CLOAK AND DAGGER ALL THE WAY - AT 9:37 A.M. ET:  There is an absolutely intriguing story out of Israel.  The prime minister was "missing" for about 12 hours on Monday.  Rumors have circulated that he made a secret trip somewhere, possibly Moscow.  Now the confirmation, from the Jerusalem Post:

A senior Kremlin official confirmed Wednesday to the Russian paper Kommersant that Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu did make a clandestine trip to Russia on Monday.

The Russian newspaper quoted experts speculating that such a trip would only be justified under extraordinary circumstances, "for example, in the case of Israel planning to attack Iran."

The report comes despite a statement Wednesday from the Kremlin press service that "nothing is known" about reports of the visit. Dmitry Peskov, a spokesman for Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, also said he had no information, the Interfax news agency reported.

Nevertheless, there was never any official denial of the report from Moscow.

COMMENT:  We will not speculate, we will not ruminate, we will not make shallow.  We don't know what this was about.  However, the trip was conducted in complete secrecy (which lasted only a while), with the PM flying aboard a leased civilian aircraft. 

Something is up.  Maybe we'll soon find out, with a bang.

September 10, 2009