ABBY SEWELL & SALLY ABOU ALJOUD
As Israeli warplanes pounded Beirut’s southern suburbs last March and residents fled in panic, one man found his opportunity. Amid the chaos, he slipped out of his imprisonment in a Hezbollah cell and made his way to the green hills overlooking the Lebanese capital.
There, in the posh diplomatic quarter of Baabda, he disappeared inside the gates of the Ukrainian Embassy. Where he is now remains a mystery, tangled up in an ongoing spy game as Hezbollah attempts to root out Israeli intelligence operatives who have infiltrated the militant group.
The man identified by Lebanese officials as Khaled al-Aydi is said to be a Palestinian refugee from Syria who also holds Ukrainian citizenship. He had been detained by Hezbollah and accused by Lebanese officials of being part of a thwarted Israeli intelligence plot to carry out bombings and assassinations.
Details of al-Aydi’s escape and a Lebanese military court’s case against him were provided by Lebanese judicial, security and Hezbollah officials on condition of anonymity.
Al-Aydi’s disappearance could have political implications for the Lebanese government, which has largely remained silent. If evidence emerges that al-Aydi escaped Lebanon with government help, it could inflame tensions with Hezbollah’s largely Shiite Muslim base. The government already faces scrutiny for directly negotiating with Israel, which has been engaged in fierce fighting with Hezbollah since the early days of the Iran war.
The Ukrainian embassy asked Lebanese authorities in March to facilitate al-Aydi’s departure, according to a Lebanese government document obtained by The Associated Press. But Lebanon’s General Security agency refused, citing a judicial arrest warrant issued in September 2025.
Israel’s Mossad intelligence agency and Ukraine’s Foreign Ministry declined to comment. A Ukrainian official said al-Aydi is not in the Ukrainian Embassy compound but would not say where he is, or whether Ukraine helped him escape.
Using human and high-tech surveillance, Israel has cultivated far-reaching intelligence networks in Lebanon to carry out dramatic operations. In the most elaborate example, Israel infiltrated Hezbollah’s supply chain and sent the militant group thousands of booby-trapped pagers and walkie-talkies. Israel remotely detonated the devices in September 2024, killing at least 37 people. Days later, Israeli airstrikes killed Hezbollah’s longtime leader, Hassan Nasrallah.
Even before that, Israel’s intelligence allowed it to hit senior leaders “with relative ease”, said Nicholas Blanford, an expert at the Atlantic Council.
Since the 2024 war, Hezbollah and Lebanese authorities have cracked down on alleged spy networks. About 50 people have been convicted, judicial officials said.
Many alleged spy networks involved individuals with ties to Hezbollah. Al-Aydi, in contrast, was an outsider who held Ukrainian citizenship through his mother. It is not known how he was recruited.
Al-Aydi entered the country in August 2025 on a flight from Ethiopia, a Lebanese security official said.
While Hezbollah began as a small guerrilla operation, it greatly expanded after its 2006 war with Israel, making it “easier for the Israelis to penetrate”, Blanford said. The group’s entry into the Syrian civil war further exposed it as recruitment standards were lowered. Lebanon’s economic crisis also aided recruitment.
Military court cases describe operatives being paid between $2,500 and $20,000 to provide intelligence on weapons depots and political offices, often recruited through social media. One high-profile case was Mohammad Hadi Saleh, a prominent religious performer connected to Hezbollah circles. He was arrested in May 2025, charged with providing maps of key sites to Mossad.
“It’s ironic that they were spending a lot of time accusing their opponents of being Israeli spies, and it turns out that the spies were actually from within the organisation,” said Mohanad Hage Ali, a senior fellow at the Malcolm H Kerr Carnegie Middle East Center.
Lebanon’s General Security said in October it had broken up a network planning bombings, including an operation targeting the one-year commemoration of Nasrallah’s death.
Al-Aydi and six Lebanese individuals were charged. Only al-Aydi was held by Hezbollah, likely because he was seen as a high-value catch. The military court alleges the operation was orchestrated by a Mossad handler in Germany.
Hezbollah official Wafiq Safa said there was an unsuccessful attempt to smuggle al-Aydi to Syria. However, two senior Lebanese security officials said al-Aydi is now believed to have left the country entirely.
If the state is seen to have let al-Aydi escape, it would face public anger among Lebanese Shia sympathetic to Hezbollah, exacerbating internal political tensions.