Sebastian Gorka, top counterterrorism adviser to the White House, praised President Donald Trump's role in brokering a ceasefire between Iran and Israel on Newsmax on Monday, calling the achievement unmatched in presidential history.
On "Rob Schmitt Tonight," Gorka said: "If this holds in the next few hours, no president in history has been able to deliver anything like this. Nobody."
On Sunday morning local time, the U.S. mission Operation Midnight Hammer targeted three nuclear sites in Iran: Fordo, Natanz, and Isfahan.
The ceasefire came after a "weak" Iranian retaliatory attack to the strike on Al Udeid Air Base in Qatar.
According to CNN, a diplomat briefed on the negotiations said Trump asked the emir of Qatar to mediate between the two sides. Qatari Prime Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman bin Jassim Al-Thani secured Iran's agreement earlier on Monday. Trump then announced the breakthrough on social media.
Other reports indicate Trump facilitated the ceasefire between Israel and Iran on Monday by contacting Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. A senior White House official said that Trump's team also communicated with Iranian officials, leading Iran to agree to the ceasefire.
"It was something to be there in the East Room on Saturday night with the Cabinet, listening to the president live. … But if this holds in the next few hours, no president in history has been able to deliver anything like this. Nobody," Gorka said.
Pressed to respond to critics of the administration's Iran policy, Gorka pushed back, addressing past comments from conservative political commentator Tucker Carlson, Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., former Trump White House chief strategist Steve Bannon, and others.
Carlson had warned in March that a strike on Iran could lead to mass casualties at U.S. bases in the Middle East.
"I'm just stunned," Gorka said. "You know, he's [Carlson's] apologized to President Trump for his rank ignorance. The Marjorie Taylor Greenes of the world, the masses, they're just imbeciles. They have no sense of history."
"Can somebody show them the photographs of 1979 of the U.S. employees held hostage for 300-plus days in the embassy? What about the Marine barracks? Two hundred twenty Marines [were] killed by a terrorist suicide bomber who was in the employ of Iran. On and on it goes. Six hundred U.S. servicemen and women murdered by Iranian-backed militias in Iraq in just the last 20 years."
"Oh, and by the way, they're trying to kill President Trump," Gorka added. "And they've tried to assassinate members of his former Cabinet. Why? In revenge for the righteous act he took the first time around when he took out General Qassem Soleimani, the most dangerous man in the world, the Iranian general who was plotting to kill another 600 servicemen."
"If you don't know these things, you shouldn't be on Capitol Hill, and you shouldn't be podcasting to the world. Stick to, I don't know, recipes, cooking books, or something else."
Information from The Associated Press was used in this story.
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Jim Thomas ✉
Jim Thomas is a writer based in Indiana. He holds a bachelor's degree in Political Science, a law degree from U.I.C. Law School, and has practiced law for more than 20 years.