Ben Zygier, the Australian-born Mossad agent known as Prisoner X, unwittingly scuppered an operation to repatriate the bodies of three Israeli soldiers missing in Lebanon for three decades, according to an ABC report.

Tuesday night’s report claimed Zygier’s attempts to impress his Mossad superiors backfired spectacularly, prompting the spy agency to abort its mission to repatriate the bodies of the soldiers, Zachary Baumel, Tzvi Feldman and Yehuda Katz, who died during Israel’s invasion in 1982.

Zygier apparently blew the cover of the secret operation by exposing Ziad al-Homsi, a former commander of Lebanese forces in the Bekka Valley, as a Mossad agent, according to ABC.

The mission was exposed after Zygier, who was trying to turn a Hizbollah contact into a Mossad agent, revealed al-Homsi’s name.

The Hizbollah agent told Lebanese intelligence sources that al-Homsi was an informer, and he was soon arrested and jailed, blowing the entire operation to repatriate the corpses.

Zygier was arrested in January 2010 by Shin Bet and jailed in secrecy until he took his life 10 months later.