Series 5 Episode 7 (Spooks)

Infobox Spooks episode
episode_name = Series 5, Episode 7
writer = Raymound Khoury
director = Andy Hay
script_editor =
producer = Andrew Woodhead
executive_producer = Simon Crawford Collins/Jane Featherstone
series = Five
episode = Seven
length = approximately 58 mins
UK date = 23/10/06
US date =
preceding = Series 5, Episode 6
following = Series 5, Episode 8
imdb_id =

Plot

The gunmen make demands for the release of al Qaeda prisoners, which leads MI5 to believe they are Islamic extremists. However, when it emerges that the 'suicide bombers' actually had fake bomb belts made of putty, MI5 question whether the attacks are really al Qaeda's 'style': furthermore, they think it convenient that the people on their top-priority watchlist are the ones to have carried out the fake bombings, and odd that al-Qaeda would attempt to stop the nuclear deal rather than let it go through and then seize the country once the plutonium had arrived there. This leads them to believe that there is a mole in the team who is divulging information to the gunmen in the trade centre, and coordinating the fake bombers to achieve maximum possible distraction.

Sally is discovered dead at her home, and when it's revealed that the watchlist information had been copied from her computer to a USB drive, the team presume that she was the mole. However, Jo persists with the investigation, and discovers that it was actually the heavily pro-Israeli member of the team, Neil (who had lost his Israeli wife in a suicide bombing in Israel) who leaked the information and killed Sally. Adam orders a lockdown at Thames House and pursues Neil, but Neil locks himself in a room and commits suicide with a cyanide capsule. The team then realise that the gunmen in the trade centre are not Islamic terrorists, but Yemenite Jewish Israeli Mossad operatives. They are trying either to stop the nuclear technology deal with Saudi Arabia, one of their enemies, or to cause country to rip itself apart should the monarchy cave in and release the prisoners.

An immediate SAS assault is ordered, against Harry's orders. However, the team realise that Mossad is not a suicide organisation but always finds its operatives an escape route. Therefore, in secret (as there may also be a mole in the SAS as there was in MI5), Adam gathers a small SAS team, which enters the trade centre at the same time as the main assault by blowing up a wall in the basement next to a disused passageway of "Wells Lane" London Underground station. Having been warned by Harry's Israeli opposite number of the SAS assault, this is the route by which the Mossad men, after booby-trapping the room with the hostages and covering the hostages' heads, intended to escape, and they arrive as the SAS explosives go off. Adam's team guns down all but one of the Mossad operatives. The remaining one evades them for a while until Adam catches him in the basement and beats him unconscious. The Prime Minister announces that "the Saudi government showed great courage in resisting the demands of the terrorists, and therefore the nuclear deal will continue". After a meeting between Harry and his Israeli opposite number, the survivor (who cannot be revealed in case of an international outcry) is sent to Camp X-Ray.

Cast

Guest stars

* Anna Chancellor - Juliet Shaw
* Matt Day - Neil Sternin
* Saskia Reeves - Sally Bernard
* Dhafer L'Abidine - Sharaf
* Ian Bartolemhew - Minister for Trade Daniel Wise MP
* Raad Rawi - Saudi Ambassador
* Alex Caan - Prince Khaldoon
* Simon Kassianides - Mourad
* Davood Ghadami - Prince Wissam
* Constantine Gregory - Uri

External links

* [http://www.bbc.co.uk/drama/spooks/series5_ep7.shtml BBC site]