The Warning That Moved a President Is Reported to Have Come From Israel

The Wall Street Journal reported on Tuesday that Israeli intelligence about an Iranian plan to bring down the president's aircraft with shoulder fired missiles was passed to the United States before Trump left the NATO summit in Ankara. A US official is the source. It is the piece that explains the decoy flight the Washington Post revealed a day earlier, in which Trump boarded Air Force One, left it by catering truck, and flew out on a C-32A.

The account has a complication in it. When the Journal first reported Israeli intelligence behind the episode on 9 July, Trump dismissed it, saying Israel came up with nothing. On Tuesday he confirmed the aircraft switch, saying he goes by the Secret Service and the military, that they wanted him on a different plane, and that he just has to do what they say. He confirmed the action without conceding the source.

Two Israeli sources speaking to Channel 12 earlier described the material as general dialogue rather than a specific plot, which is a meaningful difference. A warning that names a method and a location moves a president. A general exchange does not.

For Jerusalem the value of this story is not in being thanked. Intelligence that is acted on inside hours by the Secret Service is a demonstration of the relationship that survives whatever is said about it afterwards, and it is the kind of demonstration that is rarely available in public.