{"id":33153,"date":"2024-10-08T08:55:00","date_gmt":"2024-10-08T13:55:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/?p=33153"},"modified":"2024-10-31T21:22:46","modified_gmt":"2024-11-01T02:22:46","slug":"us-government-officials-who-quit-over-war-in-gaza-say-more-are-resigning","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/?p=33153","title":{"rendered":"US government officials who quit over war in Gaza say more are resigning"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Former US Army Major Harrison Mann has not had time to relax until now. Fresh from his holiday in Puerto Rico, he appeared in good spirits while talking about his decision to quit his role at the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) in protest over the US\u2019s support for Israel<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI have no regrets,\u201d he told i<\/strong> on a Zoom call from Washington, dressed in a short sleeve dark shirt with a neon dinosaur print. \u201cIt cost $12,\u201d he laughed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

His apparent calm was a far cry from the anguish he experienced a year ago. Having served nearly 13 years in the military, he resigned within a month of the outbreak of the war in Gaza<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Overwhelmed by reports and images of civilian deaths, he felt \u201cincredible shame and guilt\u201d for the part the US was playing in their suffering.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The decision to quit on 1 November was not made lightly, he said, and he worried about the potential consequences not only for himself, but also his family.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe are all Jewish, including me,\u201d he said. \u201cBefore I decided to publicise my story, I consulted with my family a lot, mainly because I was worried about blowback on them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI\u2019ve never done something like this before and I was incredibly scared of the consequences.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Major Mann is one of a dozen high-profile resignations within the Biden administration in the past year, reflecting a growing rift between senior and rank-and-file US officials opposed to the White House\u2019s approach to the war.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

While there have been reports of hundreds of government officials voicing dissent anonymously through joint statements<\/a>, including with European counterparts<\/a>, Major Mann and 11 others have defied established practice by openly criticising Israel, the US\u2019s closest ally in the Middle East, and accusing the White House of turning a blind eye to Israeli atrocities against Palestinians.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There have been some resignations in Europe, but only one known case in the UK government. Mark Smith, a counterterrorism official based in the British embassy in Dublin, quit the Foreign Office in August\u2002<\/a>having raised concerns \u201cat every level\u201d inside the department.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Last October, Major Mann described feeling \u201ca lot of cognitive dissonance\u201d viewing traumatic imagery coming out of Gaza<\/a>, sometimes on the flatscreen TVs in the office at the DIA, where he worked as an executive officer specialising in the Middle East.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe were treating this like business as usual,\u201d Major Mann said. \u201cIt was really difficult, confusing and frustrating to be part of that, with nobody recognising that this support we\u2019re providing is part of what\u2019s causing this humanitarian disaster.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt was not just that what we were doing was indefensible\u2026 in the first month after 7 October, I learned enough to be pretty confident that the US policy was not going to change, and that\u2019s what really hurt.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The first publicly known resignation was Josh Paul<\/a>, who oversaw arms transfers for the US government for more than a decade. He quit his role in the US Department of State on 18 October, after he voiced concerns about US arms sales to Israel, saying there was no doubt in his mind that American bombs were killing thousands of people in Gaza<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Mr Paul has been one of the loudest voices among the group of resignees, sharing his unique insider knowledge on US arms transfers in interviews with the media, discussions at universities and speeches at demonstrations outside the White House and elsewhere. He now works for Dawn, a human rights organisation that promotes democracy in the Middle East and North Africa.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He has received hundreds of messages from people who support his decision, including his former colleagues. While there have been 12 known resignations in the US government, Mr Paul said he is aware of at least \u201ctwo to three times that number\u201d who have left quietly.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI speak to colleagues who are in government every single day, in the state department, in defence and elsewhere,\u201d he told i<\/strong>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cJust in the last couple of days some have said \u2018if we get dragged into a war with Iran, I\u2019m resigning\u2019. There is an increased level of concern.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Major Mann said he is also aware of some of his former colleagues who have quit or wanted to but were afraid of the consequences, particularly younger staffers who are paying off their students debts while budgeting for the high cost of living in Washington.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Resignations are a slow process \u2013 Major Mann\u2019s did not take effect until early June \u2013 and some are anxious about what it could mean for their future careers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Major Mann said he had former colleagues crying to him on the phone, but he was \u201chonestly surprised\u201d that more did not follow in his steps.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI felt so angry that I assumed that there was going to be a bunch of people [quitting] after me, or more at least,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThere is still a lot of self-silencing on this topic.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The US government has had to strike a difficult balance between support of its key ally in the Middle East while condemning Israel\u2019s bombing of civilians in Gaza. Matters have been made more complicated with the war\u2002spreading into Lebanon<\/a> and Iran now entering the fray<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The war has been catastrophic for Palestinians in Gaza, with no end in sight for the unrelenting horror they have witnessed in the past year. More than 41,900 people have been killed since the war began, according to Palestinian health officials, but the death toll is believed to be much higher, with many bodies buried under the rubble.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

US weapons, however, continue to move through the approval process unabated, said Mr Paul.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When asked whether he had any regrets about resigning, he responded: \u201cNot for a second, and the record of the last year bears that out.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThere have been people who have stayed who have tried to make a difference from the inside and have not been able to affect or impact policy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt was very clear the direction was coming from the very senior levels that \u2018we will expedite these arms transfers, we will say yes to everything Israel requests\u2019, and that hasn\u2019t changed.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Major Mann was similarly confident that he made the right decision. For months he had kept quiet about his resignation, which he pointed out was not an irreversible process, in the hopes that the war would end or there would be a shift in US policy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

msn<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Former US Army Major Harrison Mann has not had time to relax until now. Fresh from his holiday in Puerto Rico, he appeared in good spirits while talking about his decision to quit his role at the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) in protest over the US\u2019s support for Israel. \u201cI have no regrets,\u201d he told i on a […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":33154,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[1151,1558,3734,10442,1385],"class_list":["post-33153","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-politics","tag-gaza","tag-officials","tag-resignation","tag-us","tag-war"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33153","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=33153"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33153\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":33155,"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33153\/revisions\/33155"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/33154"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=33153"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=33153"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=33153"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}