Shai established in 1940, was the intelligence and counter-espionage

Counter-Espionage

-Cast:* Warren William as Michael Lanyard* Eric Blore as Jamison* Hillary Brooke as Pamela Hart* Thurston Hall as Insp. Crane* Fred Kelsey as Detective Wesley Dickens* Forrest Tucker as Anton Schugg* Matthew Boulton as Inspector J...

 arm of the Haganah

Haganah

Haganah was a Jewish paramilitary organization in what was then the British Mandate of Palestine from 1920 to 1948, which later became the core of the Israel Defense Forces.- Origins :...

 and the forebear of the Military Intelligence Directorate in Mandate Palestine.

During World War II

World War II

World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...

 the British Special Operations Executive

Special Operations Executive

The Special Operations Executive was a World War II organisation of the United Kingdom. It was officially formed by Prime Minister Winston Churchill and Minister of Economic Warfare Hugh Dalton on 22 July 1940, to conduct guerrilla warfare against the Axis powers and to instruct and aid local...

 supplied the Haganah with weapons, training and funding, and the Haganah provided linguistic experts and operatives. The British provided commando

Commando

In English, the term commando means a specific kind of individual soldier or military unit. In contemporary usage, commando usually means elite light infantry and/or special operations forces units, specializing in amphibious landings, parachuting, rappelling and similar techniques, to conduct and...

 training for special operations to both Shai operatives and FOSH veterans through a training school designated ME 102, which was set up by MI4

MI4

MI4 was a department of the British Directorate of Military Intelligence, Section 4, part of the War Office. It was responsible for aerial reconnaissance and interpretation. It developed into the present day JARIC agency.-History:...

.

Following the defeat of Nazi Germany

Nazi Germany

Nazi Germany , also known as the Third Reich , but officially called German Reich from 1933 to 1943 and Greater German Reich from 26 June 1943 onward, is the name commonly used to refer to the state of Germany from 1933 to 1945, when it was a totalitarian dictatorship ruled by...

, "... until 1948 the SHAI's primary objectives included the promoting of an independent Israeli state; infiltrating British mandate offices in order to inform the Jewish and Zionist leadership of British attitudes and proposed actions; collecting political information that could be used as propaganda

Propaganda

Propaganda is a form of communication that is aimed at influencing the attitude of a community toward some cause or position so as to benefit oneself or one's group....

; penetrating Arab and anti-Zionist factions in Palestine and abroad; and providing security for the arms-smuggling and illegal immigration programmes of the Haganah."

David Shaltiel

David Shaltiel

David Shaltiel was an Israeli military and intelligence officer, later also diplomat, and was most well known for being the district commander of the Haganah in Jerusalem during the 1948 Arab-Israeli war.He was born in Berlin into a Portuguese orthodox Jewish family settled in Hamburg.At 16,...

 was appointed head of SHAI in April 1946, he was succeeded by Isser Be'eri

Isser Be'eri

Isser Be'eri was the director of the Haganah Intelligence Service in Israel and was responsible for helping to reorganise Israeli intelligence services in 1948, as well as knowingly ordering the execution of an innocent man, Meir Tobianski...

 in February 1948.

By 1948 Shai had 68 staff members, 60 British and Jewish agents, 80 Arab agents, and spent almost $700,000 per year. It was responsible for protecting Ta'as, the clandestine munitions industry and Rekhesh

Rekhesh

Rekhesh was the arms and munitions procurement branch of the Haganah Jewish defence force in Mandate Palestine.Rekhesh stole arms from British and Allied military bases, bought weapons on the black market and imported them from legitimate suppliers.The organisation was expert at modifying,...

, the arms procurement organisation.

Famous Shai operatives included Reuven Shiloah

Reuven Shiloah

Reuven Shiloah was the first Director of the Mossad from 1949 to 1952. Born in Ottoman ruled Jerusalem as Reuven Zaslanski, he would later shorten his last name to Zaslani and use the codeword Shiloah. From an Orthodox Jewish family and with a rabbi for a father, Shiloah abandoned the religious...

 and Nahum Admoni

Nahum Admoni

Nahum Admoni was the Director of the Mossad from 1982 to 1989. Born in Jerusalem to Polish immigrants, he fought in the 1948 Arab-Israeli War in the SHAI, the Haganah intelligence branch, and later in the newly created Israeli Defense Force Intelligence...

. The Shai was one of five intelligence agencies set up by David Ben-Gurion

David Ben-Gurion

' was the first Prime Minister of Israel.Ben-Gurion's passion for Zionism, which began early in life, led him to become a major Zionist leader and Executive Head of the World Zionist Organization in 1946...

, the others being the internal security agency Shin Bet, the Aliyah Bet, responsible for smuggling immigrants, and the police intelligence forces.