Spies of No Country

Secret Lives at the Birth of Israel

By: Matti Friedman

Narrated by: Simon Vance

Award-winning writer Matti Friedman's tale of Israel's first spies has all the tropes of an espionage novel, including duplicity, betrayal, disguise, clandestine meetings, the bluff, and the double bluff - but it's all true.

The four spies at the center of this story were part of a ragtag unit known as the Arab Section, conceived during World War II by British spies and Jewish militia leaders in Palestine. Intended to gather intelligence and carry out sabotage and assassinations, the unit consisted of Jews who were native to the Arab world and could thus easily assume Arab identities. In 1948, with Israel's existence in the balance during the War of Independence, our spies went undercover in Beirut, where they spent the next two years operating out of a kiosk, collecting intelligence, and sending messages back to Israel via a radio whose antenna was disguised as a clothesline. While performing their dangerous work these men were often unsure to whom they were reporting, and sometimes even who they'd become. Of the dozen spies in the Arab Section at the war's outbreak, five were caught and executed. But in the end the Arab Section would emerge, improbably, as the nucleus of the Mossad, Israel's vaunted intelligence agency.

©2019 Matti Friedman (P)2019 HighBridge, a division of Recorded Books

Excellent Book

This is a great story and well told. I would definitely recommend it. good performance as well.

History's Unknown Heroes

Interesting story brought to life skilfully. quite an enjoyable listen. I wish it was a little longer. I was really enjoying the story and was sad it was over.

Critical background

The author in the story gets reader some great insight on how the past the 1930s in the 1940s I’ve influenced the affairs in the middle East of today

Hear what Israel is

This is a unique book. The nature of the spies contradicts modern imagining. The story as the author insists is as much about the composition of modern Israel as the spies of the title. The shared pathos of the two enemies, the Arab Muslims and the Arab Jews whose country became Israel the author draws out in poignant stories.

Incredible story. Deeply human.

Not your typical spy biography. These portraits are beautifully drawn and deeply moving. These people were humans and this narrative honestly depicts heroic exploits without aggrandizing or trying to tear them down.