Joe Kent’s Resignation

For proof of the possibility of addition by subtraction, look to the resignation of the director of the National Counterterrorism Center, Joe Kent. He credits his departure to his view that “Iran posed no imminent threat to our nation, and it is clear that we started this war due to pressure from Israel and its powerful American lobby.” President Trump says that it is a “good thing” that Mr. Kent is leaving because he is “weak on security.”Weak on security, but strong on the hostile tropes. Mr. Kent claims that “early in this administration, high-ranking Israeli officials and influential members of the American media deployed a misinformation campaign that wholly undermined your America First platform and sowed pro-war sentiments to encourage a war with Iran.” Never mind that Iran has long chanted “Death to America” — and acted in furtherance of that wicked wish.Mr. Kent writes to Mr. Trump that an “echo chamber was used to deceive you into believing that Iran posed an imminent threat to the United States and that should you strike now, there was a clear path to a swift victory. This was a lie and is the same tactic the Israelis used to draw us into the disastrous Iraq war.” Both wars, though, were launched not by the Jewish state but by American presidents for what they reckon to be the American interest.Mr. Kent then writes that “as a veteran who deployed to combat 11 times and as a Gold Star husband who lost my beloved wife Shannon in a war manufactured by Israel, I cannot support sending the next generation off to fight and die in a war that serves no benefit to the American people.” With all respect to both Mr. Kent’s service and his loss, his wife was murdered by a bomb planted by ISIS, not — again — by Israel. The Times reports that Mr. Kent “has long had a penchant for conspiracy theories, claiming without evidence that intelligence officials had a hand in the violence around the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol.” He is also a “close friend of Tucker Carlson.” The podcaster tells the Gray Lady that “Joe is the bravest man I know” and that the “neocons will now try to destroy him.” Mr. Kent reported to the Director of National Intelligence, Tulsi Gabbard.Mr. Kent’s resignation appears to be a shot across the bow from the isolationist wing of the Republican Party, of which Mr. Carlson and Ms. Gabbard are members in sterling standing and which has come to see the war against Iran as something of a Rubicon. Mr. Trump insists against critics of the war that “MAGA includes not allowing Iran, a Sick, Demented, and Violent Terrorist Regime, to have a Nuclear Weapon to blow up the United States of America.”Mr. Kent could soon enjoy his friend Mr. Carlson’s outsized platform. Axios reports that “Trumpworld is now bracing for an expected Tucker Carlson interview of Kent.” Mr. Carlson has called the war against Iran “absolutely disgusting and evil,” and it appears as if Mr. Kent is of the same cast of mind. Also of a similar cast is the likes of Senator Mark Warner, who endorses Mr. Kent solely because of his opposition to Mr. Trump. We were equally dismayed when, in the heat of Israel’s war against Gaza, a State Department hand, Joshua Paul, resigned and published a resignation excoriating the Biden Administration’s support for the Jewish state. Now another mutiny could be afoot, also directed against the alliance between Washington and Jerusalem. Conspiratorial anti-Israel animus, now de rigueur on the left, is making its play on the right. Prenez garde.

Joe Kent’s Resignation

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