Army major resigns commission over US support of Israel in Gaza
An Army major recently assigned to the Defense Intelligence Agency has resigned his commission and posted an open letter online citing U.S. support of Israel’s actions in Gaza as his reason.
On Monday, Maj. Harrison Mann posted a letter to his LinkedIn profile that he said he previously circulated among select DIA staff on April 16.
In the letter, Mann cites the DIA’s execution of policy, specifically its “nearly unqualified support for the government of Israel, which has enabled and empowered the killing and starvation of tens of thousands of innocent Palestinians.”
Mann also wrote that such support “encourages reckless escalation that risks wider war.”
Airman dies after self immolating outside Israeli embassy in DC
The major waited the past six months hoping the war would end or actions by Israel would prompt a shift in U.S. support, he wrote.
“I told myself my individual contribution was minimal, and that if I didn’t do my job, someone else would, so why cause a stir for nothing?” Mann wrote. “I told myself I don’t make policy and it’s not my place to question it.”
However, Mann wrote, he found ultimately that those reasons were difficult to defend.
“At some point — whatever the justification — you’re either advancing a policy that enables the mass starvation of children, or you’re not,” Mann wrote.
“I know that I did, in my small way, wittingly advance that policy,” Mann wrote. “And I want to clarify 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.”
Israeli operations in Gaza followed the brutal Oct. 7 surprise attacks in Israel by Hamas militants that killed more than 1,200 people, mostly civilians, according to Israeli officials. Hamas members also took 253 individuals hostage.
To date, an estimated 35,000 people have been killed in Gaza since Oct. 7, according to Palestinian health authorities, Reuters reported.
The Israeli military offensive has drawn sharp criticism worldwide, including claims of genocide against Palestinians.
However, Israel has adamantly denied those allegations, and its officials say they are carrying out operations in line with international law.
Mann was commissioned into the Army in 2011 as an infantry officer, according to an emailed statement from Army spokeswoman Lt. Col. Ruth Castro.
In 2016, Mann became a civil affairs officer and later a foreign area officer specializing in the Middle East. He is currently assigned to the DIA as a foreign area officer.
Between 2015 and 2020, Mann deployed to Kuwait, Bahrain and Tunisia, Castro wrote.
He requested an unqualified resignation from his commission on Nov. 29. Such a resignation is “a voluntary action for officers to be discharged from service and can be requested for any reason after completion of service obligations,” Castro wrote.
Mann’s request was approved in January and will become effective on June 3, she wrote.
Reached by the New York Times on Monday, Mann deferred any comment to DIA.
A DIA official responded to Army Times’ query confirming that Mann was previously assigned to the agency.
“Employee resignations are a routine occurrence at DIA as they are at other employers, and employees resign their positions for any number of reasons and motivations,” the official wrote. The agency did not respond to additional queries regarding the nature of Mann’s work.
Another active duty military member publicly protested U.S. support for Israel in its Gaza operations in an incident livestreamed on the video platform Twitch
On Feb. 25, Air Force Senior Airman Aaron Bushnell, 25, of Whitman, Massachusetts set himself on fire outside the Israeli Embassy in Washington D.C. saying that he “will no longer be complicit in genocide.”
Bushnell died from his injuries.
Bushnell was a cyber defense operations specialist with the 531st Intelligence Support Squadron at Joint Base San Antonio, Texas, officials said. He had served on active duty since May 2020.
