SUBSCRIBE TO OUR FREE NEWSLETTER
Daily news & progressive opinion—funded by the people, not the corporations—delivered straight to your inbox.
5
#000000
#FFFFFF
5
#000000
#FFFFFF
defense intelligence agency
Jewish US Army Major Explains Why He Resigned Over Gaza
"I knew that as long as I stayed, I'd be contributing to this campaign that had already demonstrated basically it was going to be indiscriminately killing civilians at an industrial scale," said Harrison Mann.
Jun 05, 2024
After Harrison Mann's resignation from the U.S. military was finalized on Monday, the Jewish U.S. Army major who worked in the Defense Intelligence Agency gave a pair of interviews this week explaining his decision to resign over American support for Israel's war on the Gaza Strip.
"We saw, even from the first days of the Israeli air campaign, willingness to inflict very high civilian casualties," Mann toldCBS News chief investigative correspondent Jim Axelrod in a conversation that aired Tuesday.
Even before the Hamas-led October 7 attack prompted the ongoing Israeli bombardment, ground assault, and restrictions on humanitarian assistance deliveries into Gaza, the United States gave Israel billions of dollars in annual military aid. U.S. weapons and diplomatic support for the Middle East ally has increased over the past eight months, as the death toll has topped 36,500.
Journalists and human rights groups have documented Israel's use of U.S. arms to kill and injure civilians in Gaza. Asked by Axelrod whether Israeli forces were intentionally doing so, the Mann responded, "I don't know how you kill 35,000 civilians by accident."
During Mann's first televised interview, Axelrod also asked, "You felt your work was directly connected to starving children?"
The 13-year Army veteran simply said, "Yes."
U.S. President Joe Biden, meanwhile, said in an interview this week that he doesn't think Israel is using starvation as a weapon of war, contradicting conclusions by global human rights organizations and the International Criminal Court.
Bend the Arc: Jewish Action CEO Jamie Beran, whose group has historically stayed out of the decadeslong Israel-Palestine conflict, wrote in a Tuesday letter to Biden that "we, as American Jews, are sounding an alarm: U.S. support for continued violence in Gaza is putting American safety and U.S. democracy in danger."
In his CBS appearance, Mann read from his resignation letter, in which he notes his experience as a Jewish person, writing that "as the descendant of European Jews, I was raised in a particularly unforgiving moral environment when it came to the topic of bearing responsibility for ethnic cleansing—my grandfather refused to ever purchase products manufactured in Germany—where the paramount importance of 'never again' and the inadequacy of 'just following orders' were oft repeated."
Mann addressed his decision to make his letter public on LinkedIn last month after distributing it internally at DIA on April 16. He cited the Biden administration's May report—which critics called a "Friday news dump"—about Israeli assurances regarding the use of U.S. weapons in Gaza and the delivery of humanitarian aid.
That administration's report states that although "it is reasonable to assess" that Israeli forces used U.S. arms in Gaza in manners inconsistent with their international law obligations and expresses "deep concerns" about Israel's action and inaction on humanitarian aid, American support for the Israeli war effort can continue.
Mann also appeared Wednesday on Mehdi Hasan's new show for Zeteo, the media platform that the journalist launched following the cancellation of his program at MSNBC after he aired content critical of Israel's assault on Gaza.
Jewish-American Soldier Quits Biden Administration Over Gaza: “I Feel it's Appropriate to Invoke ‘Never Again’” by Mehdi Hasan
Mehdi speaks to newly-resigned Major Harrison Mann. Plus: the forgotten genocide in Sudan.
Read on SubstackMann told Hasan that he started his resignation process in November but revealed why in April, saying that "the war in Gaza and our role in it and my contribution to that was the straw that broke the camel's back and the reason I ultimately understood I could not do this work anymore."
By November, "I knew that as long as I stayed, I'd be contributing to this campaign that had already demonstrated basically it was going to be indiscriminately killing civilians at an industrial scale," Mann said. He added that it was clear that the U.S. would continue to provide Israel with "unwavering" support.
Others who have quit their jobs over U.S. government support for the Israeli war include Lily Greenberg Call, a special assistant in the Department of the Interior and the first Jewish political appointee to resign in protest; Tariq Habash, a Palestinian American who worked as a policy adviser in the Education Department; and Stacy Gilbert, Josh Paul, Hala Rharrit, and Annelle Sheline, who all left the State Department.
Citing Ethnic Cleansing, US Army Major Resigns Over Israel's Assault on Gaza
"As the descendant of European Jews, I was raised in a particularly unforgiving moral environment when it came to the topic of bearing responsibility for ethnic cleansing," wrote Maj. Harrison Mann.
May 13, 2024
An American Army officer on Monday described months of being increasingly disturbed by the images and news of Israel's U.S.-backed bombardment of Gaza, which culminated in his public resignation from his position at the Defense Intelligence Agency to avoid further complicity in Israel's "ethnic cleansing" of Palestinians.
Army Maj. Harrison Mann published his resignation letter on LinkedIn, saying he had distributed it internally on April 16 to announce his resignation from the agency.
As an officer at the DIA, Mann said, he has been unable to escape the fact that his place of work "directly executes policy" for the Biden administration, including its "nearly unqualified support for the government of Israel, which has enabled and empowered the killing and starving of tens and thousands of innocent Palestinians."
"My work here—however administrative or marginal it appeared—unquestionably contributed to that support," wrote Mann.
He described wrestling with the question of whether he could continue working at the DIA, reasoning with himself that, "I don't make policy and it's not my place to question it."
"However, at some point it became difficult to defend the outcomes of this particular policy," Mann wrote. "At some point—whatever the justification—you're either advancing a policy that advances the mass starvation of children, or you're not."
At the time Mann sent his letter to his colleagues, Israel was conducting airstrikes and preparing its ground invasion of Rafah, the southern Gaza city that over 1 million Palestinians have been forcibly displaced to since October.
Israel has continued to block aid to Gaza even after saying in early April it would open a crossing and a port, and has now pushed the enclave into what the United Nations World Food Program chief said earlier this month was a "full-blown famine." Dozens of people have died of starvation. At least 35,091 people who have been killed in Israel's military assault—two-thirds of those killed have been women and children, despite Israel's claim it is targeting Hamas fighters.
Mann wrote that as the bombardment dragged on and U.S. President Joe Biden's defense and funding of the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) continued, his mind turned to his European Jewish relatives.
"As the descendant of European Jews, I was raised in a particularly unforgiving moral environment when it came to the topic of bearing responsibility for ethnic cleansing—my grandfather refused to ever purchase products manufactured in Germany—where the paramount importance of 'never again' and the inadequacy of 'just following orders' were oft repeated," wrote Mann. "But I also have hope that my grandfather would afford me some grace; that he would still be proud of me for stepping away from this war, however belatedly."
Mann publicized his letter about six weeks after foreign affairs officer Annelle Sheline resigned from her position at the U.S. State Department, saying her work in the human rights realm in the Middle East had become "impossible" in light of Biden's material and political support for Israel's assault on Gaza.
Education Department official Tariq Habash, a Palestinian American, also resigned in protest earlier this year, and a top official who oversaw arms transfers at the State Department, Josh Paul, stepped down in October, citing the Biden administration's decision to send more arms to Israel as the war began.
In February, U.S. Air Force member Aaron Bushnell died after self-immolating in front of the Israeli Embassy in Washington, D.C., having said he was engaging "in an extreme act of protest" to avoid being complicit in genocide.
On LinkedIn, Mann wrote Monday that he "received an unexpected outpouring of support" when he distributed his letter internally, and appeared to address other federal employees who may be questioning their complicity in Biden's policies.
"I am sharing [the letter] now in the hope that you too will discover you are not alone, you are not voiceless, and you are not powerless," wrote Mann.
Feds United for Peace, which includes employees across 30 federal agencies who have advocated for a cease-fire in Gaza, called Mann's letter "incredibly significant."
The New York Timesreported that it is not known "whether other military officers have resigned in protest of U.S. foreign policy" since the Hamas-led attack on Israel in October and the IDF's deadly retaliation, "but the resignation of an active-duty officer in protest of U.S. foreign policy is likely uncommon—especially one in which the officer makes public the reasons for doing so."
Most Popular
We cover the issues the corporate media never will.
Please support our journalism.