West Asia war LIVE: Bessent says U.S. to apply measures never seen on Iran

The U.S. has received several warnings from Israel over the past year that Iran intended to assassinate ‌President Donald Trump, including before a secret Air Force One ruse in Turkey, that U.S. intelligence officials could not independently verify, according to a current U.S. official and two former officials. 

The warnings, passed to U.S. intelligence agencies and in some cases ⁠relayed directly by Israeli officials to senior White House officials, included possible plots to shoot Mr. Trump with a sniper or recruit someone to attack him with a knife at a large public event, the sources said.

The tips began in the lead-up to the 12-day war in June 2025 and intensified prior to the U.S. decision to ‌go to war in Iran in February, the sources said. 

The most detailed warning came ahead of the NATO summit in Ankara in July, the U.S. official and the other person familiar with the matter said. Israeli officials briefed the White House about intelligence ‌that indicated Iran may try to kill Mr. Trump, potentially with a shoulder-launched missile, while he traveled on Air Force One for the summit, ‌the ⁠officials said. 

The U.S. intelligence community has long assessed that Iran wants to retaliate for Mr. Trump’s killing of Iranian military commander Qassem ⁠Soleimani in 2020. But the Central Intelligence Agency has not been able to corroborate some of the specific threats against Trump’s life shared by Israeli intelligence since early last year, the officials said.

-Reuters