BEIRUT, Lebanon, March 17 (UPI) -- The secret intelligence war between Iran and its allies Hezbollah and Hamas on one side and the United States and Israel on the other is likely to heat up in the months ahead.
Right now, Iran's intelligence apparatus seems to be ahead with the Feb. 23 capture of one of the country's most wanted fugitives, Abdulmalik Rigi, leader of a Sunni militant group called Jundallah, or Soldiers of God.
The group, with an estimated 1,000 fighters, has been battling Tehran since 2005 in the southeastern province of Sistan-Baluchistan on the Afghan border.
In an apparently flawless operation, Iranian fighter aircraft reportedly intercepted a Kyrgyz airliner carrying Rigi from Dubai in the United Arab Emirates to Bishkek, capital of Kyrgyzstan. It was forced down in the southern port city of Bandar Abbas.
That was a major coup for the Tehran regime, the more so because it followed the fiasco of the Jan. 19 assassination of Hamas chieftain Mahmoud al-Mabhouh, who worked closely with Iran, in Dubai.
Although Mabhouh was killed and his assassins escaped, Dubai authorities were able to produce a highly detailed account of the killing in a luxury hotel, complete with closed-circuit television footage of the assassination team, along with their aliases, forged passports and flight details in and out of the Gulf emirate.
As intelligence operations go, it was seen as a major blunder because up to 27 agents had covers blown, with Dubai's police chief saying he was "99 percent" convinced that the Israeli intelligence service Mossad was behind the assassination.
In the Middle East, where perceptions of strength and power are immensely important, this left the Israelis and by default their ally, the United States, looking like bumbling amateurs.
The sharp increase in tension between Israel and the United States over settlement-building in the West Bank, seen as the worst rift between the Jewish state and its strategic ally in 30 years, has also played into the hands of Tehran.
The intelligence confrontation is taking place amid smoldering tension over Iran's nuclear ambitions and is seen in some quarters as the prelude to a war that could engulf much of the Middle East.
Capturing Rigi was of vital importance to Tehran. Jundallah's operations were becoming a major security problem.
Jundallah, which may now collapse, says it has been fighting for the rights of Sistan-Baluchistan's overwhelmingly Sunni population against the oppression of the Shiite regime.
Tehran claims the group was funded by the CIA to destabilize the Islamic Republic, a program intensified amid the widespread protest movement that has sprung up since the disputed re-election of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in June 2009.
In recent years, revolts have broken out in other non-Shiite provinces on Iran's periphery, all seen by Tehran as a coordinated U.S.-instigated campaign to bring about regime change.
Iran has made big propaganda out of Rigi's alleged confessions that he was controlled by the CIA, had meetings with U.S. officials who promised military aid and a base in western Afghanistan near the border with Iran.
According to Iran's media, he said: "One of the CIA officers said it was too difficult for us (the United States) to attack Iran militarily but we plan to give aid and support to all anti-Iran groups that have the capability to wage war and create difficulty for the Iranian system."
Washington has denied involvement with Jundallah. But Western and Middle Eastern intelligence circles find such allegations credible and in line with long-held U.S. efforts at regime change in Tehran.
The Israelis, for instance, are reported to be active among Iran's Kurds, who are also fighting Tehran. The intelligence services of Saudi Arabia and Pakistan are reputed to be involved with Jundallah.
The Iranians have long sought to eliminate Rigi. But their campaign went into high gear after Oct. 18, when Jundallah suicide bombers killed 41 Iranians and Baluchi elders at a reconciliation meeting hosted by the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps.
The fatalities included seven IRGC generals, one of them Gen. Nour-Ali Shoushtari, deputy commander of the corps' ground forces who headed the IRGC campaign against Jundallah.
As Iran's intelligence agents, infiltrating Jundallah and tapping into old tribal espionage networks set up decades ago, tightened the ring, Tehran ordered that Rigi be taken alive so he could be seen as being in Iran's power and to humiliate his alleged U.S. masters.
The Middle East waits to see who'll make the next move.
