Channel plugin MCP tools not available in session when using --channels flag

Bug Report

Claude Code version: 2.1.81

Plugin: telegram@claude-plugins-official

Description

When launching Claude Code with --channels plugin:telegram@claude-plugins-official, the MCP tools exposed by the channel plugin (reply, react, edit_message) are not available in the session. They don't appear in the direct tool list, and ToolSearch (via tengu_mcp_tool_search) returns no results for them.

The channel message receiving works correctly — incoming Telegram messages are injected as <channel source="telegram" ...> blocks. But Claude cannot reply because the reply tool is inaccessible.

Steps to reproduce

1. Install the telegram plugin: /plugin install telegram@claude-plugins-official
2. Configure bot token: /telegram:configure <token>
3. Launch: claude --channels plugin:telegram@claude-plugins-official
4. Receive a message from Telegram
5. Attempt to use the reply tool — it is not in the tool list and ToolSearch cannot find it

What I verified

• The MCP server process is running correctly (bun server.ts)
• Manual MCP handshake confirms the server properly exposes all three tools (reply, react, edit_message) via tools/list
• The server responds to initialize with capabilities: { tools: {}, experimental: { "claude/channel": {} } }
• The mcp__telegram__reply etc. are in settings.json permissions allow list
• tengu_mcp_tool_search: true is set in cached feature flags

Expected behavior

The reply, react, and edit_message tools should be available (either directly or via ToolSearch) so Claude can respond to incoming Telegram messages.

Actual behavior

Tools are absent from the session entirely. The MCP server's system instructions appear correctly in the system-reminder (confirming the server is connected), but its tools are never surfaced to the model.

🤖 Reported via Claude Code