British and US officials who concluded that a plane crash in the Sinai last week was likely the result of foul play were influenced by Israeli intelligence, reports indicate.
By: Atara Beck, World Israel News
American officials are increasingly convinced that a bomb planted by terrorists caused the October 31st crash of a Russian plane in the Sinai, CNN reported Sunday.
The Russian Metrojet airliner had left the Egyptian resort of Sharm el-Sheikh in the Sinai for St. Petersburg. All 224 passengers and crew on board were killed. The Islamic State (ISIS/ISIL) terror organization immediately claimed victory for the attack.
“We’re going to spend a lot of time just making sure our own investigators and own intelligence community find out what’s going on before we make any definitive pronouncements. But it’s certainly possible that there was a bomb on board,” US President Barack Obama said several days ago. Since then, investigators are increasingly convinced that it was not just possible, but likely.
Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson told CNN that officials are now taking “precautionary interim steps” to increase security on international flights.
“ISIL is out there now active in a lot of different areas and, while this investigation is pending and because we have this group claiming responsibility, we believe it’s significant to do these things on an interim basis,” he said.
According to the CNN report, “At least some of the intelligence intercepts being used to assess what happened to the jetliner came from Israeli intelligence, according to a US official briefed on the intelligence and a diplomatic source.”
A member of the Egyptian investigation team also said they were “90-percent sure it was a bomb,” Reuters reported.
Israeli officials would not comment on its intelligence activity regarding the crash.