The State Attorney’s Office filed an indictment on Tuesday against two brothers from the Judean Hills for conducting espionage on behalf of Iranian agents, Walla reported.
The indictment on charges of serious security offenses was filed several weeks ago but was under a press embargo due to the nature of the investigation, the report said.
The brothers, from Betar Illit and Beit Shemesh, were accused of contact with a foreign agent and passing information to the enemy.
They received more than NIS 100,000 from Iranian agents in exchange for information, much of which was fabricated, according to the indictment.
The main suspect deceived his Iranian handler by creating a false impression and providing information obtained through artificial intelligence tools, such as ChatGPT, Grok, and Gemini, it said.
He then passed on information about a future Israeli-American attack in Iran and a list of strategic locations in Iran found using AI and Google Maps.
The defendant found personal details of an Iranian citizen and his wife on Telegram and passed them on to the handler, along with a forged document he created, which implicated the “Iranian” with cooperating with Israel during strikes targeting senior Iranian regime officials during Operation Rising Lion last June, the indictment said.
Defendant knew it was Iranian agent, decided to trick him
The connection was made in August, when the agent contacted the defendant via Telegram, asking if he was interested in making money, it said.
The defendant, suspecting that the handler was an Iranian agent, responded positively, provided a fake name, and told the handler he was a computer-science student who was about to enlist in the IDF Intelligence Directorate’s Unit 8200, which is responsible for signal intelligence and analysis of chatter.
The defendant later fabricated a story about having a friend in the unit, using the name of an actual person whose identity card and driver’s license he had found online. He created a false impression with the agent by presenting screenshots of a supposed conversation that he had had with the Unit 8200 soldier in which he tried to convince him to cooperate with the Iranian handler.
The defendant then created a Telegram group where the agent, the defendant, and “soldier,” who was actually the defendant as well, were members. The agent then started chatting with the “soldier” and asked him to send his ID card for verification.
The defendant found a video of an unspecified Israeli citizen, including a driver’s license, and sent it to the agent. The agent was not satisfied with this, however, and insisted on receiving a photograph of the “soldier” with an ID document. He eventually agreed to accept a picture of them making an “okay” hand gesture.
The defendant created this image using AI software and sent it to the agent, the indictment said. The agent then asked for a document proving that the “soldier” really served in Unit 8200, causing the defendant to send a forged document he found online, which he edited with the details of the “soldier.”
Israel's role in Iran's Raisi's helicopter crash questioned
AFTER IRANIAN president Ebrahim Raisi died in a helicopter crash, the agent asked the defendant if Israel had been involved in the incident, the indictment said. The defendant said it had and sent a document that he created with ChatGPT, referencing Israel’s involvement.
When the agent later sought to verify the credibility of the “soldier,” the defendant used ChatGPT to answer several questions about Unit 8200 and the so-called soldier’s supposed role within the unit. He compiled details into a password-protected PDF file and sent it to the agent.
In October, the defendant learned from his friend in Unit 8200 that part of his role was mapping different sites, the indictment said. As a result of this, the defendant said the “soldier” belonged to the mapping department of the unit and told the agent Unit 8200 used an advanced system based on AI and satellite assistance.
When the agent later asked the defendant for information about the coordinates mapped by the unit, he found various coordinates across Iran using Google Maps, created a PDF document, and wrote coordinates and targets, including an airport in Tehran, a building with a senior regime official’s residence, and a commercial factory suspected of being a weapons depot, and sent the “document” to the agent.
In early January, amid the widespread anti-regime protests across Iran, the agent contacted the defendant and asked again about mapped sites, the indictment said. The defendant used Gemini to ask about targets for a US strike on Iran. He sent its responses, including various pro-regime symbolic sites, to the agent and later alerted the agent to an alleged heightened security alert at the Unit 8200 base.
During his interactions with the agent, the defendant also passed on fabricated information about an Iranian citizen, whose details had been found on Telegram. It was used to allege collaboration with Israel in assisting the assassination of senior Iranian regime officials, the indictment said.
Using Grok, the defendant created a full narrative about the Iranian citizen’s supposed involvement, saying he could operate a drone and ride a motorcycle and was recruited by “Israeli handlers” via a social-media network.
The citizen was arrested, interrogated, and cleared of suspicion.
The defendant also learned from a military acquaintance studying with him at university that there had been an expected development in Iran on January 7, which he then informed the Iranian agent about, the indictment said. The defendant later overheard a conversation between this military acquaintance and a senior military official in which one of the parties mentioned a decision to target Iranian infrastructure.
The defendant inferred that this conversation was regarding Iran and told the agent: “We received a date.” Later in the conversation, the defendant also detailed what Israel’s and the US’s roles would be in an attack, gathering the information from Telegram channels.
Lawyer: This is 'an outrageous indictment'
“The indictment is outrageous,” the defendant’s lawyer said.
“As seen in the indictment materials, these are two patriotic Zionist brothers who sought to trick the Iranians,” he said. “The Jewish mind is known for inventing patents, and as loyal sons of the Start-Up Nation, they sold fabricated information to the Iranians using ChatGPT in exchange for money.”
“Their intention was to harm and deceive the Iranian enemy, and they succeeded in doing so,” the lawyer said. “Instead of filing an indictment in this unnecessary case, the state should award them the Israel Prize for their contribution to the nation’s security.”