A Ukrainian official with knowledge of the case said al-Aydi is not in the Ukrainian Embassy or its compound in Lebanon. The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the situation, would not say where al-Aydi is — and out of concern for the security of Ukraine’s embassy and its personnel, would not say whether al-Aydi was ever in the embassy, or whether Ukraine helped him escape.

Israel’s intelligence networks

Using human and high-tech surveillance, Israel has cultivated far-reaching intelligence networks in Lebanon. That has helped it carry out dramatic operations against Hezbollah.

In the most elaborate example, Israel infiltrated Hezbollah’s supply chain and sent the Iran-backed militant group thousands of booby-trapped pagers and walkie-talkies. Israel remotely detonated the devices in September 2024, killing at least 37 people. Days later, Israeli airstrikes killed Hezbollah’s longtime leader, Hassan Nasrallah, while he was hiding in a heavily fortified bunker.

Even before that, Israel’s intelligence within Hezbollah allowed it to hit the group’s senior leaders and field commanders “with relative ease,” said Nicholas Blanford, an expert on the militant group at the Atlantic Council.

Since the 2024 Israel-Hezbollah war, Hezbollah and Lebanese authorities have cracked down on alleged spy networks. About 50 people have been convicted and are serving sentences, while others remain under investigation, the judicial officials said.

“We were successful in detecting many spy networks, and the state was also successful in this matter,” Hezbollah political official Wafiq Safa, said. But “the Israelis are always working to recruit young Lebanese people from all communities.”

Al-Aydi doesn’t fit the profile of other alleged spies

Many alleged spy networks have involved current or former Hezbollah members or individuals with family ties to the group.

Al-Aydi, in contrast, was an outsider. He had Ukrainian citizenship through his mother, according to the Lebanese government document AP obtained. It is not known how he was allegedly recruited by Israel.

Hundreds of thousands of Syrians came to Lebanon for refuge during Syria’s 14-year civil war. But Al-Aydi entered the country in August 2025 on a flight from Ethiopia, one of the Lebanese security officials said.

While Hezbollah began in the 1980s as a small guerrilla operation fighting Israel’s occupation of southern Lebanon, it greatly expanded after its 2006 war with Israel, making it “easier for the Israelis to penetrate,” Blanford said. The group’s entry into the Syrian civil war further exposed it, as recruitment standards were lowered, he said.

Lebanon’s economic crisis also aided Israel’s recruitment efforts, Blanford said.

Cases filed in Lebanon’s military court describe operatives being paid between $2,500 and $20,000 to provide intelligence on Hezbollah weapons depots and political offices. Many of the alleged agents were recruited by Israeli handlers through social media, judicial officials said.

One high-profile case was Mohammad Hadi Saleh, a singer and prominent religious performer within circles connected to Hezbollah. He was arrested in May 2025 and charged with providing the Mossad with maps and coordinates of key Hezbollah sites later struck in Israeli operations. He is in jail awaiting trial.

“It’s ironic that they (Hezbollah) were spending a lot of time accusing their opponents of being Israeli spies, and it turns out that the spies were actually from within the organization and its support base,” said Mohanad Hage Ali, a senior fellow at the Malcolm H. Kerr Carnegie Middle East Center in Beirut.

Recruitment efforts continue. During the latest war, Israel has dropped leaflets over Lebanon with QR codes that, according to the Lebanese army, direct people to an Israeli military unit tasked with recruiting agents.

Al-Aydi is thought to have fled the country

Lebanon’s General Security said in October it had broken up a network planning bombings and assassinations in Lebanon, including an operation meant to target events for the one-year commemoration of Nasrallah’s death. Authorities discovered a motorcycle rigged with explosives and a car modified to hold explosives, security and judicial officials said.

Al-Aydi and six others, all Lebanese, were charged. One of the six also escaped, and the others are in a Lebanese jail awaiting trial, the judicial officials said. Only al-Aydi was being held by Hezbollah, likely because he was seen as a high-value catch.

The military court alleges the operation was orchestrated by a Mossad handler living in Germany who communicated with others through encrypted applications. The court sent a summons to the Ukrainian embassy that went unanswered.

Safa said there was an unsuccessful attempt to smuggle al-Aydi out of Lebanon to Syria. He did not elaborate.

The two senior Lebanese security officials said al-Aydi is believed to have left the country. It was not clear whether he crossed into Syria, where officials said they had no information about him.

Alleged spy’s disappearance raises political tensions

Relations between the Lebanese government and Hezbollah are at a low point. The government was angered by the militant group’s unilateral decision to enter another war with Israel, while Hezbollah is furious the government has chosen to negotiate a ceasefire and potentially wider security and political agreement directly with Israel.

Al-Aydi’s escape could exacerbate tensions and put the Lebanese state in a difficult situation.

If Lebanese authorities refused to let al-Aydi leave the country, the U.S. and Ukraine were “well-positioned to exert significant pressure” to secure his release, Hage Ali said. On the other hand, if the state is seen to have let al-Aydi escape, it would face “public anger, predominantly among Lebanese Shia” sympathetic to Hezbollah, which could use that emotion to inflame internal tensions, he said.