A Palestinian man from Gaza was detained by alleged Mossad agents in Malaysia and released by Malaysia's security services, the Malaysian New Straits Times reported on Monday.
The abduction-style capture of the Gazan men, whose ties to Hamas were allegedly subject to a Mossad investigation, occurred in Kuala Lumpur on September 28, according to the paper.
Four Malaysian mercenaries allegedly operating on behalf of the Mossad drove up to two Palestinian nationals, who were reportedly computer programming experts. They dragged one into the vehicle – warning the other to stay away – and drove him to a secretive location, where he was tied up and forced to answer questions via a video call with Israeli agents, the Malaysian paper reports.
Malaysian security forces freed the two Palestinian men and arrested the alleged Mossad operatives 24 hours later, as the second suspect lodged a report at a Kuala Lumpur police station about 40 minutes after the abduction.
Hamas in Malaysia
Hamas has set up a network of satellite offices across the world – a network that reaches as far as the southeast Asian nation of Malaysia. During the Israeli-Hamas conflict in May 2021, the IDF announced that its policy was to target Hamas activists anywhere. Malaysia was noted specifically, as Hamas has built a social media propaganda apparatus there.
Malaysia, which does not have formal ties with Israel, has been seen as sympathetic to the Palestinians. In 2020, a Gazan imam was sentenced to a year in jail for smuggling funds from Malaysian charities to Hamas, and in 2018 a Hamas-affiliated Palestinian engineer from the Gaza Strip was shot dead in Kuala Lumpur in what many suspected was a Mossad assassination.