(Jerusalem Post) The Pentagon has reportedly named Chief of Staff of the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Special Operations, Ariane Tabatabai, as the prime suspect for an alleged leak of classified documents, Sky News Arabia reported on Tuesday, citing a senior Pentagon official.
Tabatabai, an American of Iranian origin, is also an officer in US Naval Intelligence.
Ariane Tabatabai is the chief of staff of the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Special Operations. She is also an officer in US Naval Intelligence.
She has access to all naval movements and all special forces operations in the world, and specifically in the Middle East. pic.twitter.com/zsbXPkcLLf— Caroline Glick (@CarolineGlick) October 20, 2024
According to the report, members of Congress wrote a letter in 2023 to US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin against keeping Tabatabai in her position.
The members of Congress urged Secretary Austin to “immediately suspend Tabatabai’s security clearance pending further review, as the State Department did with his former supervisor, Robert Malley,” the report stated.
The FBI has also begun investigating the leak of a pair of highly classified intelligence documents describing Israel’s preparations for a retaliatory strike on Iran, The Washington Post reported on Tuesday.
“The FBI is investigating the alleged leak of classified documents and working closely with our partners in the Department of Defense and Intelligence Community,” the Federal Bureau of Investigation said in a statement cited by the Washington Post.
