Pentagon sees growing espionage threat from Israel: Reports

WASHINGTON, (APP - UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 7th Jun, 2026) The Pentagon has raised Israel’s counterintelligence threat level to its highest category, amid growing alarm that Washington’s supposed closest middle East ally is intensifying efforts to spy on senior US officials, according to American media reports.

The warning, reported by NBC news and The New York Times on Saturday, exposes behind the scenes tensions in a relationship Washington often treats as untouchable.

Israel and the United States have long known, and tolerated, that each was spying on the other. But an intensified Israeli effort to learn about U.S. positions in talks with Iran has crossed a line, American officials told the Times.

The Pentagon’s Defence Intelligence Agency (DIA) recently issued the new assessment as tensions grow between the Trump administration and Israel over the Israeli-US war on Iran.

US officials told NBC that the DIA posted an internal message raising Israel’s threat level to “critical”.

The designation signals alarm inside the Pentagon that Israel is working to monitor top US officials and obtain information about internal Trump administration deliberations on wars across the Middle East.

The New York Times reported that US intelligence has focused on Israeli efforts to eavesdrop on senior officials, including Steve Witkoff, Trump’s top negotiator, Elbridge A Colby, the Pentagon’s top policy official, and Michael P DiMino, one of Colby’s main deputies.

Colby has in the past called for a "reset" on the US relationship with Israel.

Israel’s counterintelligence threat level now stands higher than that of any other US ally and even higher than some adversarial states, the Times reported.

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One senior official described Israel’s intelligence collection against top US officials during the second Trump administration as “unhinged”.

The DIA assessment includes a seven-page document and a chart, one US official told NBC. The document says Israel’s ability to conduct human espionage and technical collection has reached a “critical level” and lists specific incidents that sharpened US concern.

Current and former US officials told NBC that Israel’s recent activity has moved far beyond routine espionage between allies.

The warning comes as Israel pushes for deeper military integration with the United States. A provision before Congress would bind the US and Israeli militaries more closely on weapons research, production and technology - a move expected to benefit Israel heavily.

The Pentagon’s assessment could now complicate efforts to expand war planning between US Central Command and Israel, especially if officials restrict the information shared with Israeli officers, it was pointed out.

Since a ceasefire took effect in early April, Trump has pursued diplomacy with Iran to end the war the US and Israel launched on 28 February. Israel has openly pushed for Washington to restart the war.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has pressed for renewed bombing of Iran and clashed with Trump, who has urged him to scale back attacks on Lebanon.

The episode revives a long-running concern in Washington, reports said. In the 1980s, US Navy intelligence analyst Jonathan Pollard spent 30 years in prison after selling suitcases of top-secret documents to Israel.