Inside Mossad’s Ahmadinejad recruitment

Few political figures have undergone as dramatic a transformation in public perception as former Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. Once regarded as the uncompromising face of Iran’s revolutionary establishment, Ahmadinejad built his presidency on anti-Western rhetoric, support for Iran’s nuclear ambitions, and fierce hostility toward Israel. His confrontational foreign policy and controversial domestic record made him one of the Islamic Republic’s most recognizable leaders internationally.

Recent reports, however, have introduced a striking and highly controversial narrative. They allege that Israel’s intelligence agency, Mossad, sought to cultivate Ahmadinejad as a long-term intelligence asset and even considered him a potential political figure in a post-Islamic Republic Iran. Although these allegations remain unverified, they have generated significant debate among regional observers.

In an interview with The Beiruter, Brigadier General Dr. Omar Al-Raddad, a strategic security expert, examined the credibility of these reports, their broader strategic implications, and what they suggest about the future of Iran’s political system.

Credibility remains uncertain, but psychological impact is real

Dr. Al-Raddad cautions against accepting the reports at face value, stressing that no publicly available evidence confirms Ahmadinejad was recruited by Mossad.

From an intelligence perspective, he notes that genuine espionage operations rarely become fully public, meaning the absence of evidence neither confirms nor completely disproves the allegations. Nevertheless, without verifiable proof, the reports should be approached with caution.

More importantly, Al-Raddad argues that the timing of these disclosures cannot be separated from the broader security environment inside Iran. According to him, Iran is experiencing an unprecedented climate of suspicion fueled by years of successful intelligence operations conducted by Israel and Western intelligence agencies.

Western and Israeli intelligence penetration of Iran is greater than what is publicly revealed through media leaks.

He points to numerous Israeli intelligence successes inside Iran, particularly operations reportedly carried out in Tehran and the ability to gain access to senior members of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) and even circles surrounding the Supreme Leader.

In his assessment, these operations illustrate 2 complementary forms of intelligence penetration. The first is technical intelligence, involving surveillance and advanced technological capabilities. The second, and arguably more significant, is human intelligence, built through agents and recruited sources capable of providing sensitive information from within Iran’s political and security institutions.

Within this broader context, Al-Raddad believes the Ahmadinejad allegations should also be viewed as part of an ongoing psychological warfare campaign designed to deepen mistrust among Iran’s leadership, regardless of whether every detail is accurate.

Ahmadinejad’s isolation reflects Iran’s internal power struggles

Beyond the intelligence dimension, the reports have renewed attention on Ahmadinejad’s remarkable political decline.

Al-Raddad explains that although Ahmadinejad once enjoyed the confidence of Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei and served 2 presidential terms, his relationship with Iran’s highest leadership gradually deteriorated. Deep disagreements eventually emerged, leading to his political marginalization.

Unlike many former officials, Ahmadinejad did not successfully reposition himself within Iran’s reformist movement. Instead, he became politically isolated, accepted neither by conservatives nor reformists, and failed to establish an independent political current or movement capable of sustaining his influence.

For Al-Raddad, this trajectory demonstrates the resilience of Iran’s authoritarian political system. Rather than eliminating former leaders physically, the system has shown an ability to remove them from meaningful political influence while allowing them to remain publicly present. Ahmadinejad, in his view, represents precisely this model of political neutralization.

His experience demonstrates the resilience of the Iranian regime as an authoritarian system capable of politically eliminating former presidents while leaving them formally alive.

Despite retaining some popularity among segments of Iran’s working class, Al-Raddad believes Ahmadinejad no longer commands sufficient political influence to become a decisive actor in Iran’s future.

I do not believe Ahmadinejad possesses sufficient influence on the ground or a loyal following capable of becoming a meaningful political force inside Iran.

This assessment also casts doubt on the practical intelligence value that Ahmadinejad could provide to a foreign intelligence service. If the allegations were true, Al-Raddad argues, their primary objective would likely be political and psychological rather than operational. Associating a former Iranian president with Mossad would primarily serve to undermine public confidence in Iran’s leadership while reinforcing perceptions of widespread foreign infiltration.

He also recalls Ahmadinejad’s own repeated criticism of Iran’s security establishment, including his widely cited claim that an IRGC counterintelligence unit ultimately discovered its own commander had allegedly been working for Mossad; a statement that itself reflected growing internal distrust.

Intelligence penetration and Iran’s uncertain political future

According to Al-Raddad, the broader significance of the controversy lies not in Ahmadinejad personally but in what it reveals about Iran’s evolving political landscape.

This entire affair exposes the Iranian regime’s internal fragility despite the image of unity projected by its revolutionary rhetoric.

He argues that recent military confrontations involving Israel and the United States (U.S.) have exposed vulnerabilities within the Iranian system while highlighting growing tensions between hardline factions and more pragmatic political figures, including Parliament Speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, President Masoud Pezeshkian, and Foreign Minister (FM) Abbas Araghchi.

These internal divisions have become increasingly visible through accusations that pragmatic politicians are serving Western interests at the expense of Iran’s revolutionary principles. At the center of Iran’s power structure, Al-Raddad says, remains the IRGC, which exercises extensive influence over political, military, and security affairs.

Yet he believes this dominance may not remain permanent. Al-Raddad argues that the relative absence of Iran’s conventional armed forces from major strategic decision-making illustrates the extent of the IRGC’s authority, creating what amounts to a “state within a state.”

“Current operations are being directed almost entirely by the IRGC rather than by Iran’s conventional armed forces.”

From here, Al-Raddad anticipates that if the current regime survives, Iran is likely to undergo profound institutional transformation. These changes could include reducing the authority of the Supreme Leader, redistributing executive powers, or gradually evolving toward a more conventional republican political system with clearer separation between executive, legislative, and judicial institutions.

Much, however, will depend on future developments, including the long-term impact of military strikes against Iran, potential weakening of the IRGC, possible integration of some of its functions into the regular armed forces, the continued rise of pragmatic political currents, and even the possibility of renewed domestic unrest.

While no single scenario can be predicted with certainty, Al-Raddad believes

Iran is entering a period of profound structural change, with the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps likely to emerge as its principal institutional loser.

The alleged Mossad operation

According to recent media reports, Mossad allegedly identified Ahmadinejad’s growing estrangement from Iran’s ruling establishment as an opportunity for recruitment beginning around 2022 or 2023.

The reports claim Israeli operatives held secret meetings with the former president during overseas visits, including trips to Hungary in 2024 and 2025, and even explored the possibility of positioning him as a political figure in a post-Islamic Republic government.

They further allege that the operation culminated during the recent Israeli-American military campaign against Iran, when Ahmadinejad was briefly moved to a clandestine safe house before reportedly abandoning the plan. Parallel plans reportedly included supporting Iranian Kurdish opposition forces based in northern Iraq to establish footholds inside western Iran before advancing toward Tehran.

Regardless of whether the allegations surrounding Mahmoud Ahmadinejad are accurate or not, they have nevertheless highlighted the growing questions about the depth of foreign intelligence penetration, the widening divisions within Iran’s ruling establishment, and the uncertain future of the Islamic Republic’s political structure.