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On July 21 1973, Ahmed Bouchiki, an Algerian-born Moroccan citizen working as a waiter in Lillehammer, Norway, was murdered by Israeli agents of the Mossad intelligence agency.
He was shot 14 times in front of his pregnant Norwegian wife as they returned from a movie. Six Israelis were arrested for the murder. Bouchiki had been mistakenly identified by the Mossad as Ali Hassan Salameh, the "Red Prince", who Israel alleged was the mastermind of the 1972 attack against Israeli athletes at the Munich Olympics. Bouchiki was innocent of any involvement in attacks against Israelis. His murder ranks as one of the Mossad's biggest (known) embarassments to date.
Six Mossad agents received Norwegian court sentences ranging from one to five and a half years, of which they served between seven and 22 months.
The leader of the assassination squad, Michael Harari, escaped punishment and in the 1980s, served as an arms broker for Panamanian strongman Manuel Noriega and right-wing death squads in Colombia, Nicaragua, Guatemala and Honduras.
Two of the Mossad agents involved in killing Bouchiki, Dan Ert and Marianne Gladnikoff, rented cars under their own names. They were arrested when they returned the cars to Oslo airport. Under interrogation, they provided the address of a Mossad safe house and four other agents were arrested. One member of the hit squad was using the identity of Canadian Patricia Roxborough, a legal secretary whose passport had been stolen months earlier from the desk of her Montreal office.
The Israeli government paid compensation to the Bouchiki family but refused to admit responsibility for the murder. Five of the Mossad agents served short terms in prison and were pardoned. Mr Harari and his fellow agent and girlfriend were almost alone in escaping. Another of the Mossad agents married her Norwegian lawyer.
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