2 AIPAC Officials on Paid Leave

[Moses]

News[/color]
Aipac Puts Two Officials on Paid Leave[/b]
By ori Nir[/size]
March 18, 2005

WASHINGTON — The country's most influential pro-Israel lobbying organization has put on leave two top officials who are the target of an FBI investigation.

Recently the American Israel Public Affairs Committee put Steve Rosen and Keith Weissman on paid leave, the Forward has learned. It is not clear what led Aipac to take the step. The two were put on leave this past September, shortly after news of the FBI investigation first broke. But they were called back to work several days later to prevent having it appear that the organization's work was being hurt by the investigation.

At the time, despite the examination, Aipac officials said that "it is business as usual."

According to press reports, Rosen, Aipac's director of research, and Weissman, deputy director of foreign policy issues, are suspected of transferring a secret document to an Israeli diplomat in 2003 from Larry Franklin, a midlevel Pentagon official with expertise on Iran.

For the most part, Jewish communal officials close to Aipac did not know of the decision to sideline the two Aipac officials and they were left wondering what had triggered the move.

"It seems that something has happened which makes [Aipac] want to distance itself from these two," said a Jewish activist with close connections to Aipac.

In an attempt to avoid negative publicity, Aipac has been tight-lipped about the investigation in recent weeks.

A spokesman for the organization said that it does not comment on personal matters involving its staffers.

Aipac has consistently contended that none of its employees did anything wrong. "Neither Aipac nor any member of our staff has broken any law," the organization declared in a statement this past December. "We are fully cooperating with the governmental authorities. We believe any court of law or grand jury will conclude that Aipac employees have always acted legally, properly and appropriately."

That statement was released after the FBI raided Aipac's Washington office and four of the organization's senior staffers — executive director Howard Kohr, managing director Richard Fishman, communications director Renee Rothstein and research director Rafi Danziger — were subpoenaed to appear before the grand jury.

The Aipac spokesman refused to say whether four other senior employees, who were summoned to testify before a federal grand jury, have given their testimony.

Throughout the investigation, Rosen and Weissman have not been summoned to testify before the grand jury, although from the outset their lawyer told the prosecutor who is investigating the case that they are willing to testify. It is not clear whther they have been summoned to testify, which, some observers said, would indicate that the investigation has reached a critical turning point.

U.S. Attorney Paul McNulty of Alexandria, Va., a prosecutor with experience in criminal cases involving national security, is handling the case. According to press reports, he has handed evidence to a grand jury for a decision on possible indictments.

[Moses]

March 03, 2005
Is the Potential AIPAC/Neocon Scandal About to "Blow Up"?


I am often surprised that some investigations in Washington draw much (leak-fueled) attention in the media and others proceed far below the radar. The intricacies and overall shape of Patrick Fitzgerald's investigation of the Wilson leak affair has eluded Washington reporters. What does draw coverage is his very public--and seemingly maniacal--pursuit of reporters Matt Cooper (of Time) and Judith Miller (of The New York Times). What progress he has made in determining which administration officials leaked the identity of a CIA undercover official to columnist Robert Novak is unknown. There also are no good indications of whether he has pressed Novak--rather than reporters who are peripheral to the alleged crime--to reveal his sources. Compare this to Kenneth Starr's investigations of Monicagate and Whitewater, the confidential details of which were in the newspapers practically every day.

Another under-the-radar investigation is the AIPAC inquiry. But, I'm told, this may soon change.

First, some background. The FBI has twice raided the offices of the influential pro-Israeli lobby and subpoenaed AIPAC officials. The feds are apparently looking at whether AIPAC officials passed classified information obtained from Bush administration officials to Israel. If true, this could be a rather explosive scandal. Yet it hasn't garnered much notice. For a quick primer, here's how The Washington Post described the mysterious investigation last September:

For more than two years, the FBI has been investigating whether classified intelligence has been passed to Israel by the American Israel Political Action Committee, an influential U.S. lobbying group, in a probe that extends beyond the case of Pentagon employee Lawrence A. Franklin [who has come under investigation for allegedly passing information to Israel], according to senior U.S. officials and other sources.

The counterintelligence probe, which is different from a criminal investigation, focuses on a possible transfer of intelligence more extensive than whether Franklin passed on a draft presidential directive on U.S. policy toward Iran, the sources said. The FBI is examining whether highly classified material from the National Security Agency, which conducts electronic intercepts of communications, was also forwarded to Israel, they said.

Israel said the characterization of the probe is speculative. "We are aware of all the speculation, but that is all it is. We have not heard anything official, and U.S.-Israeli relations remain as strong as ever and, as far as we are concerned, it's business as usual," said David Siegel, spokesman of the Israeli Embassy here. AIPAC has forcefully denied that any of its personnel received classified information.

National security adviser Condoleezza Rice and her deputy, Stephen J. Hadley, were apprised of the FBI counterintelligence investigation of AIPAC as a possible conduit for information to Israel more than two years ago, a senior U.S. official said late yesterday. That official and other sources would discuss the investigation only on the condition of anonymity because it involves classified information and is highly sensitive.

The investigation of Franklin is coincidental to the broader FBI counterintelligence probe, which was already long underway when Franklin came to the attention of investigators, U.S. officials and sources said. Franklin, a career analyst at the Defense Intelligence Agency who specializes in Iran, is suspected of passing the proposed directive on Iran to AIPAC, officials said, which may have forwarded it to Israel. According to friends and colleagues, Franklin spent time in Israel, including during duty in the U.S. Air Force Reserve, in which he served as a specialist in foreign political-military affairs. Franklin now works for Douglas J. Feith, undersecretary of defense for policy.

Reports on the investigation have baffled foreign policy analysts and U.S. officials because the Bush administration and the government of Prime Minister Ariel Sharon already cooperate on intelligence matters and share policy views. Despite some rocky moments, the relationship has been among the United States' closest in both policy and intelligence sharing since Israel was founded almost six decades ago.

What's going on is not all that clear. But it does seem to spell bad news for the neocons, since Franklin leads to Feith, a leading neocon (who has announced he will be leaving his post at the Pentagon). Perhaps that's why some neoconners--those pioneering cheerleaders of the war in Iraq--have been suggesting that the FBI used Franklin in a "sting" operation to set up AIPAC. Tugging on the neocon thread, Washington Post columnist David Ignatius last month wrote,

What adds a sharp edge to the Bush II ideological debate [between neocons and so-called "realists"] is the fact that the FBI is continuing an investigation of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, or AIPAC, which, like the neoconservatives, is strongly supportive of Israel. The investigation appears to have touched some prominent neoconservatives who are friendly toward AIPAC. Journalist Edwin Black discussed the fallout in a Dec. 31 article in the Forward newspaper, headlined "Spat Erupts Between Neocons, Intelligence Community." He described an apparent effort by the FBI to use the Pentagon official whose contacts with AIPAC triggered the investigation, Larry Franklin, in an unsuccessful "sting" operation to draw [neocon leader Richard] Perle into passing information to the neocons' favorite Iraqi leader, Ahmed Chalabi.

The FBI investigation has received surprisingly little publicity in the mainstream press, but it continues to rumble along. A prominent former government official with access to highly classified information told me this week that he was interviewed in late January by two FBI agents and quizzed about his luncheon meetings with Steve Rosen, AIPAC's director of foreign policy issues. He said he told the agents that he had never given Rosen classified information and that Rosen had never asked for it. The FBI investigation seemed, to this former official, to be largely a "fishing expedition."

...Meanwhile, I'm told that more than a half-dozen officials in the Bush administration who are apparently suspected of leaking classified information to AIPAC have had to retain defense lawyers.

Six Bushies on the run? That sounds like major news. But no details have leaked out. So let me contribute in my own small way. A reliable source of mine reports that he recently chatted with one of the principle figures in the investigation and that this fellow said the AIPAC scandal was about to "blow up," meaning there would be new, noteworthy developments that presumably would generate headlines. The person talking to my source was in a position to know and in a position to hope for the opposite. Consequently, I would assign a fair degree of confidence to this person's prediction. If that comes to pass, perhaps the Washington media will finally get around to providing more thorough and penetrating coverage of this potential scandal.