Allied Intelligence — 2026-07-02

Israeli Sources Accuse VP Vance of Leaking Classified Mossad Kurdish Plan Against Iran to Erdogan

BLUFRegardless of whether the Vance allegation holds, the episode poisons US-Israeli covert coordination on Iran proxy options at precisely the moment both governments need it most.

The Jerusalem Post reported that Israel, under outgoing Mossad chief David Barnea, had prepared a plan to arm Kurdish forces in Iran and Iraq for a ground campaign against Tehran backed by Israeli air power, but Trump vetoed it before execution 12. Israeli security sources accused Vice President JD Vance of leaking the plan to Turkish President Erdogan in time to reach Trump and halt it 12; Vance's press secretary Luke Schroeder called the allegation "categorically false" 1. IDF strikes on Iranian regime and Basij forces in Kurdish areas hit only about ten percent of the operation's intended targets before that phase was halted 1. Maariv and Channel 12 reported Mossad allocated roughly one billion shekels and a team of hundreds to the initiative, with results internally assessed as "highly disappointing" 3. Some of the weapons funneled to Kurdish fighters were arms Israel had confiscated from Hamas in Gaza and Hezbollah in Lebanon, repurposed alongside separate US-supplied weapons and Israeli training 3.

Analysis
The allegation, whether credited or not within Israeli security circles, creates a durable trust rupture between Jerusalem and the White House's Iran-skeptic wing that complicates any future joint covert planning on Kurdish or other proxy options. Mossad's own internal verdict, that the billion-shekel program produced "highly disappointing" results, undercuts any argument that Vance's leak alone doomed an operation already generating marginal battlefield effects. Barnea's departure removes the plan's principal institutional champion, leaving skeptics such as Katz and Ratcliffe with a freer hand to shelve Kurdish options for the remainder of the administration's term. The dispute over attribution, Erdogan's pressure versus internal administration dissent, remains unresolved absent a formal US inquiry that neither side has institutional incentive to request.

4 sources

JD Vance Allegedly Leaked Mossad Kurdish Plan Against Iran to Erdogan - JFeed
Outgoing Mossad chief favoured Kurdish-led ground op to topple Iranian regime—The Jerusalem Post report - ThePrint
Israeli Officials Accuse US Vice President JD Vance of Leaking Mossad's Iran Regime-Change Plan - AtlasPress News Agency
David Barnea's Mossad revolution: How the spy agency became a war-fighting juggernaut - exclusive - The Jerusalem Post