Israel has told the United States that Iran is working on a new plot to kill President Trump. That’s the headline from a Wall Street Journal report Thursday, and it landed at a moment when the war with Tehran is already at a boil.
The intelligence, according to people familiar with it, points to a plan American officials hadn’t been tracking before Israel flagged it. CNN adds texture: two sources say Washington has been picking up a “steady drumbeat” of related intelligence for weeks, and the Israeli warning itself came in earlier this week. The threat, notably, has not yet been independently vetted by U.S. agencies.
Not everyone reads it the same way. Some American officials, speaking to CNN, see the Israeli report as one piece of a broader campaign to shape Trump’s thinking as he decides whether to escalate against Iran. Two U.S. officials went further with Israel’s Channel 12, saying the information was closer to general internal Iranian chatter about assassinating Trump than a defined operational plot — and that Israel’s real motive was repairing a strained relationship between Trump and Netanyahu.
The backdrop explains the urgency either way. Iran has vowed revenge on Trump since the 2020 strike that killed Qassem Soleimani, and that vow was on loud display this week. Mourners at Ayatollah Khamenei’s funeral in Mashhad carried “Kill Trump” banners and chanted for his death. Trump, asked about it aboard Air Force One, didn’t dodge the question. “They want to take out the U.S. leader — me,” he said. “I’m on every single one of their lists. And so far, I guess I’ve been a little bit lucky, but that maybe doesn’t last very long.”
This isn’t Iran’s first documented attempt. In November 2024, the Justice Department charged an alleged IRGC operative, Farhad Shakeri, with plotting to surveil and kill Trump before the election. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said earlier this year that the operative had been tracked down and killed. A separate case, involving a Pakistani national with alleged ties to the Revolutionary Guard, ended in a conviction in March.
None of this is happening in isolation. The 60-day ceasefire between the U.S. and Iran has collapsed, strikes have resumed, and Trump’s relationship with Netanyahu has grown visibly tense — reporting has surfaced past friction between the two leaders over the pace and scope of Israeli operations in Lebanon. Both governments say they spoke by phone Thursday and agreed to keep coordinating. The Israeli embassy and Iran’s UN mission both declined to comment on the assassination report itself.
Whether this is a fully formed plot or Iranian officials talking dangerous talk, the U.S. is treating it seriously enough to say so out loud. That, on its own, tells you where things stand.
