Pentagon raises threat of Israeli spying to 'critical': US media

WASHINGTON: The Pentagon has raised its counterintelligence threat level for Israel to its highest level, US media reported on Saturday.

The Pentagon’s Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) said Israel’s “ability to conduct human espionage and technical collection is at a ‘critical level’,” NBC News said, citing US officials.

The move came after concerns that Israel had been attempting to spy on top US officials to get information on “the Trump administration’s internal deliberations and decision-making on the conflicts in the Middle East,” the American network said.

The New York Times cited reports of Israeli efforts to eavesdrop on senior officials, including President Donald Trump’s top negotiator, Steve Witkoff, and the Pentagon’s top policy official, Elbridge Colby.

The United States and Israel launched joint strikes on Iran on February 28, triggering the war.

Since then, Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s relationship appears to be under strain.

Trump unleashed a profanity-laced tirade over the phone at Netanyahu over Israel’s threats to bomb the Lebanese capital Beirut, fearing it would undermine talks with Tehran, the Axios news outlet and ABC News reported earlier in the week.