Israel-related animal conspiracy theories

What it is

A family of modern rumours holds that Israel sends animals to do its secret work: vultures and eagles fitted with electronics to watch across borders, a shark steered to injure bathers, a dolphin hunting naval divers. The stories surface in newspapers, on television and online, chiefly in Muslim-majority countries of the Middle East, and are usually told as proof of a Zionist plot. They belong to the wider set of conspiracy claims about Israel that credit its government, army and intelligence services with exaggerated powers, a pattern researchers say often carries antisemitic tropes. Unlike a charm or a rite, nothing is performed; the belief is a story about a state's hidden reach. Scientists who examine the captured creatures usually identify ordinary wildlife research gear.

Where it comes from

The oldest cases on record come from Sudan, which decades apart held a white pelican in the early eighties and, before that, an Egyptian vulture in the late seventies, each carrying Israeli migration-tracking gear. The stories drew wide notice after several shark attacks at the Egyptian resort of Sharm el-Sheikh in December 2010. Vulture scares in Saudi Arabia and Sudan, a dead bee-eater in Turkey and a shot-down eagle claimed by Hezbollah in Lebanon followed within a few years. Hamas raised the dolphin claim in 2015, a fresh version of it appeared on video in January 2022, and the pattern is still commented on by journalists today.

How it is done

A typical episode runs the same way. A banded bird crosses a frontier or is found dead, or a shark injures swimmers. Villagers or officials announce that the creature works for Israeli intelligence, and newspapers or television repeat the claim as a Zionist plot. Authorities then inspect the animal. In Turkey a counter-terrorism team, in Saudi Arabia the national security council and in Egypt marine biologists all concluded that the marks and devices were standard research equipment, and detained birds were usually sent home.

Tools and materials

The objects at the centre of the stories are humble. Researchers fit migratory birds with numbered leg bands, some marked in Hebrew, along with wing tags and small GPS loggers, a German-made chip in one young vulture's case; radios and labels mark griffon vultures in an Israeli reintroduction project. Such devices record where an animal travels, and detailed tracks can help watch for bird-borne disease such as the H5N1 flu strain. Believers read the same hardware as cameras or listening gear.

What it is for

Claims about the animals' jobs vary with the teller. A diver on Egyptian television said a device on a shark guided it towards tourists; Hezbollah said eagles gathered intelligence across the Middle East; Hamas and an Iranian news agency described a dolphin, or a robot copy of one, filming and attacking commandos. An agriculture official in Gaziantep suggested a bee-eater's beak could carry audio and video equipment. Commentators read the stories as a way to explain frightening events, fitted to a picture of Israel as all-powerful.

Who does it

Nobody trains for this belief; it lives in talk. It has been voiced by villagers and hunters who catch a strange bird, by a television presenter and his diver guest in Egypt, by columnists and newspapers in Saudi Arabia, Sudan and Lebanon, and by officials: a South Sinai governor first called a Mossad link not out of the question, and the armed groups Hezbollah and Hamas made claims of their own. Against them stand scientists, park rangers, wildlife authorities and some journalists and editors who checked the animals and doubted.

Peoples and places

The stories cluster among Israel's neighbours. In Egypt the trigger was shark attacks off Sharm el-Sheikh that threatened tourism. In Turkey, where the BBC's correspondent says alleged Israeli plots rank among the most widely believed conspiracy claims, villagers in Elazığ Province and near Gaziantep handed in a kestrel and a bee-eater. Saudi Arabia's scare centred on a hunter's catch near Ha'il, which Prince Bandar bin Sultan dismissed. Sudan reported a 'spy' vulture from Kereinek. In Lebanon Hezbollah paraded a shot-down eagle, and villagers at Bint Jbeil tied up a vulture that UN peacekeepers later returned. Iran's Fars News Agency preferred to call a captured dolphin an Israeli robot.

What people believe

Behind the tales sits an image of Israel's intelligence services, often named as Mossad, as able to reach anywhere and command even wild creatures. Amr Yossef of the American University in Cairo traces the pattern to a public misconception in Egypt that Israel is all-powerful, noting that the country also faces serious security problems of its own. On the other side stands the ecologists' view: tagged wildlife is a shared resource, as one Israeli Nature and Parks Authority scientist put it, and spy stories grow from ignorance of ordinary research.

How scholars and sceptics see it

Several writers have weighed in. James Hider, in The Times, saw paranoia among Israel's enemies and nominal friends alike, and noted there is little sign Mossad has ever run animal agents. In the Washington Post, Jackson Diehl argued that outlets repeating the tales earn ridicule, while offering a gentler reading: Israel's actual covert work is nearly as outlandish as the inventions. Jihad el Khazen, in the Lebanese paper Dar Al Hayat, held that conspiracy thinking is no Arab specialty and that people pick explanations to match their prejudices. Gil Yaron, in The Toronto Star, allowed that Israel's forces genuinely employ animals, dogs for bomb detection and alpacas as pack carriers, but judged the spy-shark and spy-bird tales products of imagination.

Compare and confuse

The rumours shade into real military practice, which may lend them plausibility. Israel's army has used pack mules and camels since its founding in 1948, trains llamas that hide soldiers from heat-detection devices, sent anti-tank dogs against a Lebanon headquarters in 1988, and keeps oryx, antelope and Barbary sheep on its bases. Foreign Policy magazine notes that American and Russian militaries have also used dolphins, and that the Israeli-animal genre is nonetheless a busy one of its own.

Today

The pattern is still alive. A masked al-Qassam Brigades spokesman alleged on video in January 2022 that another Israeli dolphin had chased Hamas frogmen. Cross-border encounters sometimes end gently now: UN peacekeepers flew one vulture home in 2016, and the Syrian-held eagle was returned as a goodwill gesture the next year. Ornithologists keep fitting birds with trackers, so tagged birds will keep crossing borders, and the arguments about what that means continue.

Questions people ask about Israel-related animal conspiracy theories

Good reading and sources

• Shark attacks not linked to Mossad says IsraelBBC, Article
• Lebanon returns Israeli vulture cleared of spyingBBC, Article

• Israel-related conspiracy theories on WikipediaEncyclopedia
• Wikidata recordOpen data