Theft of sensitive IDF intel, transfer to ‘people at PM’s office’ called ‘systematic’
Bild’s report on one such document said to pose ongoing threat to soldiers, hostages in Gaza by exposing sources; 4 suspects said to serve in IDF unit tasked with preventing leaks
Investigators suspect that the theft of classified intelligence documents from Israel Defense Forces databases and the transfer of those files to people in the Prime Minister’s Office was “systematic,” and the publication of one such document in foreign media is a source of “ongoing” danger to the lives of both soldiers and hostages in Gaza, according to a Monday report.
Citing an unnamed source involved in the investigation, Channel 12 news said that a September report in Germany’s Bild newspaper damaged Israel’s intelligence capabilities, including by causing the “exposure of sources.”
“The use of the published material caused real and ongoing security harm that, daily, endangers the safety and security of IDF soldiers at war and harmed and harms the capacity to protect the lives of the hostages in the negotiations for their release,” the source was quoted as saying.
The report said that while the illicit extraction of sensitive documents from the IDF’s databases was bad enough, their publication revealed some of Israel’s sources of information to its enemies. Such material would have barred from publication in Israel by the military censor, the report noted.
The document allegedly leaked to Germany’s Bild newspaper, which reported on it in September, “was not the only document” taken and conveyed to “people in Netanyahu’s office,” according to the report, which said that there were “apparently other classified documents” that were accessed and conveyed in this way.
A spokesman for Netanyahu, Eli Feldstein, was named by a judge on Sunday as the central suspect in the case. Netanyahu is not a suspect.
The ongoing investigation is focused on “grave leaks of classified information from the IDF’s Intelligence Directorate to unauthorized recipients,” the TV report said.
The Shin Bet reportedly suspects that an “infrastructure” was put in place that was able to access “all the classified material held by IDF Military Intelligence,” and that “it extracted — and may have intended to continue to extract in the future — classified material that could expose the capabilities of the entire intelligence community” — encompassing the IDF, the Shin Bet, and the Mossad.
The exposure of this material — as happened with the Bild article — while evading military censorship, endangers the lives of IDF soldiers and harms efforts to free the hostages, the TV report said, citing what it said is the assessment in the defense establishment and of the investigators of the case.
Both the defense establishment and investigators in the case share the assessment that the exposure of the material — as was the case with the Bild article — harmed efforts to free the hostages, the report said.
This ongoing danger to soldiers and to the efforts to free the hostages “is the heart of the matter,” according to the TV report, which said the questions of what the suspects intended to do with the material, who knew what they were doing, and who gave the instructions were all being probed.
The TV report came after another IDF officer was arrested on Monday as part of the investigation, bringing the total number of suspects in the case to five — four soldiers and Feldstein.
According to Hebrew media outlets, the four soldiers all serve in an intelligence unit tasked with preventing leaks. One of them was released on Sunday, Haaretz reported.
The same unit was initially tasked with investigating the leaks to foreign media, according to Haaretz, but the investigation was later transferred to the Shin Bet.
The leaked document cited by Bild was not found by IDF soldiers in Gaza as hitherto believed, the Kan public broadcaster reported on Monday, but was uncovered through “another type of intelligence.”
Feldstein was arrested in an early-morning police raid on October 27 on suspicion of divulging top-secret information with national security implications to European media outlets, including Bild. He was remanded into custody for two more days by a judge on Sunday.
Hebrew media reported on Monday that Feldstein and another suspect in the case were allowed to meet with their lawyers for the first time since their arrests. Because the pair are suspected of having committed a national security offense, they had been barred from meeting with an attorney. The names of the other suspects remain under a gag order.
The leaked Hamas document said to have formed the basis of the Bild article appeared to show that the Palestinian terror group was drawing out hostage talks as a form of psychological warfare against Israel, including the use of pressure on the families of the hostages.
According to sources quoted in Hebrew media, the document was penned by Hamas military intelligence, not the group’s then-leader Yahya Sinwar, who was since killed by Israeli troops in Gaza. The Monday report said that the document was inaccurately represented both in the Bild article and in subsequent references to it by Netanyahu, including at a September 8 cabinet meeting.
A second, widely discredited article in the London-based Jewish Chronicle, also published in early September — which was later withdrawn — claimed a document uncovered by the IDF in Gaza showed that Sinwar had planned to spirit hostages out of Gaza through Egypt. At the time, IDF spokesman Daniel Hagari officially denied that the army had any knowledge of the supposed intelligence on which the Chronicle story was based, while defense officials described the claims as likely baseless.
Both articles were published days after the bodies of six hostages were found in a tunnel in southern Gaza’s Rafah. According to the IDF, the six were found with signs of violence showing they had been executed a day or two earlier, as troops closed in on the location.
The discovery heightened doubts about the wisdom of relying on rescue operations to save hostages and reenergized protests pressuring the government to seal a deal to free the remaining living captives, even if it meant halting the military offensive.
The Monday Channel 12 report quoted another source elaborating: “This is not a case [merely] about leaks. This investigation was opened after the leak of secret, classified material was identified, which was likely to burn sources. This is sensitive intelligence material that was taken from the IDF, extracted illicitly, and manipulative and dangerous use was made of it.”
The Rishon Lezion Magistrate’s Court said in a ruling on Sunday that the leaks in the case risked efforts to secure the release of the 97 hostages kidnapped by Hamas-led terrorists on October 7, 2023, who remain in the Strip, many of them still alive.
Critics have noted that the Bild and Jewish Chronicle reports dovetailed neatly with Netanyahu’s talking points at the time, which sought to play up the importance of Israel’s demand for soldiers to remain stationed inside Gaza while placing blame on Hamas for the lack of progress on a hostage-ceasefire deal.
The Prime Minister’s Office has distanced itself from Feldstein, who was brought in by the Prime Minister’s Office to help liaison with military reporters following the October 7, 2023, Hamas massacre and the launching of a military campaign in Gaza, according to reports in Hebrew-language media. He has been seen beside Netanyahu in various photos over the past year. According to reports, Feldstein failed a polygraph test and was denied security clearance.
Feldstein had previously worked as a spokesman in National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir’s office, and prior to that was a senior officer in the Israel Defense Force’s spokesperson unit.
The Ynet news outlet reported on Sunday that investigators were examining four separate issues in the case: the leaking of top-secret documents; allowing an adviser without security clearance to access meetings and premises that should have been off-limits to him; negligence in the handling of classified documents; and the use of documents to influence public opinion on a hostage deal.
Some of the suspects in the ongoing investigation could reportedly face up to 15 years in prison.
Netanyahu asks AG to probe separate cabinet leaks
Meanwhile, Netanyahu on Monday sent a letter to Attorney General Gali Baharav-Miara, asking her to investigate separate leaks from cabinet meetings throughout the war.
“Since the beginning of the war,” he wrote, “we have witnessed a never-ending flood of serious leaks and revealing state secrets.”
Netanyahu added that the leaks have come from cabinet meetings, the national security cabinet, hostage negotiators, and other means, in situations at which there were no government members present.
“Until now,” he wrote, “despite my repeated requests that these leaks be investigated and an end be put to them, nothing has been done.”
He claimed that Shin Bet chief Ronen Bar told him on Saturday that there must be an official request for an investigation, and included a secret annex listing leaks that he said have not been investigated.
Part of the PMO’s defense around the ongoing investigation has been that while other leaks were not investigated, those that could harm the prime minister were being investigated aggressively.
