White House: No Advance Notice on Iran Strikes

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The Biden administration dismissed as “ridiculous” reports that Iranian officials provided the U.S. advance notice of the timing and targets of its drone and missile attacks against Israel on Saturday.

Reuters reported Sunday, citing Turkish, Jordanian, and Iraqi officials, that Iran gave wide notice to neighboring countries and the U.S. days before its drone and missile attack on Israel. Iran launched hundreds of drones and missiles Saturday, most of which were downed before reaching Israeli territory.

“We receive messages from Iran, and they receive messages from us, too, but there was never any message to us or anyone else on the timeframe, the targets, or the type of response,” national security adviser John Kirby said at Monday’s press briefing. “I want to be clear: This whole narrative out there that Iran passed us a message of what they were going to do is ridiculous.”

President Joe Biden on Friday warned that an Iranian attack on Israel would come sooner than later and, a day later, it happened. But Kirby said that didn’t mean the U.S. was given advance notice of a timeframe and targets.

“I never said we didn’t have an idea,” Kirby said. “I never said we didn’t have information that we could act on and speak to our Israeli counterparts about.”

A reporter asked Kirby if it’s so ridiculous that Iran would send such advance notice, why would sources from U.S. allies in Turkey and Iraq provide such information?

“I can’t possibly answer that question,” Kirby said. “All I’m telling you is it is nonsense. Think about this for a minute: Can you imagine a world in which Iran would pick up the phone and say, Hey, we’re about to try to swack Israel with 300 cruise missiles and drones. We just wanted to let you know it’s coming, and by the way, here’s what we’re going to hit.

“I’m sorry. It just didn’t happen. I can’t account for what sources might be telling you all about what they heard. I’m telling you what we heard.

“While we did get a message from Iran and we pass messages to Iran as well, which I won’t get into the details of, none of it was, here’s the targets, here’s the timeframe, here’s the munitions we’re going to put on target.”