Reports: Intel Firm Was Hired To Discredit Former Obama Iran Deal Negotiators

Reports: Intel Firm Was Hired To Discredit Former Obama Iran Deal Negotiators Enlarge this image toggle caption Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images An Israeli intelligence firm was hired last year to do "dirty ops" research on former Obama administration officials who worked on the Iran nuclear deal, according to reports in the U.K.'s Observer and The New Yorker. The Observer reports that an Israeli intelligence firm was hired by aides to President Trump, "who contacted private investigators in May last year to 'get dirt' on Ben Rhodes, who had been one of Barack Obama's top national security advisers, and Colin Kahl, deputy assistant to Obama, as part of an elaborate attempt to discredit the deal." In the New Yorker, Ronan Farrow writes that a source told him "it was, in fact, part of Black Cube's work for a private-sector client pursuing commercial interests related to sanctions on Iran." Black Cube agents were instructed to try to find damaging information about them, including unsubstantiated claims that Rhodes and Kahl had worked closely with Iran lobbyists and were personally enriched through their policy work on Iran ; rumors that Rhodes was one of the Obama staffers responsible for "unmasking" Trump transition officials who were named in intelligence documents ; and an allegation that one of the individuals targeted by the campaign had an affair.