Biden State Department official steps down over Biden's military aid to Israel
Former State Department deputy special envoy Ellie Cohanim joined 'FOX & Friends First' to discuss the official's resignation and Rashida Tlaib's criticism of Biden's support of Israel.
Former State Department official Josh Paul spoke out in an op-ed for the Washington Post after he resigned from his job over President Biden's announcement of material support for Israel.
Paul announced, Thursday, that he would be resigning because of a "policy disagreement concerning our continued lethal assistance to Israel."
"I cannot work in support of a set of major policy decisions, including rushing more arms to one side of the conflict, that I believe to be shortsighted, destructive, unjust, and contradictory to the very values that we publicly espouse," he wrote on LinkedIn.
In an op-ed for the Washington Post, Paul wrote that he worked in the State Department's bureau "responsible for arms transfers and security assistance to foreign governments."
Department of State official Josh Paul resigned from the cabinet department over U.S. aid to Israel. (Mark Wilson/Getty Images)
"I was involved in many complex and morally challenging debates over what weapons to send where. What I had not seen until this month, however, was a complex and morally challenging transfer in the absence of a debate," he wrote.
Paul has repeatedly condemned Hamas' terrorist attacks in Israel, but wrote in his op-ed that while Israel has a right to defend itself, "the country’s track record over a half-dozen major clashes in the past 15 years suggests that thousands of Palestinian civilians will die in the process."
The former official said he urged a "frank discussion" over Israel's requests for munitions.
"These requests deserved the attention we would pay to any large arms package, and I urged a frank discussion. My urging was met with silence — and the clear direction that we needed to move as fast as possible to meet Israel’s requests," he wrote.
President Joe Biden is greeted by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu after arriving at Ben Gurion International Airport, Wednesday, Oct. 18, 2023, in Tel Aviv. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)
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He added that Congress has blocked arm sales to places with "questionable human rights records," and said that managing the concerns surrounding human rights and the munitions request of U.S. allies was standard in completing an arms transfer.
Paul cited the "furious debates" over providing cluster munitions to Ukraine.
"The absence of a willingness to hold that debate when it comes to Israel is not proof of our commitment to Israel’s security. Rather, it is proof of our commitment to a policy that, the record shows, is a dead end — and proof of our willingness to abandon our values and turn a blind eye to the suffering of millions in Gaza when it is politically expedient," he continued. "That is not the State Department I know. And that is why I had to leave it."
A view of United States Department of State logo is seen in Washington D.C., on January 9, 2023. (Celal Gunes/Anadolu Agency/Getty Images)
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Fox News' Lawrence Richard contributed to this report.