Highlights of Joe Kent's Interview With Tucker Carlson

Former National Counterterrorism Center Director Joe Kent has given his first in-depth public account of why he resigned from the Trump administration, using a lengthy interview with Tucker Carlson (watch here) to challenge the rationale for the US war with Iran and to criticize how decisions were made inside the White House. His remarks, centered on intelligence, Iran's nuclear program, and Israel's role in the conflict, have intensified an already contentious debate over US Middle East policy and sparked accusations of antisemitism from some Republicans. Some key takeaways, via CNN:

• Limited debate: "In the lead up to this last iteration, good deal of key decision makers were not allowed to come and express their opinion to the president," said Kent, as opposed to last year's strikes, which featured "robust debate." "They had that discussion, you know, behind closed doors, and there wasn't a chance for any dissenting voices to come," he said of the lead up to the war.
• Intel: "There was no intelligence that said, hey, on whatever day it was, March 1st, the Iranians are going to launch this big sneak attack, they're going to do some kind of a 9/11, Pearl Harbor, etc. They're going to attack one of our bases. There was none of that intelligence," said Kent.

• Israel's role: One of Kent's more contentious statements was that Israel was in the driver's seat, per the AP. "The Israelis drove the decision to take this action," Kent said, eventually nodding to conspiracy theories that pro-Israel forces were behind the assassination of Charlie Kirk. "I'm saying there are unanswered questions," Kent said.
• Killing Khamenei: "I'm no fan of the former supreme leader, you know, Ali Khamenei, however, he was moderating their nuclear program," said Kent. "He was preventing them from getting a nuclear weapon. If you take him out, if you kill him aggressively, people are going to rally around that regime."
• His decision to resign: "I know what happens if I stay ... and I go along with this, I'm going to be, you know, knee deep in it, trying to just chip away and make a difference. But my ability to have, you know, my voice heard, to present data that runs contrary to the trajectory and the agenda that the administration's on, that's going to be squashed before it even really reaches the White House."