A top Syrian suspect accused of torture crimes under the Assad regime was smuggled into Austria by Mossad, the Israeli spy agency, which arranged asylum for him there because he was a double agent, the New York Times reported on Wednesday.
According to the report, which cited nonprofit investigators and prosecutors, Brig. Gen. Khaled al-Halabi, 62, had lived in a Vienna apartment that was paid for by Mossad.
The report came as Halabi was charged in Vienna for torture. He had been held by Austria since December and is the highest-ranking former Syrian official in Europe accused of war crimes.
Another senior former Syrian official, Lt. Col. Musab Abu Rukbah, 53, was also charged Wednesday, but the NY Times said was not clear if he has been detained by Austrian authorities.
The charges relate to their activities in suppressing an uprising in Raqqa during the Arab Spring uprising from 2011 to 2013 against the Assad regime.
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Halabi joined Syrian intelligence in 2001 and, in 2008, was given responsibility for Security Branch 335 in Raqqa, the newspaper said. When anti-government protests broke out in 2011, the security services worked to find the organizers and those passing videos to international media, torture victims have said.
Victims have described being tortured in the branch Halabi led, with one saying he was abused for hours in his office, though not by Halabi himself, but by Abu Rukbah.
Halabi was a double agent working for Mossad, according to the report. He left Syria in 2013 for Turkey and then, via Jordan, headed to Paris in 2015 but later fled when French authorities began probing asylum applicants over possible war crimes.
???? ???????????????? War criminal who was a Mossad agent?
The prosecution in Austria yesterday filed a serious indictment against Khaled al-Khalabi, the highest-ranking officer of the Assad regime who is on trial in Europe for serious crimes committed during the civil war. According to the… pic.twitter.com/XtQpnBBEmC
— Shield Of Truth (@Zion_Report) November 13, 2025
Mossad and a group of Austrian intelligence officers aided Halabi in traveling by car from the French capital to the Austrian border. Halabi was taken to Vienna, and he hid out in an apartment paid for by Mossad.
The Austrian officers’ part in the affair was later discovered — prosecutors said they acted on their own initiative — and they were charged in 2023 with abuse of office for arranging Halabi’s asylum under a deal with Mossad. Prosecutors said that the head of Austria’s domestic intelligence agency, BVT, had made a trip to Israel in 2015 when the deal on cooperation was reached.
Prosecutors in the case said Mossad requested that Halabi be brought to Austria as he had been an agent for the spy agency.
Four of the defendants were eventually acquitted due to a lack of evidence that they harmed the state, and the fifth was not at the trial due to health issues.
In January 2016, the Austrian Justice Ministry began searching for Halabi after receiving information about his alleged torture crimes from activists. The search led to suspicions that the country’s intelligence service was hiding him.
“The Austrian government and intelligence service helped Mossad and helped their war criminals,” said Asyad Almousa, a lawyer who was tortured in a Syrian prison. “This is the worst level of criminality.”
The Israeli government and Mossad did not respond to questions about Halabi, the NY Times said. The Austrian Interior Ministry and Justice Ministry said they do not comment on specific cases due to privacy issues.
Austria’s public prosecutor’s office in Vienna did not give Halabi or Abu Rukbah’s names when announcing the indictments, but, according to the report, attorneys and victims identified the two men.
Prosecutors who filed the indictment against Halabi said in a statement that 21 torture victims have been identified.
Both men deny the charges, and lawyers for them could not be reached for comment on the charges, the NY Times said.
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