The mystery woman who blew the lid off former CIA Director David Petraeus’ career-ending affair is also tied to the military — a sexy social liaison for an Air Force base in Tampa who says she and the ex-general are just “friends.”
Jill Kelley, 37, a married mother of three from the Gulf Coast city, alerted the FBI several months ago after receiving emails from Petraeus’ alleged mistress, biographer Paula Broadwell, warning the stunning Tampa socialite to “stay away from” the spymaster, according to sources with knowledge of the messages.
The raven-haired Kelley, who has an unpaid position as a social planner for MacDill Air Force Base, insisted in a statement Sunday her relationship with the retired four-star general and ex-CIA director was platonic, dating to when Petraeus ran the U.S. Central Command from the base.
“We and our family have been friends with Gen. Petraeus and his family for over five years,” Kelley said. “We respect his family’s privacy and want the same for us and our three children.”
But Broadwell’s father said Sunday his daughter is the victim of character assassination and implied the bombshell story is just a smoke screen for something bigger.
“This is about something else entirely, and the truth will come out,” Broadwell’s dad, Paul Krantz, told the Daily News outside his home in Bismarck, N.D.
“There is a lot more that is going to come out,” said Krantz, claiming he was not allowed to elaborate. “You wait and see. There’s a lot more here than meets the eye.”
He said he supports his daughter “100%.”
“I stand by my daughter. She is an exceptional person,” Krantz told The News, adding that Broadwell, a West Point grad, and her family were “doing well, considering.”
Kelley has not spoken publicly about the scandal. She and her husband, Dr. Scott Kelley, were busy Sunday entertaining guests at a birthday party for one of their daughters at their colonial-style mansion overlooking Tampa’s Hillsborough Bay.
In an exclusive photo obtained by The News, the Kelleys appeared worried while speaking with Vice Adm. Robert Harward, deputy commander of the Central Command, who showed up at the party in his white dress uniform.
Jill Kelley was raised in Philadelphia, where her family settled in the mid-1970s and opened a Middle Eastern restaurant after immigrating from Lebanon. Her father, John Khawam, was a renowned organist in Lebanon.
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