How the woman set to be Israel's new leader earned her spurs as an agent working for a covert cell in an elite spy unit
It is an eye-catching episode on the CV of any would-be prime minister: a dangerous, youthful stint as a spy in one of the world's most respected and feared secret services.
True to her training, Tzipi Livni, the Israeli leader-in-waiting, has maintained a Sphinx-like silence about her Mossad career in Paris in the early 1980s. Consequently, reports on her service have pegged her as anything from a frontline agent hunting down Arab terrorists across Europe to a mere house-sitter deployed to provide a respectable front for Mossad safe houses in the French capital.
Mossad does not divulge details but The Times can reveal that Ms Livni ran substantial risks as an Israeli agent operating in a covert cell in Europe.
