The New York Times reported on Sunday that former Secretary of State John Kerry, now President Joe Biden’s climate envoy, told Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif that “Israel had attacked Iranian interests in Syria at least 200 times.”
While Zarif did not say when Kerry shared the information with him, Kerry repeatedly met with Zarif while and after he was America’s chief diplomat. The implication is that Kerry shared sensitive U.S. or Israeli intelligence with a top adversary.
This is deeply concerning.
While leading the State Department, Kerry was responsible for reaching the 2015 nuclear deal with Iran, a nation that also happens to be the world’s leading state sponsor of terrorism. That deal afforded Ayatollah Ali Khamenei’s regime $150 billion in sanctions relief — money that did not go to Iran’s people, but rather to the increased support of proxies such as Hezbollah in Syria and Lebanon, the Houthis in Yemen, and Hamas in Gaza.
In 2018, Kerry said that he had met with Zarif “three or four times” since leaving the Obama administration. And if Kerry told Zarif about the Israeli strikes before they were publicized, or about potentially more sensitive Israeli covert actions, it would have been a breach of U.S. and Israeli national security. To be clear, it seems far more likely than not that Kerry did tell Zarif something he did not already know; otherwise, why would Zarif have explicitly mentioned Kerry informing him so?
But there’s another point to note here. Regardless of whether Kerry told Zarif about any Israeli action during or after his tenure at Foggy Bottom, Kerry has demonstrated that he cannot be trusted with national security. Zarif’s revelation requires investigation, and, in the interim, it is reason for Kerry, who sits on Biden’s National Security Council, to have his security clearance suspended. Depending on the outcome of that investigation, Kerry’s security clearance should be revoked, and he should be fired or forced to resign.
This is a scandal that should be more widely covered. The media have so far mostly focused on condemnations of Kerry from Republicans. We need answers as to what Kerry said, when he said it, and where it came from.
Jackson Richman is a journalist in Washington, D.C. Follow him @jacksonrichman.
