Israel intercepted communications involving U.S. negotiators who were carrying out consultations with Iran. In response, the Pentagon upped its counterintelligence threat level from Israel to critical, informed sources say. This incident points to growing rifts between Washington and Tel Aviv against the backdrop of Israel’s escalating military operations in Lebanon.
As reported by the media, citing several current and former U.S. officials, the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) and other military intelligence units recently wrapped up an assessment, as a result of which the counterintelligence threat level from Israel was raised from high to critical. Although the U.S. and Israel have long been aware of each other’s intelligence-gathering operations and had largely let them slide, the current administration has concluded that Israel’s attempts to get at Washington’s strategic thinking during negotiations with Iran crossed a line.
According to the DIA’s report, Israel has stepped up its surveillance of senior U.S. officials, including Steve Witkoff – the White House’s special envoy for the Middle East, who is leading talks with Iran – and Elbridge Colby, the Pentagon’s undersecretary of defense for policy. The document was drawn up shortly after the discovery of spyware that had been covertly planted on the mobile phones of U.S. service members stationed in Israel.
By some accounts, the current U.S. administration believes that Israel poses a more serious counterintelligence threat than any other U.S. ally – and in some respects an even greater one than certain adversaries. This raises the question: might the Pentagon scale back how much intelligence it shares with Israel? One senior official said that since Donald Trump’s second presidential term got under way, Israel’s intelligence-gathering efforts targeting top U.S. officials have reached – in his words – an “unbridled” level. The Pentagon declined to comment.