Israel provided sensitive intelligence on a Houthi terrorist targeted in a US attack described by National Security Adviser Mike Waltz in the unclassified Signal chat with Trump administration officials, the Wall Street Journal reported on Thursday, citing two US officials.
Israeli officials reportedly complained when the information was leaked to an Atlantic journalist.
Waltz wrote in the Signal group that a Houthi missile expert, a key target in the attack, was seen entering his girlfriend’s building, which he said was destroyed.
A US judge later on Thursday ordered President Donald Trump's administration to preserve messages sent on the Signal messaging app discussing attack plans against the Houthis in Yemen that became public after they were inadvertently shared with a journalist.
This follows Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth's text about plans to kill a Houthi terrorist leader in Yemen two hours before a military operation that was meant to be shrouded in secrecy, according to screenshots of a chat released by The Atlantic on Wednesday.
Hegseth has repeatedly denied texting war plans, and Trump and his top advisers are saying no classified information was shared, bewildering Democrats and former US officials, who regard timing and targeting details as some of the most closely held material ahead of a US military campaign.
Waltz has said he took full responsibility for the breach as he had created the Signal group. But on Wednesday, Waltz also played down the disclosure, saying on X: "No locations. No sources & methods. NO WAR PLANS. Foreign partners had already been notified that strikes were imminent."
The White House incident, which has reverberated through diplomatic and cybersecurity circles, has prompted an internal investigation by the National Security Council. Officials confirmed that a discussion about military operations appears to have occurred and are looking into how Goldberg’s phone number was added to the group.
A report by Al-Ain media in the UAE on Wednesday said that recent US strikes in Yemen have caused heavy losses among the Iranian-backed Houthis. The report says that “the US military has intensified its airstrikes on Houthi militia bases, facilities, and command centers in their main stronghold in Saada Governorate, northern Yemen.”
“The US military launched a new series of airstrikes early Wednesday morning, targeting militia barracks and hideouts east of Saada city and Al Salem district in the same governorate,” Al-Ain reported.
What is Signal?
Signal is a free messaging app that enables users to send texts, make voice and video calls, and hold group chats. Its main selling point is its use of end-to-end encryption, which ensures that only the sender and recipient can access the content of a message or call.
The platform uses the open-source Signal Protocol, which is also employed by WhatsApp, which is owned by Meta. Telegram, another popular app, does not use end-to-end encryption by default and requires users to activate it manually.
Although Signal offers strong encryption, experts note the app is not without flaws. Messages are encrypted in transit, but once they arrive on a device, they can be accessed if that device is compromised. Furthermore, the app does not provide full transparency on how message data is stored or accessed locally — a potential vulnerability.
This is a developing story.
Seth J. Frantzman, Dr. Itay Gal, and Reuters contributed to this report