Germany's former spy chief is facing espionage charges, an embarrassment for Berlin and a fresh strain on its relationship with Israel.

• August Hanning, who once led Germany's foreign intelligence service, is accused of buying classified material and passing it to foreign clients after he retired.
• He was exposed through a bizarre side case: a wealthy heiress allegedly hired former Israeli operatives to snatch her own children from her ex-husband in Denmark.
• Prosecutors say the operation used ex-Mossad personnel; a former Mossad agent has sat in German pre-trial detention for two years, and two other Israelis fled before arrest.
• Israel does not extradite its intelligence people, so those two are unlikely ever to face a German court.
• Major US coverage of the case has pointedly avoided naming which country Hanning allegedly served.

Outlook: The heiress's trial in Hamburg is still running, and Hanning's own case will keep pulling Israeli intelligence operations in Europe into public view.