Luft was a lieutenant colonel in the Israel Defense Forces, and is the executive director of the Institute for the Analysis of Global Security and cofounder of the Set America Free Coalition.

[1][2] Luft was arrested in Cyprus on February 17, 2023, on a warrant issued by Interpol on U.S. charges of weapons trafficking.

[3][4][5][6] On July 10, 2023, the US Justice Department unsealed the indictment for this arrest, dated November 2022, accusing Luft of eight charges including acting as an unregistered foreign agent of Chinese entities under the US Foreign Agents Registration Act and violating trade sanctions against Iran.

[7][8] Among the indictment's allegations is that Luft, at the behest of Chinese entities, recruited and paid an unnamed adviser to then-president-elect Donald Trump to adopt pro-Chinese positions.

These allegations were made in March 2019 involving improper financial arrangements with the Chinese energy company CEFC.