U.S. officials believed Israel was plotting to kill Iranian negotiators

> In April, Mr. Ghalibaf was set to travel to Islamabad to meet with Vice President JD Vance. But Iranian security officials were concerned that Israel would use the opportunity to assassinate Mr. Ghalibaf or Mr. Araghchi to derail the talks, the officials said.

> Iranians sought guarantees from the United States, through Pakistani and Qatari intermediaries, that Israel would not carry out any covert operations targeting the Iranian delegation, the officials said.

> Pakistani fighter jets escorted the Iranian airplanes carrying a delegation of more than 70 Iranians from the border of Iran to Islamabad and back again when the session was over.

> But on the way back to Tehran, an Israeli security threat emerged.

> Iran’s security forces notified the plane carrying Mr. Ghalibaf back to Tehran that they had picked up intelligence that Israel planned to attack the plane and that two Israeli fighter jets had entered Iran’s airspace from its western border near Iraq, the two officials said.

> Mahdi Mohammadi, a senior adviser for Mr. Ghalibaf, who accompanied him to Islamabad, confirmed this account on his social media page. The plane made an emergency landing in the city of Mashhad, Iran’s closest airport to the Pakistani border, and the Iranian delegation traveled some eight hours by land back to Tehran, Mr. Mohammadi and the two officials said.

Belligerence, perfidy, and I don't even know the term for that last part, it's so unheard-of. We have violated rules of warfare that were already old thousands of years ago.

At what point do we admit we're the bad guys?

"America First" brought to you by "The Peace President"[1].

[1] https://xcancel.com/WhiteHouse/status/1976081153699508480

I am giving the NYT the credibility that they thoroughly check their sources, so the question is why would anyone from the US Government want this to be publicly available information?

It makes all involved parties look like idiots.

This report basically says that the us administration currently has terrible intelligence relationships with Israel, if they have not been informed officially as a direct strategic partner in the Iran war over the planned operation. It’s kinda important if your ally plans to blow up the people you negotiate your own peace deal with, don’t you think?

It also means that the "we don’t spy on allies", Americans, indeed spy on allies. I’m absolutely shocked. Shocked, I tell you.

How else do you get in possession of information that your war ally didn’t seem necessary to share, if not by spying?

It also says that Mossad/IDF leaks at the highest level because the assassination of government officials who are actively brokering a peace deal is a kind of very high-level decision.

Still, if this actually happened this way, it’s not a power play to make this public, it is dumb. But dumb is the signature move of the current US administration, so it makes the report even more believable.

Will be interesting to see how this develops.

Am I the only one?

I’d love to harp on Israel I don’t even mind being called an anti-Semite or whatever, but give some decent justification why this keeps coming up on Hacker News of all places.

“First they come for the Saturday people”