The FBI has arrested a suspect in Cambodia linked to the leak of classified Pentagon documents detailing Israel’s preparations for its attack on Iran, The New York Times reported Wednesday afternoon.
According to court documents and sources familiar with the case, the suspect, identified as Asif William Rahman, is a CIA officer who had been working outside the United States.
The Times cited court filings indicating that Rahman had a security clearance granting him access to top-secret information, similar to many CIA employees handling classified material. The CIA declined to comment on the report.
Rahman was reportedly detained in Cambodia on Tuesday, following the filing of charges against him last week in a federal court in Virginia. He faces two counts of willful retention and transmission of national defense information. He is expected to appear in court on Thursday in Guam, a U.S. territory in the Pacific Ocean.
The two classified documents were leaked last month during Israel’s preparations for a potential response to a barrage of ballistic missiles launched by Iran on October 1. According to at least one foreign media report, which Israel later denied, the leak caused a delay in its response, which eventually came three weeks after the missile strike in an operation called Days of Repentance.
The documents, dated October 15 and 16 and marked "Top Secret," first surfaced on a pro-Iran Telegram channel before being shared on X (formerly Twitter). They were reportedly produced by the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency (NGA), which analyzes data and images gathered by U.S. spy satellites. Their security classification restricts sharing to the Five Eyes alliance, an intelligence-sharing network among the United States, Australia, Canada, New Zealand and the United Kingdom.
The leaked documents detail Israeli preparations for an attack on Iran, including a “large-scale deployment drill” by the Israeli Air Force and an aerial refueling exercise. One document states that the Air Force was working with air-launched ballistic missiles, and, since October 8, had engaged with at least 16 missiles labeled “Golden Horizon” and at least 40 of another model known as ISO2 or Rocks.
The specifics of the "Golden Horizon" missile remain unclear, as it has not been previously disclosed by Israel or other sources. The Rocks missile, however, was unveiled by Rafael Advanced Defense Systems in 2019 and is described on the company’s website as an air-to-surface missile equipped with a lethal warhead, capable of destroying targets both above ground and in fortified underground locations.
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