US intelligence agencies alerted Israel to the dangers posed by the coronavirus outbreak in China in mid-November, Channel 12 reports.
According to the report, the US intelligence community became aware of the emerging disease in Wuhan and decided to inform some of their allies of the development in a classified document.
That information was not in the public domain — and was known only apparently to the Chinese government. US intelligence informed the Trump Administration “which did not deem it of interest,” the report says.
But the Americans decided to update two allies with this classified document: NATO and Israel.
The network says Israeli military officials discussed the possibility of the spread of the virus as early as mid-November.
“Still in November, the IDF held a first discussion regarding what impact this unknown disease would have were it to reach the Middle East. How would we be affected? How would it affect our neighbors? As you can imagine, the information [on the virus outbreak in China] did not remain solely with the IDF. It reached Israel’s decision makers and the Health Ministry.”
In the Health Ministry “nothing was done,” the report says.