Joerg Haider, arguably the first European 'populist' of the modern era
Mossad used Peter Sichrovsky, one of Haidar's closest aides, to gather information on his contacts with Arab dictators. Sichrovsky said he had been a Mossad informant for five years until retiring from politics in 2002.
"I wanted to help Israel and certainly did not do anything wrong," said Sichrovsky, who was secretary-general of Haider's Freedom Party and a member of the European Parliament.
The Austrian state prosecutor said Wednesday he would open an investigation to determine whether Sichrovsky should be prosecuted. Spying for a foreign power carries in Austria a jail sentence of up to three years.
The revelations, in the news weekly Profil, stunned the Austrian political class. The Jewish community had regarded Sichrovsky as a traitor, while anti-Semitic Freedom Party activists made no secret of their distrust.
The Freedom Party became a member of Austria's governing coalition in 1999, prompting a diplomatic boycott by the European Union. Haider had publicly praised the SS and Hitler's employment policies. Israel withdrew its ambassador.
Comment: Three years later, following his most successful election result in 2008, he was dead.
This is not to suggest that it was necessarily the Israelis who took him out in a covert assassination. They would not have been the only ones with means and motive.
Nevertheless, it's interesting that Mossad, spying operations, and Austrian 'far-right' leaders have a colorful recent history, given what happened in Vienna last week...