allowed Israel to easily win the Six-Day War, which was seen as his biggest achievement.
In 1964 Cohen was concerned that he would be discovered following the appointment of a new Syrian Intelligence Colonel. He asked to terminate his contract and was advised he could do so following one final mission. During this final mission he was caught during the middle of transmission via radio to Israel by the Syrian security services.
Cohen was sentenced to death during his trial and, despite appeals from many prominent public figures from around the world, this sentence was upheld. The execution took place on the 18th of Many 1965 and his burial site, to this day, is unknown.
Eli Cohen’s Watch
It seems strange to think that a nation would send their secret service into an operation to retrieve a spy’s wristwatch. Especially when such an operation would be heading deep into very dangerous territory risking the lives of those involved. But that is exactly what they did.
Well…. kind of!
An Israeli officer with knowledge of the operation which took place confirmed to the New York Times that the operation was part of a larger long term operation. Eli Cohen is a hero in Israel for the dangerous work he carried out, with streets and buildings named after him. So there is no doubt that there would be widespread support for retrieving his belongings back to Israel. But the main goal of the long term operation which retrieved the spy’s wristwatch was actually to retrieve his body and return home for a hero’s burial.
The Mossad operation has been taking place for 14 years with huge sums of money being invested into intelligence. Paying off bribes to shady people and sending agents into dangerous areas, but so far they have not been able to locate the body. During this operation they did find that the body had been taken from the initial burial site and transferred on more than one occasion. They suspect that not even the Syrian authorities have lost track of the body and no longer know where Cohen is buried.
During this ongoing operation, agents of the Mossad located a man who was in possession of the spy’s wristwatch. It turned out that a man involved in the investigation of Cohen had kept hold of the watch and passed it on to someone close to him. This led to the Israeli authorities starting a very complex investigation in Damascus in order to retrieve the watch.
The specifics of this how the spy’s wristwatch was retrieved are unknown, but once it was returned to Israel an investigation begun to verify it was indeed Cohen’s watch. The Mossad brought photo experts and forensic in and even took time to investigate sales records from Switzerland. In the end, it was verified that the watch was indeed the one which belonged to Cohen.
Eli Cohen acquired the watch in Switzerland on one of his visits to Europe which he used to take in order to disguise his return to Israel. He returned with an incredibly valuable Eterna-Matic Centenaire 61 which he kept with him throughout his time undercover in Syria.
The Mossad chief, Mr Cohen, issued a statement which stated: “We managed to locate and bring to Israel the wristwatch of Eli Cohen, which he wore in Syria until the day he was caught, and was part of Eli’s operational character and part of his fictitious Arab identity.” The watch is currently on display at the Mossad headquarters and is expected to be returned to Eli Cohen’s family in the near future.
When it is returned to the owners family, it will end the most incredible story of the return of a personal possession in history.
Images: Israel Government Press Office
