White House National Security Council Archives

Nobody at the White House should ever speak this way about our veterans seeking accountability for the Gold Star families the Biden-Harris Administration created with their reckless decisions.

Absolutely despicable.

White House National Security Council spokesman John Kirby was met with intense criticism Wednesday after he inadvertently emailed a reporter that there is “no use in responding” to veteran concerns about the Harris-Biden administration’s disastrous withdrawal from Afghanistan.

Kirby, 61, apparently intended to send his dismissive response to White House staffers but accidentally hit “reply all” on an email chain that included the Fox News reporter making the inquiry.

“Obviously no use in responding. A ‘handful’ of vets indeed and all of one stripe,” read Kirby’s email, according to the outlet.

Kirby: ‘No use in responding’ to a ‘handful of vets’ on Biden’s botched Afghan withdrawal

‘Obviously no use in responding. A “handful” of vets indeed and all of one stripe,’ Kirby said in a ‘reply all’ email chain

By Emma Colton, Fox News, September 11, 2024 4:43pm EDT

The White House pushed back on a report released by the GOP on Sunday that criticized President Biden’s chaotic 2021 withdrawal from Afghanistan.

On the anniversary of 9/11, White House National Security Council communications adviser John Kirby dismissed the concerns of military veterans critical of the botched withdrawal from Afghanistan, writing in response to a Fox News Digital press inquiry that there’s “no use” weighing in on the veterans’ views.

“Obviously no use in responding. A ‘handful’ of vets indeed and all of one stripe,” Kirby said in a “reply all” email chain Wednesday afternoon that appeared to be intended for White House staffers, but which also included Fox News Digital.

Fox News Digital had reached out to the White House earlier Wednesday afternoon regarding critical comments from four veterans, including Rep. Cory Mills, R-Fla., who blasted Kirby for his Monday press conference that they said provided “cover” for the Biden administration’s 2021 withdrawal.

Included in that initial reachout were quotes from the four veterans, and Fox News Digital asked the White House if it had any comment to include on the vets’ blistering criticisms of Kirby and the White House’s handling of the Afghanistan withdrawal. The email chain was forwarded to White House staffers on the National Security Council, before Kirby replied to all on the chain that there’s “no use in responding.”

Kirby’s message was sent in error, with him following up with a Fox News Digital reporter, “Clearly, I didn’t realize you were on the chain.” Kirby sent the email while traveling with President Biden on the anniversary of 9/11.

The veterans quoted in the email lambasted Kirby for “deflecting” from the Biden administration’s disastrous withdrawal from Afghanistan in 2021, following House Republicans releasing a scathing report this week following the anniversary of the botched withdrawal.

“The bottom line is that the Biden-Harris administration chose politics over strategy, and Kirby, who I wouldn’t trust to guard my grocery list, is now trying to cover for them,” Mills, an Army veteran, said in comments to Fox News Digital.

The Republican chair of the Foreign Affairs Committee, Texas Rep. Mike McCaul, released a report this week disputing President Biden’s claims that his hands were tied to an agreement made under former President Trump’s administration for the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan under an established deadline in 2021. The report added that State Department officials had no plan for helping Americans and allies out while there were still troops in the region to protect them.

McCaul’s report argued that the administration failed to adequately respond to terror threats ahead of the terrorist bombing at Abbey Gate at the Kabul airport that killed 13 U.S. service members and more than 150 Afghan civilians, and that the Taliban likely had access after the withdrawal to $7 billion in abandoned U.S. weapons, and up to $57 million in U.S. funds that were initially given to the Afghan government.

Kirby joined the White House’s press conference on Monday and defended the Biden-Harris administration’s withdrawal, while arguing the new report “says little or nothing new.”

Kirby went on to list the “actual facts” surrounding the withdrawal, including arguing that the Trump administration cut a deal with the Taliban that “mandated a complete U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan.”

“President Biden, for his part, faced a stark choice when he came to office: Abide by the flawed agreement and end America’s longest war, or blow up the deal, extend the war, and see a much smaller contingent of American troops back in combat with the Taliban,” Kirby said. “He chose the former and was able to buy additional time to prepare for that withdrawal all the way into summer, and we, as a nation, are safer for it.”

Mills said Kirby was “deflecting” from the White House’s “failed foreign policies,” while pointing to the House Foreign Affairs Committee threatening to subpoena Secretary of State Antony Blinken last year regarding a July 2021 dissent cable by 23 diplomats that offered avenues to mitigate disaster as the Taliban’s power grew ahead of the U.S. pulling out of Afghanistan.

“Once again, John Kirby is deflecting from the Biden-Harris administration’s failed foreign policies. If they were truly transparent, why did HFAC have fun threatening contempt of Congress for Secretary Blinken for intentionally withholding DoS dissent cables from 23 U.S. Embassy diplomats warning that the administration’s strategy would allow the Taliban to advance and lead to the collapse of the Afghan government and American lives to be lost? They knew this and tried to cover it up. This wasn’t ignorance, it was intentional and putting political optics above strategy/safety with a complete lack of transparency. This administration knew exactly what they were doing, tried to cover it up, and got caught. Worse, their actions cost the lives of 13 American service members and severely damaged our credibility with allies. It welcomed aggression from adversaries and showed weakness geopolitically,” Mills said.

AUTHOR

Pamela Geller

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Why did Obama National Security and State Department officials meet with Israeli leftist NGO Breaking the Silence to provide maligned ‘testimonies’ of IDF reservists about allegations of “revenge firing” on Palestinians during last summer’s Operation Protective Edge? Especially, since testimonies of fellow serving IDF reservists who appeared on IsraelChannel 2 in early May 2015 said the ‘testimonies” were a pack of lies. Earlier this week Deputy Foreign Minister Tzipi Hotovely called out the Swiss Foreign Ministry for funding a photographic exhibit mounted by Breaking the Silence. This is not the first time for an Israeli objection to foreign programs funding programs of the leftist group. A prior episode occurred following the 2009 Operation Cast Lead when groups in The Netherlands, Switzerland and the UK launching similar disinformation efforts maligning IDF self-defense operations against the rocket wars in Gaza perpetrated by Hamas.

Breaking the Silence was formed in 2004 during the Second Intifada. NGO Monitor reported the following sources of the group’s funds:

2013/4 donors include the European Union, Misereor (Germany), Broederlijk Delen (Belgium), Norway, AECID (Spain), Dan Church Aid (Denmark), ICCO (Netherlands), CCFD (France), Human Rights and International Law Secretariat (joint funding from Sweden, Switzerland, Denmark and the Netherlands), Sigrid Rausing Trust (UK), SIVMO (Netherlands), Rockefeller Brothers Fund, Open Society Institute, New Israel Fund, and others

Based on financial information submitted to the Israeli Registrar of Non-Profits, in accordance with the Israeli NGO transparency law, BtS received 992,901 NIS from foreign governmental bodies in 2014 and 1,271,368 NIS in 2013 (accessed March 15, 2014).

In 2008-2013, the New Israel Fund (NIF) authorized grants worth $560,428 to Breaking the Silence (2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013).

Received two grants from the Rockefeller Brothers Fund totaling $145,000 (2012-2015).

Matt Duss, President of the Foundation for Middle East Peace, known for its agitation against Israeli settlement policies in the disputed territories, escorted the Breaking the Silence representatives to both Obama NSC and State Department Human Rights meetings. This is another instance of Israeli leftists being given entre by the Obama Administration seeking to delegitimize the conduct of IDF front line soldiers during combat in Gaza against the rocket and terror tunnel wars of Hamas. This has infuriated Ministry of Defense and IDF commanders from the platoon level on up to the Chief of Staff.

Here are excerpts from a Ha’aretz report about yesterday’s Breaking the Silence meetings in Washington:

Senior White House officials met this week with members of the left-wing NGO Breaking the Silence. The meeting, the first of its kind, dealt with testimonies that the organization had collected on alleged human-rights violations by the Israel Defense Forces during last summer’s war in Gaza. The meetings were held a few days after Israel’s Foreign Ministry tried to get a Breaking the Silence exhibition to be held in Switzerland canceled.

Matt Duss, president of the Washington-based Foundation for Middle East Peace, organized the meeting between Breaking the Silence representatives and members of the White House National Security Council.

The meeting did not take place at the White House but at the offices of an American nonprofit in the capital.

A Breaking the Silence representative also held a separate meeting at the State Department with senior officials in its human rights bureau.

Duss told Ha’aretz that during the meetings, Breaking the Silence presented its recent report last summer’s Operation Protective Edge in the Gaza Strip. Obama administration officials reacted with a great deal of interest, Duss said, asking “many questions about the vetting process of the witnesses, the testimonies and the fact-checking.”

According to Duss, the fact that both White House staff and the State Department held meetings with Breaking the Silence shows that the organization has an open door to the administration.

“It is in line with what Obama said recently. These are the shared values between Israel and the United States – wanting to improve our society,” said Duss. This is Washington recognizing “they are young Israeli patriots who are trying to improve their society,” he added.

An Obama Administration official said: “U.S. Government officials met with Breaking the Silence, as we routinely meet with a range of actors from official and non-official international groups, including from civil society.”

The State Department also responded, “Officers from the State Department’s Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor met with a representative from the Israeli NGO Breaking the Silence. The State Department regularly meets with a broad array of political and civil society organizations from various countries worldwide.”

[…]

Israel’s ambassador to Switzerland, Yigal Caspi, lodged a protest with the Swiss Foreign Ministry over it, and asked that donations and support for a group that deals with the “defamation of Israel” be halted.

Deputy Foreign Minister Tzipi Hotovely, who this week called for action against the Breaking the Silence exhibition, said the organization “is working against Israel from within,” adding, “We will not ignore it when an organization whose whole purpose is to defame IDF soldiers works in the international arena to seriously damage Israel’s image.”

In early May 2015 several soldiers and officers who served in a tank unit appeared on Israeli Channel 2. The Algemeiner reported their contrasting comments disputing testimonies acquired by Breaking the Silence. The soldiers spoke on Israel’s Channel 2 to give their side of the story to counter the testimonies compiled by Breaking the Silence.

One soldier called the report “a wicked story” and a “stab in the back.”

Another soldier, Lt. Oren (a pseudonym), was a platoon commander in the 7th Brigade during the previous Operation Cast Lead, which began in late 2008. The Breaking the Silence report claimed that one of the tank commanders in Oren’s platoon carried out a “revenge attack” by targeting civilian houses in Gaza.

Oren refuted the claim, saying “this nonsense about ‘fire on the house that you want for revenge’ is simply a total lie.”

He said “it is very hard for me to believe that one of ours said something like that, definitely not someone who was there.”

Oren, who was personally involved in the operation, told a different story.

He said that any “revenge” incident might have occurred after Armored Core Capt. Dmitri Levitas (26) was killed in battle, but that the Breaking the Silence testimony “simply is not true.”

He said despite the fact that he and his fellow soldiers were severely affected by the death of Levitas, “we maintained combat ethics.”

“While it’s true there was heavy [IDF] fire, this fire was directed at positions from which we were being fired upon, or suspicious locations,” he recalled.

IDF tanks only fired “in accordance with procedure, and after a very strict identification process,” he said.

Oren emphasized that despite “losing a great commander and friend … we still abided by shooting procedure.”

A decade ago I attended a presentation at Wesleyan University in Middletown, Connecticut by an IDF Sgt, a refusenik reservist. Anti-Israel and BDS leftist group Jewish Voices for Peace (JVP) sponsored the event at Wesleyan. The IDF reservist had served a term in a military jail for refusing to serve with his unit in the disputed territories during the Second Intifada. The packed amphitheater lecture hall was filled with attentive students and some faculty listening to the reservist rationale about why he refused to serve because of alleged human rights problems occasioned by Israeli occupation. When it came time for Q&A I raised my hand, was recognized by the moderator. I asked the refuseniks IDF Sgt. if he knew anything about the group he was marching with at his next stop in San Francisco. He said, “no”. I told both he and the audience that ANSWER, the sponsoring group was rabidly anti-Semitic. I explained that the ADL considered A.N.S.W.E.R one of the leading anti-Israel and Anti-Semitic groups in the US. A.N.S.W.E.R stands for Act Now to Stop War and Racism. The ADL also considered the JVP on the leading anti-Zionist groups in the U.S. The refusenik sheepishly smiled and scurried off in a clutch of admiring students and faculty for refreshments shepherded by his JVP minders.

EDITORS NOTE: This column originally appeared in the New English Review.

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White House Officials meet with Anti-IDF Israeli Leftists