Two Israeli researchers are claiming that Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas was a KGB agent during the early 1980s.
Two Israeli researchers are claiming that Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas was a KGB agent during the early 1980s.
According to the BBC, Isabella Ginor and Gideon Remez with Hebrew University say they have found a document that identifies the leader by his name.
Remez told Reuters that the brief entry "...starts with the codename of the person, 'Krotov', which is derived from the Russian word for 'mole', and then 'Abbas, Mahmoud, born 1935 in Palestine, member of the central committee of Fatah and the PLO, in Damascus 'agent of the KGB.'"
It was reportedly included in a section titled “KGB developments - Year 1983.”
The pair said that they discovered the evidence at Cambridge University which has reportedly authenticated the document.
The researchers believe that, at the time, Abbas worked under a man named Mikhail Bogdanov who is still active in Middle Eastern diplomacy on behalf of Russia.
According to the BBC, the document was "smuggled in to the UK by a defector called Vasily Mitrokhin."
The Palestinian government has denied these claims, alleging that the research is part of an Israeli “smear campaign.”
