US intelligence officer indicted after Israel's attack plan against Iran leaked | CIA

A U.S. intelligence official has been charged with espionage offenses following an investigation last month into the leak of top-secret documents detailing Israel's plans for military attacks on Iran.

Asif W. Rahman, who works for the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), will appear in court in Guam on Thursday and is charged with two counts of intentionally storing and disseminating information for national defense, The New York Times reported Wednesday.

The newspaper said FBI agents arrested Rahman in Cambodia on Tuesday after he entered charges in federal court in Virginia last week.

In October, the White House said it was “deeply concerned” about the unauthorized release of papers attributed to the US National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency (NGA) and the National Security Agency that were posted on the messaging app Telegram.

The documents concerned Israel's military planning for a retaliatory strike against Iran after the October 1 rocket fire, which marked Tehran's largest-ever attack on its regional opponent and an escalation of the Middle East conflict sparked by Hamas' terrorist attacks on Israel in October 2023 became.

The first document was titled “Israel: The Air Force continues to prepare for an attack on Iran and conducts a second large force deployment exercise” and the second read “Israel: The Defense Forces continue to prepare critical munitions and covert drones.” “ [unmanned aerial vehicle] activity almost certainly for an attack on Iran.”

The NGA collects and analyzes information from U.S. spy satellites for the Department of Defense. Rahman's exact connection to the agency is unclear, but court documents show he had a top-secret security clearance with access to sensitive, classified information, typical of many CIA employees who handle classified materials, the Times reported.

His arrest follows the sentencing Tuesday of Air National Guard member Jack Teixeira to 15 years in prison in a case with striking parallels.

Teixeira pleaded guilty earlier this year to six counts of intentionally storing and disclosing national defense information, particularly top-secret military documents about the war in Ukraine, which he shared on the social media platform Discord.

Prosecutors said the leak was “one of the most significant and consequential violations of the Espionage Act in American history.”