ISRAEL: British Israeli man alarmed to find his name among Dubai assassin suspects; Ireland says passports are fake

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Hours after Dubai authorities released chilling video and passport photos of 11 suspects in the assassination of Hamas arms dealer Mahmoud Mabhouh, countries and at least one individual are coming forward to say the documents appear to be false. That’s hardly surprising given the highly professional manner in which the attack appears to have carried out.

On the outskirts of Jerusalem, Melvyn Adam Mildiner, a British Israeli who moved from London nine years ago, awoke Tuesday to find his name splashed across Israel’s major newspapers alongside someone else’s photo in a mug-shot collage of the alleged hit squad.

“I went to bed with pneumonia and woke up a ‘murderer,’’ he mused to the Jerusalem Post.

Mildiner spent the day fielding phone calls from the press and being ribbed by his friends. But joking aside, he’s worried about what sort of future hassles he might encounter while traveling if Interpol has an arrest warrant in his name.

Officials in Ireland also announced that the three Irish passports apparently used in the assassination were fake.

Israeli officials continue to keep silent regarding suspicions that its spy agency Mossad organized the hit. Some said that last month’s assassination had the hallmarks of a Mossad operation while others wondered if it wasn’t staged to look that way. Meanwhile, the arrest of two Palestinians suspected of meeting with one of the 11 suspects could prove to be an embarrassment for Palestinians. Rival Palestinian factions Fatah and Hamas are both distancing themselves from the arrested men, though neither side will release their names.

Hamas is accusing the Fatah-led Palestinian Authority of collaborating with Israel in the murder of one of its senior operatives.

But now some are wondering if the men won’t turn out to be from Hamas. Palestinian Authority officials have essentially dared Hamas to reveal the names publicly. Meanwhile, Dubai officials are refusing to allow Hamas to take part in the probe.

-- Edmund Sanders in Jerusalem
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