Red Sea Spies: The True Story of Mossad’s Fake Holiday Resort

BBC journalist Berg’s outstanding debut reveals the true story of a secret Israeli operation to bring Ethiopian Jews to Israel, using a fake holiday resort as a base of operations. Ethiopian Jews had long been cut off from the rest of the world, living in poverty and oppression, and many of them faced hardship and death to walk across the border to Sudan, where they wound up in horrific refugee camps. One such Jew, Ferede Aklum, sent telegrams to aid agencies asking for help, and Israel’s intelligence agency, the Mossad, launched Operation Brothers in Sudan, run by a Mossad agent named Dani with assistance from Aklum. As part of the scheme, Dani created a false company to lease an abandoned diving resort on the Red Sea from the Sudanese government and used it for years as a base to smuggle out people via airlifts and ships. Between 1979 and 1983, Operation Brothers relocated 28,695 Ethiopian Jews to Israel. Berg’s moving, well-researched book stands as the definitive account of this heroic rescue mission. It deserves a wide readership. (Apr.)