President Joe Biden is “deeply concerned” about a leak of classified documents that contain the US’s assessment of Israeli plans to attack Iran, White House National Security Council spokesman John Kirby said.
Officials have not determined whether the documents were released due to a hack or a leak, Mr Kirby said.
House of Representatives Speaker Mike Johnson confirmed the publication of the documents over the weekend. They are said to contain the movements of Israeli military assets in preparation for a response to Iran’s 1 October missile attack.
Iran’s foreign ministry spokesman said the country was prepared to counter any Israeli attack.
The documents, marked top secret, were shareable within the Five Eyes intelligence alliance of the US, Britain, Canada, New Zealand and Australia, CBS, the BBC’s US partner, reported.
There is no “indication” that additional documents will “[find] their way into the public domain”, Mr Kirby said on Monday.
He added that President Biden “will be actively monitoring” the investigation to uncover how the documents were released, and he intends to hear measures that will be taken “to prevent it happening again”.
For weeks Israel has been deciding how and when to respond to Iran’s latest missile attack. Israel’s defence minister has warned it will be “deadly, precise and surprising”.
The two documents reportedly appear to be attributed to the US National Geospatial Intelligence Agency and the National Security Agency (NSA), and were published on an Iranian-aligned Telegram account on Friday.
Johnson, the highest-ranking member of Congress, told CNN on Sunday that “the leak is very concerning.”
Credit: bbc.com
