Lebanese Prime Minister Saad Hariri’s resignation Nov. 4 caught even Israeli intelligence by surprise. His disappearance in Saudi Arabia made the incident all the more mysterious. Embarrassingly, no one in Israel's intelligence community had a precise explanation in real time for this series of remarkable events, which caught the entire Middle East off guard.
"There is contradictory intelligence regarding financial debts," a senior Israeli intelligence official told Al-Monitor last week on condition of anonymity, in the middle of Israel's ongoing efforts to unravel the mystery surrounding Hariri's resignation. On Nov. 13, a senior Israeli Cabinet member told Al-Monitor on condition of anonymity, "Based on what we know, Hariri got into some trouble with the Saudis for his behavior. He also owes them lots of money. It is possible that he promised to deal with Hezbollah for them, but he didn't actually come through on this. At some point, they got fed up with him."
As to the question of whether he is being detained in Saudi Arabia against his will, the senior minister responded, "They handed him an offer he couldn't refuse. They also asked him to decide where he stands."