World War III 'has begun'

2007-01-27 16:34

Lisbon - A third World War is already underway between Islamic militancy and the West but most people do not realise it, the former head of Israel's intelligence service Mossad said in an interview published on Saturday in Portugal.

"We are in the midst of a third World War," former Mossad chief Efraim Halevy told weekly newspaper Expresso.

"The world does not understand. A person walks through the streets of Tel Aviv, Barcelona or Buenos Aires and doesn't get the sense that there is a war going on," said Hakevey who headed Mossad between 1998 and 2003.

"During World War I and II the entire world felt there was a war. Today no one is conscious of it. From time to time there is a terrorist attack in Madrid, London and New York and then everything stays the same."

Violence by Islamic militants has already disrupted international travel and trade just as in the previous two world conflicts, he said.

Halevy, who was raised in war-time London, predicted it would take at least 25 years before the battle against Islamic fundamentalist terrorism is won and during this time a nuclear strike by Islamic militants was likely.

"It doesn't have to be something very sophisticated, It doesn't have to be the latest nuclear technology, it can be something simple like a dirty bomb which instead of killing millions only kills tens of thousands," he said.

Halevy served as an envoy for former Isreali prime ministers Yitzhak Shamir, Yitzhak Rabin and Shimon Peres and is a former Israeli ambassador to the European Union.

- AFP