Newly revealed emails show senior military officials raised concerns with the White House within days of Israel commencing its operation in Gaza. 

Reuters obtained and examined emails between senior State Department and Pentagon officials between Oct. 11-14 that showed concern and alarm as Israel started hitting the Gaza Strip with missile strikes. 

The emails specifically focused on the mass evacuation of Palestinians as a potential legal issue. Dana Stroul, the deputy assistant secretary of defense for the Middle East at the time, wrote to senior Biden aides Oct. 13 and warned that Israel could face war crime charges for its actions. 

The emails also include pressure to include messages of sympathy for the Palestinian people and to allow more aid into Gaza while seeking to remain in solidarity with Israel. 

Israel’s invasion of Gaza has proven polarizing and painful for the Democrats. The progressive wing and younger voters are trying to hold the Biden administration to account for its support of Israel as tens of thousands of Palestinians die. 

The invasion also made it difficult — if not impossible — for aid groups to help the displaced residents of Gaza who fled their homes to avoid getting caught up in Israel’s operations. 

Stroul outright alleged that Israel could be ‘close to committing war crimes’ after the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) dropped leaflets over northern Gaza urging residents to flee their homes ahead of the military rolling into the territory as part of the early ‘targeted incursions.’ 

‘Their main line is that it is impossible for one million civilians to move this fast,’ Stroul wrote. One official said that such an operation was not possible without creating a ‘humanitarian catastrophe.’ 

Three senior U.S. officials argued the White House was slow to address these problems, with Biden’s team at one point arguing that the U.S. was ‘leading international efforts to get humanitarian aid into Gaza,’ which would remain a ‘top priority.’ 

Bill Russo, at the time an assistant secretary of state in the Bureau of Global Public Affairs, attempted to drive home the long-term impact of the U.S.’s ‘lack of response on the humanitarian conditions’ in Gaza, calling it ‘ineffective and counterproductive’ while also harming relations with Arab nations. 

‘If this course is not quickly reversed by not only messaging, but action, it risks damaging our stance in the region for years to come,’ Russo wrote in one email, according to Reuters. A colleague forwarded his emails to White House officials and warned that ‘otherwise would-be stalwart’ Arab partners might think twice about relations with the U.S. 

Russo eventually resigned from his post in March 2024, citing personal reasons for his decision.

Far-left voters have placed the fate of Gaza front and center of their concerns approaching November’s election. The voters of Michigan started an ‘uncommitted’ protest vote during the Democratic primary as a means of venting frustration at the Biden administration’s handling of the crisis. 

Those same voters shredded Harris for her DNC speech in August, calling it ‘horrible’ and accusing Harris of ‘downplaying’ U.S. complicity in the Gaza invasion by providing Israel funding and weapons. 

Neither the White House, the State Department nor the Pentagon responded to Fox News Digital’s requests for comment. 

Reuters contributed to this report. 

Taiwan’s top official in the U.S. is warning that China has ramped up its aggression toward the island, and that its people are ready to fight.

‘Yes, of course,’ Alexander Yui, the Taiwanese representative to the U.S., told Fox News’ Aishah Hasnie when asked whether the island’s residents were willing to meet the moment, if China were to invade. ‘We’ve seen Ukraine.’

Taiwan has been intensely watching the conflict in Eastern Europe as Kyiv’s forces have battled a Russian invasion for more than two years. 

Yui said he hoped to not need help from U.S. troops, which Ukraine also does not have, but suggested they would be eagerly accepted if offered.

‘If your house is under fire, and they respond to help you with a bucket of water, would you say no?’ Yui posed.

The diplomat said Chinese President Xi Jinping has escalated regional tensions since former President Donald Trump left office, but he stopped short of blaming the Biden administration for emboldening China.

‘XI Jinping has been emboldened because he wants to realize what he calls his China dream,’ Yui said. ‘It’s not about which administration is in the United States . . . but rather, what are the thoughts of Xi Jinping?’

Taiwan’s ministry of defense tracked eight Chinese military aircraft and two naval ships near the island earlier this week. The defense ministry said four of the eight planes crossed the median line dividing China and Taiwan’s territory in the Taiwan Strait – though Beijing, which claims ownership of Taiwan, does not recognize the geographic delineation. 

A week prior, on Sept. 25, Taiwan’s defense ministry said it had detected 43 Chinese military aircraft in a 24-hour period, with 34 having crossed the median line. The next day saw 41 Chinese military planes detected near Taiwan.

Xi is believed to be preparing his country for an invasion of Taiwan by 2027 – meaning the U.S. response would fall to whoever wins the presidency in November.

Asked if he had a message for Americans about Taiwan ahead of Election Day, Yui said it was a ‘peace-loving nation.’

‘We believe in democracy and freedom. We have to share the same values. And we want to be incorporated in the world, because we’ve been isolated for many decades due to the conflict that we have . . . with mainland China,’ he said.

Melania Trump is not the only first lady to express pro-choice views. She joins several former Republican first ladies who have shared similar perspectives, often in their memoirs, despite this stance historically contrasting with the GOP platform.

Other spouses of Republican presidents, such as Pat Nixon, Betty Ford, Nancy Reagan, Barbara Bush and Laura Bush, have been recorded either during or after their husbands’ tenure in office expressing pro-choice views.

‘I feel very strongly that it was the best thing in the world when the Supreme Court voted to legalize abortion and, in my words, bring it out of the backwoods and put it in the hospital where it belongs,’ Betty Ford said in a CBS News’ ’60 Minutes’ interview in 1975, two years after Roe v. Wade was handed down.

Following Ford’s comments on premarital sex, marijuana and abortion during the CBS interview, then-President Gerald Ford reportedly joked that she had cost him votes.

As a more conservative first lady, Nancy Reagan avoided taking a public stance against abortion that would put her at odds with former President Ronald Reagan. However, she later revealed her personal position on the issue.

‘I’m against abortion, I don’t believe in abortion,’ Reagan said at George Washington University in 1994, five years after her husband left the Oval Office. ‘On the other hand, I believe in a woman’s choice. So, it puts me somewhere in the middle, but I don’t know what you’d call that.’

Barbara Bush, former President George H. W. Bush’s wife, was more reserved in her public statements about abortion and was at odds with her husband’s anti-abortion stance. While she was not as outspoken as Betty Ford, she wrote in her 1994 memoir, ‘I hate abortions, but I just could not make that choice for someone else.’

Former first lady Laura Bush, wife of former President George W. Bush and daughter-in-law to Barbara Bush, also differed with the former Presidents Bush on abortion. 

‘I think it’s important that it remain legal, because I think it’s important for people for medical reasons and other reasons,’ she said in an interview with Larry King Live in 2010. 

Pat Nixon, then-President Richard Nixon’s wife, told reporters during a 1972 press conference – as Roe v. Wade arguments were being considered by the Supreme Court – that she supported the right to choose an abortion, but opposed ‘wholesale abortion on demand.’

Trump, wife of Republican presidential candidate and former President Donald Trump, wrote the memoir entitled ‘Melania’ that is scheduled to come out on Oct. 8, per the Amazon release date. In the book, according to a preview by The Guardian, she expresses a viewpoint closely aligned with that of former first ladies before her.

‘It is imperative to guarantee that women have autonomy in deciding their preference of having children, based on their own convictions, free from any intervention or pressure from the government,’ Trump reportedly wrote.

‘Why should anyone other than the woman herself have the power to determine what she does with her own body? A woman’s fundamental right of individual liberty, to her own life, grants her the authority to terminate her pregnancy if she wishes.

‘Restricting a woman’s right to choose whether to terminate an unwanted pregnancy is the same as denying her control over her own body. I have carried this belief with me throughout my entire adult life.’

The former first lady drew criticism from pro-life advocates on social media after the excerpts were published just a month away from Election Day. This year, the Republican Party’s official platform also softened its language on abortion, as former President Trump also said he would not support a federal abortion ban.

Taiwan’s de facto U.S. ambassador is warning that China, Iran and Russia are forming an ‘alliance’ that the rest of the world should be ready for.

It comes days after Secretary of State Antony Blinken said the three autocratic countries were working together but not an ‘axis,’ as they have so often recently been called.

‘They’re working together, that’s for sure, whether that’s an axis or an alliance’ Alexander Yui, Taiwan’s representative to the U.S., told Fox News this week.

‘And as you know, it’s up to anyone to define it. But there were certainly there are symptoms, signs that they’re working together.’

During the interview, Yui also suggested that Taiwan’s government was in touch with both Vice President Harris and former President Trump’s circles to be prepared for whatever comes next in U.S. relations.

‘The whole world is watching, and I’m sure the diplomatic community here in Washington, D.C., is also watching closely and [trying] to reach out to both candidates or to the people around the candidates,’ Yui said.

Blinken penned an op-ed in Foreign Affairs Magazine on Oct. 1 that said world powers were in competition to set the stage for a ‘new age’ of international relations.

‘A small number of countries — principally Russia, with the partnership of Iran and North Korea, as well as China — are determined to alter the foundational principles of the international system. While their forms of governance, ideologies, interests, and capabilities differ, these revisionist powers all want to entrench autocratic rule at home and assert spheres of influence abroad,’ the Biden administration official wrote.

‘While these countries are not an axis, and the administration has been clear that it does not seek bloc confrontation, choices these revisionist powers are making mean we need to act decisively to prevent that outcome.’

Meanwhile, national security hawks on the right and left have warned that those four regimes were forging an unholy alliance not seen since WWII.

Both House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., called them a new ‘axis of evil.’

Rep. Steny Hoyer, D-Md., House Democrats’ former majority leader, said after President Biden’s address on Israel and Ukraine in October 2023, ‘We face a new axis of evil today. The dictators, despots, and dealers of destruction leading Russia, North Korea, Iran, and Iranian proxies like Hamas and Hezbollah stand together in their assault on democracy.’

The FBI is refusing to give the House Judiciary Committee a briefing on Iran’s hack of the Trump campaign and other key issues, Chairman Jim Jordan told Fox News Digital, saying that the American people deserve to have the information before Election Day. 

Jordan, R-Ohio, spoke exclusively with Fox News Digital and said that he and his committee have been seeking a briefing in an unclassified setting to obtain information relating to Iran’s hack of the Trump campaign, and whether the former president and his team had been given a defensive briefing on the matter.

The FBI has told Fox News Digital that it is committed to working with the committee but did not say if or when officials would brief Jordan. 

‘This hacking of the Trump campaign by Iran — it looks like there was a dossier on JD Vance — that dossier winds up at the Harris campaign, and somehow, it happens to wind up in the press,’ Jordan said. ‘There are lots of questions, like when did you find out about this? How did you find out about this? Did you give Trump a defensive briefing? Who was the person in the Harris campaign who got the information? How did they get the information? When did they tell you they had the information? How did it then get to the press?’ 

Jordan said, ‘Those are just questions off the top of my head.’ 

‘It makes no sense, because we know if everything were reversed and the Iranians hacked the Harris campaign and there was a dossier on Tim Walz that ended up in the Trump campaign and then in the press, we know that they would all be going crazy,’ Jordan said. ‘There would probably already be a special counsel.’ 

Jordan also pointed to the fact that the hack was taken by an adversarial nation — Iran. 

‘This is the same country that says they are trying to assassinate President Trump. This is the same country who is the chief sponsor of terrorism. This is the same country that wants to assassinate [Israeli] Prime Minister Netanyahu. And this is the same country who just sent rockets to our best ally — ballistic missiles to our best ally — the State of Israel,’ Jordan said. ‘And we want to be briefed on this hacking, and they won’t do it.’ 

The Trump campaign said that the documents had been obtained ‘illegally from sources hostile to the United States,’ who ‘intended to interfere in the 2024 election and sow chaos throughout our Democratic process.’ 

The hack by Iran came ‘after recent reports of an Iranian plot to assassinate President Trump around the same time as the Butler, PA tragedy.’ 

The documents were sent to Politico and included a 271-page ‘dossier’ that the Trump campaign had put together on his eventual running mate Sen. JD Vance, R-Ohio, that dated back to February, the outlet said. 

It included Vance’s past stances on issues, statements and previous criticisms of Trump in a section called ‘POTENTIAL VULNERABILITIES.’

Meanwhile, Jordan also said his committee has other questions relating to Trump, the GOP presidential nominee, including why the Justice Department released the ‘bounty letter’ from the second attempted assassin, Ryan Routh, who offered $150,000 to someone who could ‘complete the job’ against Trump if he were to fail.

The DOJ, in a court filing last month, released Routh’s letter as evidence in a detention memo by the Justice Department in an effort to ensure Routh’s detention. 

Jordan also told Fox News Digital he wants information from Justice Department Inspector General Michael Horowitz, who testified last week that he would include in his highly anticipated report on Jan. 6, 2021 details about confidential human sources from the FBI and whether they had been embedded in the mob during the Capitol riot. 

During the hearing last week, Horowitz was asked whether he would ‘expose that there were confidential human sources at the Capitol’ on Jan. 6, and ‘how many went into the Capitol?’ 

Horowitz replied, ‘I’ll have that information in the report.’

Horowitz, though, indicated his report would not be made public until after Election Day. 

‘Well, for goodness’ sake, it’s been four years,’ Jordan said. ‘Why not give us that information now, right?’ 

But Jordan said that ‘the FBI will not sit down with the committee.’ 

Jordan stressed that the House Judiciary Committee is ‘the authorizing committee for the Justice Department.’ 

‘They will not sit down and talk with our committee, and it’s ridiculous,’ Jordan said. ‘This is important information for the American people to know before a consequential election.’ 

Fox News Digital has learned that representatives for the House Judiciary Committee began requesting the briefing during a phone call on Sept. 24 with the FBI. The committee then had two phone calls on Sept. 25 with the FBI requesting a briefing, a call with the Justice Department on Oct. 1 requesting a briefing, and two calls with the FBI on Oct. 1 requesting a briefing. 

A source said representatives of the committee also left a voicemail for the FBI on Oct. 1 requesting a briefing and had a call with the FBI again on Oct. 2. 

An FBI spokesperson told Fox News Digital that the bureau ‘has continually demonstrated its commitment to working with the Committee to accommodate its requests, and we have provided numerous documents and briefings.’ 

‘The FBI recognizes the importance of congressional oversight and remains committed to cooperating with the Committee in good faith,’ the FBI spokesperson said. 

But that cooperation has not met Jordan’s requests, the chairman said, and warned that all options are on the table. 

‘We have done more than 100 subpoenas this Congress, so every option is on the table for us to try to get the information that we believe the American people are entitled to have before making a decision, as I said, in an election that is so consequential,’ Jordan told Fox News Digital. 

‘We’ve got important questions about important issues that impact our country and one of the major candidates for political office,’ he said. ‘Give us the briefing, for goodness’ sake. Answer our questions.’ 

More than 400 national security and foreign policy officials, ex-Cabinet members, retired military officers and Gold Star families endorsed former President Trump on Thursday.

In an open letter organized by former National Security Adviser Robert O’Brien and former NSC Chief of Staff Alex Gray, the signatories condemn the ‘repeated failures’ of the Biden-Harris administration’s foreign policy and urged Americans to re-elect Trump.

‘From a world at peace under President Trump, we are closer to a third world war than ever before under the Biden-Harris Administration,’ the letter states. ‘With multiple escalating wars around the world, an open border that allows terrorists to flood into the American homeland, and malign actors like China operating unabated, U.S. national security has been profoundly damaged by the failed policies of Kamala Harris and Joe Biden.’

The endorsement was signed by several prominent officials from the Trump administration, including former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, former Attorney General Bill Barr, former U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations and former 2024 Republican presidential candidate Nikki Haley, and many more.

Eleven family members of the 13 American troops killed at Abbey Gate at Kabul’s airport during the 2021 U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan also signed the letter, which praised Trump’s foreign policy record in contrast to Biden’s controversial actions. 

‘When President Trump took office, the war in Afghanistan had dragged on for almost 16 years. By February 2020, a peace agreement was reached, ensuring no American soldier was killed in combat until the end of the Trump Administration. This agreement held strong because the Taliban understood President Trump’s resolve and U.S. forces were prepared to ensure their compliance,’ the letter reads.

‘The botched withdrawal from Afghanistan under the Biden-Harris Administration in 2021, led to the unnecessary deaths of thirteen brave American troops at Abbey Gate and left untold billions of dollars of high grade military equipment to the Taliban, making it the most well-armed terror organization in the world.’

Additionally, 40 retired U.S. ambassadors, 75 retired senior military officers and several hundred officials from previous Republican administrations signed the letter, praising Trump’s diplomatic efforts on cease-fire agreements between Turkey and Kurdish fighters in Syria and the Abraham Accords. The letter refers to Trump as a ‘peacemaker.’ 

‘Securing peace is in the greatest tradition of American foreign policy and the Judeo-Christian principles upon which our nation was founded,’ the letter continues before quoting from Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount in the Gospel of Matthew. ‘Jesus said, ‘blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be sons of God.’ (Matthew 5:9) Such is the legacy of the Trump Administration.’

Writing on X, O’Brien said he was ‘honored’ to join his colleagues from the Trump administration in ‘supporting a return to a ‘peace through strength’ foreign policy under President Trump.’

Another signatory, Dr. Jerry Hendrix, former director of the Secretary of the Navy’s Advisory Panel, said it ‘wasn’t a hard decision’ to attach his name to the letter.

‘Trump had 1 of the more successful foreign policy presidencies since the Cold War,’ Hendrix wrote on X. ‘He ended sequestration. He invested in the Navy. The Biden-Harris admin has been one foreign policy debacle after another.’ 

The Trump campaign did not respond to a request for comment.