(AFP) – Atlantic magazine editor Jeffrey Goldberg has been propelled to global fame — and put under immense pressure — after being inadvertently added to a group chat in which top US officials shared secret plans for Yemen air strikes. He has been roundly attacked by President Donald Trump, as well as by other officials, after publishing details of the sensitive exchanges on the Signal app in the run-up to US strikes on rebel Houthis. Goldberg says the attacks on him are expected but misguided.
“This is their move. You never defend, just attack,” said Goldberg, 59, in an interview with the BBC. “I’m sitting there, minding my own business. They invite me into this Signal chat and now they’re attacking me as a sleaze bag, I don’t even get it,” he said. “Maybe they should spend a little time thinking about why I was invited into the chat in the first place.”
– Rising US journalism star –
Born into a Jewish New York family, Goldberg migrated to Israel in the 1980s. He briefly served in the Israeli army during the first Intifada, or Palestinian uprising, including a stint as a guard at a Palestinian detention camp, an experience he recounts in a book on the issue. Back in the United States, he launched a stellar career with a job covering the police for The Washington Post, before moving to the prestigious New York Times Magazine and The New Yorker, according to The Atlantic’s website. He joined the Atlantic in 2007, becoming its fifteenth editor-in-chief in 2016, a position he still holds today.
– The Atlantic success story –
Founded in 1857 in Boston, the magazine was originally a literary and cultural monthly, publishing notable authors and essays on contemporary issues — with a particular focus on the abolition of slavery. After cutting back publication from 12 issues annually to 10, amid severe economic headwinds for traditional US media, The Atlantic has enjoyed a revival under Goldberg’s editorship. It announced last year that it had surpassed one million subscribers and was once again profitable, after winning three Pulitzer Prizes — in 2021, 2022, and 2023.
– A tempestuous history with Trump –
Goldberg previously drew Trump’s ire in 2020 for an article in which he reported senior US military officers hearing the president call soldiers killed in World War I “losers.” Monday’s article about his stunning inclusion in the Yemen strikes chat on Signal won him further opprobrium from the White House. Trump said: “I just know Goldberg. He’s a sleazebag. You know, his magazine’s terrible.” A White House spokesperson, Taylor Budowich, described The Atlantic as “scumbags.” Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, who revealed secret attack plans in the chat while Goldberg was included, branded him a “deceitful and highly discredited so-called journalist who has made a profession of peddling hoaxes time and time again.” The Atlantic has endorsed Trump’s Democratic rivals for the White House since 2016.
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