Israel passed U.S. officials intelligence that Iran had planned another attempt on President Donald Trump’s life, the Wall Street Journal reported overnight Thursday into Friday, Israel time. It cited officials familiar with the matter.
Trump had hinted at the threat himself at this week’s NATO summit in Ankara. Iranians “want to take out the U.S. leader, me,” he said. “I’m on whatever list. I saw this morning I’m on every single one of their lists.”
The Israeli Embassy in Washington declined to comment, the Journal said. Iran’s mission to the United Nations had not yet responded, and the White House pointed the paper to Trump’s remarks at the summit.
CNN added a detail. Israel’s warning reached Washington this week, a source told the network, but a “steady drumbeat of intelligence” about a possible attempt had been reaching U.S. officials for several weeks.
The earlier plot
This would not be the first. In November 2024, the Justice Department disclosed that an Iranian plot against Trump had been foiled before he won a second term. An indictment filed in federal court in Manhattan named Farhad Shakeri, an alleged Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps operative, as the man tasked with surveilling Trump and ultimately killing him.
The department said Shakeri, an Afghan citizen, was assigned on October 7, 2024 to carry out a plan to “eliminate Trump.” The FBI thwarted it.
Shakeri had served 14 years in a U.S. prison for robbery. Inside, he met two New York residents, Carlisle Rivera, known as “Pop,” 49, and Jonathan Loadholt, 36, who later became his operatives in the United States. He was deported in 2008 after his release, and was later arrested in Sri Lanka on drug trafficking charges after authorities found 92 kilograms of drugs on him. U.S. officials assessed in 2024 that he was in Iran.
In March, about a week into the war with Iran, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth confirmed that Shakeri had been killed. “The leader of the unit who attempted to assassinate President Trump has been hunted down and killed,” Hegseth said. “Iran tried to kill President Trump, and President Trump got the last laugh.”
