The following version of the novel was used to create this study guide: Silva, Daniel. The Black Widow. Harper, July 12, 2016. Kindle.

In The Black Widow by Daniel Silva, Israeli spy and assassin Gabriel Allon attempted to outsmart Saladin, the leader of ISIS by embedding a spy in that organization. Even though Natalie Mizrahi, the woman he recruited for the job, got closer to Saladin than Gabriel had ever imagined she would be able to, she was given no information about an attack ISIS had planned for the United States. Unable to stop the attack on America, Gabriel and his team members hurried to save Natalie, who had been discovered as a traitor, before it was too late.

After having faked his death so that he could get revenge on the terrorists who killed his young son and seriously injured his wife, Gabriel was trying to put his life back together. He had married again and was the father of infant twins. He was busy reconstructing a painting he had found on one of his spy missions when he learned the news that his friend Hannah Weinberg, had been killed in an ISIS attack in France. She had left him her Van Gogh painting, but the French would not release it to Gabriel unless he agreed to hunt down and kill the people who had ordered the attack.

Hoping to get an inside look at how ISIS operated and perhaps even learn plans for the next attack, Gabriel gave Natalie a cover identity as an Islamic woman and arranged for her to be recruited into ISIS. Because she was a doctor, Natalie was taken to care for Saladin after he was critically injured in a bombing. Natalie hopes Saladin will take her into his confidence, but he never does. After he is out of danger, Natalie is returned to Paris where she is told to wait for her assignment from ISIS.

Several months later Natalie was sent a plane ticket to America and reservations in a Washington hotel. Natalie and the other intelligence officers assume the devastating attack that Saladin has threatened will be taking place on American soil. However, Natalie has still not been given any idea what her target is or what she will be doing. It was only after the terrorist attacks began that Gabriel realized Saladin might have outsmarted him by using Natalie as a decoy to distract them from the real activity.

Meanwhile, Natalie was taken to a cottage where she was confronted by Saladin who told her that he knew she has betrayed him. Because of her treachery, he ordered her to be beheaded. Before she was killed, he questioned her in an attempt to determine her real identity and the agency for which she worked. Natalie lied in response to his questions. Gabriel and Mikhail located Natalie just seconds before she was to be killed.