Pentagon raises Israel espionage threat to highest level amid Iran talks concerns

The newspaper reported that while Washington and Tel Aviv have long been aware of and generally tolerated mutual espionage activities, recent Israeli efforts to obtain information about US strategy toward Tehran have triggered growing concern within the American intelligence community.

According to the report, the Israeli regime’s intelligence agencies have intensified attempts to monitor senior US officials, including President Donald Trump’s special envoy Steve Witkoff, Under Secretary of Defense for Policy Elbridge Colby, and his deputy Michael P. DiMino IV.

US officials said the Israeli regime is particularly interested in understanding Trump’s negotiating strategy toward Iran, despite extensive tactical and operational intelligence sharing between the two allies.

A senior American official described the regime’s intelligence activities during Trump’s second administration as unhinged.

Separately, NBC News reported, citing two current and one former US officials, that the Pentagon recently raised the counterintelligence threat level posed by the Israeli regime to its highest category, reflecting increasing concerns over espionage activities.

The heightened alert comes amid differences between President Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu over the war with Iran and the regime’s operations in Lebanon. Trump recently acknowledged telling reporters that he had called Netanyahu crazy during a phone conversation.

Despite their close alliance and decades of intelligence cooperation, former US officials warned that concerns over Israeli spying at a time of disagreements over Iran could undermine trust between Washington and Tel Aviv and complicate future security coordination./irna