If anyone believes Iran had no role in the Hamas attack on Israel, then I've got a bridge to sell you. But that seems to be the narrative the Iranians are feeding the U.S. intelligence services and the media.

American spy agencies have obtained "exquisite" intelligence that shows Iranian leaders were surprised by Hamas' attack on Israel last Saturday, according to a source with direct knowledge of the matter. A second source described the intelligence as “good evidence.” 

The intelligence has prompted U.S. officials to question whether officials in Tehran had a direct role in approving or planning the deadly assault. The sources said that the Biden administration has not reached a definitive conclusions (sic) about whether Iran had any direct role in the attack in part due to that intelligence reporting, the sources told NBC News.

It is unclear what NBC News means by "exquisite" intelligence, but my decades-long acquaintance with a former CIA Field Intelligence Officer may yield some clues. According to him, human intelligence — that is, information supplied by people rather than by direct observation — is generally unreliable and is rarely accepted unless confirmed by some other means.

Also, note the weasel wording: "The intelligence has prompted U.S. officials to question whether officials in Tehran had a direct role in approving or planning the deadly assault." Let's break that phrase down.

First, the intelligence "...has prompted U.S. officials to question whether officials in Tehran..." is pretty vague. U.S. officials are questioning? Yes, and they will be questioning their human intelligence until they have some robust confirmation. Second, note that they mention whether officials in Tehran "...had a direct role in approving or planning" the assault.

It is belaboring the obvious to note that Iran need not, in fact, have a direct role, but that this does not excuse the Islamic Republic from complicity. Tehran has been urging Hamas on in this effort for months, if not years. Hamas receives weapons, technology, and training from Iran. It does not require Iranian officials to fly to Gaza, meet with Hamas leaders, and tell them, "We want you to take action A on date B" to establish Iran's involvement.

Of course, Iran was involved. Iran is the largest state sponsor of radical Islamic terrorism in the world, and they will continue to be until they are forcibly stopped from providing that support. That's the elephant in the room that much of the American legacy media seems reluctant to discuss. 

As for this comment:

The sources did not name the Iranian officials who were surprised by the Hamas operation. But the officials were high enough that they would usually be informed about Tehran’s support for Iran’s proxies before an attack.

The White House National Security Council and the CIA declined to comment.

If one were to apply some knowledge of how Iran typically comports itself and use Occam's Razor, the obvious answer would be "the Iranian officials are lying." The Islamic Republic has recently been found to be trying to gather intelligence on their possible attempts to influence our own government; that speaks eloquently as to their intent.

As my colleague Bonchie has reported, the U.S. and Qatar have already re-frozen the infamous $6 billion payout to Iran, which speaks volumes in itself as to what the U.S. and Qatar think of the likelihood of Iran's aid to Hamas, especially when you consider that Qatar is a nation not particularly friendly to Israel.

Any claim by Iran to be unaware of Hamas' intent to attack Israel rings about as true as Captain Louis Renault's surprise at finding out there was gambling in Rick Blaine's Casablanca nightclub.