WASHINGTON — US spy chief Tulsi Gabbard acknowledged the U.S. and Israel have different goals for their joint military campaign in Iran, underscoring tensions after Israeli jets struck energy facilities and President Donald Trump pressed for deescalation.

Gabbard, the U.S. director of national intelligence and previously a vocal critic of U.S. engagement in foreign wars, told lawmakers that Israel is focused on targeting Iran’s leadership, while the Trump administration’s goals are centered on degrading the country’s military.

“The objectives that have been laid out by the president are different from the objectives that have been laid out by the Israeli government,” she said in a House of Representatives hearing about global threats on Thursday, which followed similar testimony focused on Iran in a similar Senate session a day earlier.

Gabbard’s comments came as Brent crude, the international benchmark, topped $111 and natural gas jumped, fueled by concerns around an Israeli strike on Iran’s South Pars gas field. That attack prompted Iranian retaliation against the world’s largest liquefied natural gas export facility in Qatar.

Those attacks came just days after after a top Gabbard adviser and senior counterterrorism official, Joe Kent, publicly resigned over the war. He said Iran “posed no imminent threat to our nation,” and accused Israel of misleading Trump into launching the war.

Kent is now under FBI investigation over alleged unauthorized disclosures of classified information, according to a person familiar with the matter, a probe that began months before his resignation and continued after his departure.

Trump has called on Iran and Israel to stop hitting energy facilities, as his administration attempts to lower soaring gas prices as a result of the war and Iranian threats that have paralyzed the Strait of Hormuz, a key waterway for global energy.

Rep. Joaquin Castro, Democrat of Texas, asked Gabbard repeatedly on Thursday morning whether U.S. and Israeli goals were “aligned” in the current conflict. He asked her specifically about the recent Israeli strikes on Iran’s energy facilities, which have led Tehran to vow even more retaliation beyond hitting Qatar.

“To what do you attribute Israel’s decision to strike Iranian energy, despite President Trump’s call to keep those facilities off limits?” Castro asked.

“I don’t have an answer for that,” Gabbard replied, declining follow-up questions and saying she couldn’t speak for Israel.

The conflict has led to Iranian retaliation against several Gulf countries, strained U.S. ties with allies in Europe and effectively closed the Strait of Hormuz.

Earlier Thursday, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth pushed back against criticism the US war on Iran risked becoming a military “quagmire” and said that the conflict would end when Trump chooses to end it.

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