Shamron found no fault in this; in fact, he wholeheartedly approved. Lying, he said, was a distinctly human endeavor, even when it was being done by professionals. And a lie that was too well told was one not easily believed. Initially, there was confusion over precisely what had occurred at sunset in the narrow street outside the Stadttempel. The first bulletins on Austrian radio reported that a pair of gunmen had killed four Jewish men outside the synagogue in what appeared to be an act of right-wing extremist violence. The situation was muddied further when an obscure neo-Nazi group proudly claimed responsibility for the deed. Jonas Kessler’s first instinct was to quickly correct the story. But Shamron and Uzi Navot prevailed upon him to let it linger until nine that evening, when he finally appeared in the Interior Ministry’s press briefing room to reveal the truth—or at least the truth as he saw it. Yes, Kessler began, there had indeed been a shooting at the synagogue, but the four dead were suicide bombers from Hezbollah who had come to Vienna to carry out a murderous terrorist attack.
