- 16 nov 2010
In deposition, porn claims made and AIPAC officials admit lack of policy on classified info
WASHINGTON (JTA) -- AIPAC officials acknowledged in depositions that the organization only recently adopted a stated policy forbidding the receipt of classified information. The depositions also produced claims regarding the viewing of pornographic materials on office computers.
The depositions are part of a brief filed earlier this month in the District of Columbia Superior Court by lawyers for the American Israel Public Affairs Committee seeking the dismissal of a defamation lawsuit by Steve Rosen, AIPAC's former foreign policy chief.
Rosen was fired in March 2005, seven months after the FBI raided AIPAC offices on Aug. 27, 2004 seeking evidence in a federal case that would charge Rosen and Keith Weissman, AIPAC's top Iran analyst, with dealing in classified information.
The firing came after federal law enforcement officials replayed a wiretapped conversation for AIPAC lawyer Nathan Lewin with Rosen, Weissman and Glenn Kessler, a Washington Post correspondent, in which Weissman and Rosen relay information to Kessler about a purported Iranian plan to attack Americans and Israelis in Iraq.
Weissman in the conversation wondered if relaying the information would get him in trouble, and Rosen countered that the United States does not have an Official Secrets Act, the British law that criminalizes the receipt of classified information by civilians.
After hearing the conversation, Lewin recommended firing Rosen and Weissman.
What happened in the conversation was that these two AIPAC employees were trying to persuade a Washington Post reporter that they had information that was so hot that he should print; that they could go to jail as a result of printing it, but they are disclosing it to him notwithstanding that, Lewin said. And my feeling was that was something that, as I said in the letter [recommending the firings], AIPAC could not condone, much as I felt that they had not committed a crime.
Lewin instructed an outside publicist, Patrick Dorton, to say that Rosen and Weissman were fired because their conduct did not comport with what AIPAC would expect of its employees, he recalled in the deposition.
That claim is the crux of Rosen's defamation lawsuit, which he filed in March 2009, just weeks before the government dropped its criminal case.
In the deposition, a lawyer for Rosen pressed Lewin if he knew of relevant AIPAC standards.
I didn't, he acknowledged. It wasn't a question of knowing what the standards were. I just knew, in terms of my general experience and my feeling in terms of a Washington lawyer, that if it become public that AIPAC's employees were trying to peddle a story based on classified information, AIPAC would not be able to withstand the criticism that would follow the fact that those employees were retained.
In the same filing Richard Fishman, AIPAC's managing director, also acknowledged in a deposition the lack of a stated policy. He noted that AIPAC within the last two years has made explicit a policy against receiving classified information.
When Rosen was employed, Fishman said, it was a common sense understanding, although he did not elaborate how such an understanding was conveyed.
Dorton in his deposition said Rosen was fired also for not being candid with AIPAC officials about his conversations with the FBI prior to the raid. AIPAC's lawyers pressed Rosen in his deposition about his decision to contact an Israeli diplomat when he learned that the FBI was planning a raid -- even before he spoke to Howard Kohr, AIPAC's executive director.
Much of the material in Rosen's deposition had to do with his viewing pornography on an office computer. Rosen countered that he knew Kohr and others at AIPAC also viewed pornography on AIPAC computers.
Additionally, AIPAC's lawyers insisted that Rosen list the AIPAC donors whose donations helped sustain him between the time he was fired and the time the government dropped the case, in May 2009. Rosen has been at pains not to identify the donors in order not to create tensions between them and AIPAC.
Depositions in the filing are heavily redacted, with AIPAC excerpting only those portions that would seemingly support its motion to dismiss.
Rosen, who is suing AIPAC for $20 million, said Tuesday that his lawyers would file a counter motion by Dec. 2 with fuller excerpts and more material.
We're going to show in our brief most of the reasons they're giving in this thing played no role in my firing, he said, noting as an example that his bosses were made aware of the pornography on his hard drive months before he was fired.
In a statement, Dorton said AIPAC was confident it would prevail.
As is demonstrated in detail in the pleadings that AIPAC has filed, this is a frivolous lawsuit with no merit, Dorton said in a statement. AIPAC has made it clear during the course of this litigation that it disagrees with Mr. Rosen's characterization of events relevant to the litigation.
http://bit.ly/cqYMom 21 nov 2010, 20:35 , Respect -
Maria 17 nov 2010
Rosen-AIPAC lawsuit, the movie
We go into the back and forth in our story today between Steve Rosen and AIPAC's lawyers over who viewed porn on AIPAC's computers. For concision's sake, we kept away from some of the more bizarre exchanges.
The hilarious anime version of the deposition below includes just such an exchange, in which Rosen exhibits a formidable defensive wit. One of my favorite lines comes after the lawyers ask him to describe how often he browsed for porn as opposed to how often he viewed it. Rosen asks them to explain the difference and then: "Even after you explained it, I don't understand it." And it gets better.
Why AIPAC's lawyers insist on going into what kind of porn Rosen viewed is one for smarter minds than mine to resolve. The point seems to be to establish that Rosen was violating company policy by viewing porn -- Rosen acknowledges it, but notes that it was honored in the breach not only by him, but by his superiors, including Howard Kohr. How on earth is how many people were in the video/what they were doing/what were the genders involved -- germane? What's AIPAC getting at?
Like I said, for smarter legal minds than mine to resolve.
UPDATE: I have no idea who TheMarkusHatch -- the person who created this video -- is. But I was alerted to it by a Facebook posting by my former colleague, Daniel Sieradski. And via Daniel, I learn from Eli Valley that this is more correctly referred to as animation, not anime.
I thought they were cute enough to be anime. But I stand corrected.
UPDATE: video is removed.
http://bit.ly/8Y351w
AIPAC dirty laundry aired as former staffer sues for defamation
Accusations of porn-viewing and nefarious activities abound as ex-employee sues after fired following espionage charges.
WASHINGTON, D.C. The U.S. Jewish community has been scandalized by details of an increasingly dirty lawsuit, brought by a former AIPAC staffer who was dismissed after he was charged with attempting to spy for Israel.
Steven Rosen was sacked by the America Israel Public Affairs Committee in 2004 after he and fellow staffer Keith Weissman were charged with espionage and passing sensitive information to Israeli diplomats and journalists. The charges against the two, however, were dropped before the case reached a courtroom.
The FBI claimed that it had enough evidence for convictions, but all the charges were dropped nonetheless. The controversial case made headlines again in March 2009 after Rosen filed a civil suit in a Washington, D.C. court against his former employers for defamation.
In his suit, Rosen demanded damages of $21 million for comments by AIPAC officials, which Rosen claims they knew to be lies, while criminally disregarding the damage it would do to his reputation.
AIPAC submitted a detailed declaration in court at the beginning of November, requesting the dismissal of Rosen's lawsuit. The document included transcripts of conversation between Rosen and his lawyer and other AIPAC senior officials, intending to prove that the organization had legitimate reasons to fire him.
The AIPAC declaration included recorded statements made by Rosen to a Washington Post reporter in which he says that he does not want to 'run into trouble' a phrase that AIPAC claims proves that Rosen knew that he was doing something wrong.
Later in the conversation, Rosen expresses relief that the United States does not have a law on the books similar to the British law of 'national secrets,' according to which journalists can be tried for publishing classified information.
"The significance of this is that the plaintiff knew that the information he passed to the journalist was classified, otherwise there would be no need to mention the law," the AIPAC deposition read. The organization spent $4.9 million on Rosen's trial. The deposition mentioned that although the case never came to trial, Rosen was never exonerated.
A large part of the deposition relates to Rosen's 'inappropriate behavior,' claiming that he experimented with sexual liaisons with other married men on Craig's List and used his AIPAC office computer to surf pornographic websites.
The deposition also claimed that pornographic files were found on Rosen's computer, a clear violation of AIPAC policy. Additionally, the deposition notes, criminal charges are not something that AIPAC expects from its employees.
For his part, Rosen sees himself as a victim and scapegoat that AIPAC knowingly put at risk with untrue accusations and by ignoring the facts. Rosen rejects AIPAC's accusations that his actions should not be considered to be work done for the organization, claiming that they are considered to be normal behavior for the lobby.
In reponse to a request from haaretz, AIPAC issued the following statement:
As is demonstrated in detail in the pleadings that AIPAC has filed, this is a frivolous lawsuit with no merit. AIPAC has made it clear during the course of this litigation that it disagrees with Mr. Rosen's characterization of events relevant to the litigation.
"As the pleadings demonstrate, it is AIPAC's position that Steve Rosen's claims are wildly inaccurate, are undermined by Rosen's own admissions under oath in his deposition, and constitute a blatant attempt to detract attention from the true and relevant facts. We have filed a motion for summary judgment in this case with the court and look forward to resolving these matters in that venue.
At the time of publciation, Rosen had not replied to Haaretz's request for comment.
http://bit.ly/9h7AX8
The Israel lobby gone wild
AIPAC staffers looking at porn and cruising for sex on Craigslist, according to allegations in court filings
The latest shot in a long-running legal battle between AIPAC and Steven Rosen, a former top official at the pro-Israel group, reveals that AIPAC staffers regularly looked at Internet porn in the office, and that the married Rosen allegedly cruised for gay sex on Craigslist, according to new court filings.
The Forward has the full back story 16 nov 2010, but the basics are these: Former AIPAC official Steven Rosen was charged http://bit.ly/c7ClAk with espionage in 2005 for allegedly receiving and distributing classified information on U.S. policy toward Iran and other matters (the charges were later dropped). Soon after the charges were brought, AIPAC fired Rosen, with a spokesman saying that Rosen "did not comport with standards that AIPAC expects of all its employees." In response, Rosen sued AIPAC for defamation.
Which brings us to the new, 260-page document filed by AIPAC in the case and first reported on by Grant Smith http://bit.ly/c7ClAk . In transcripts of a recent deposition of Rosen, a picture emerges of a frat-house atmosphere at AIPAC headquarters. "Q" here is an attorney for AIPAC, and "A" is Rosen.
Q How often would you browse for pornographic websites?
A I thought I answered that earlier. It varied a great deal. There were ...
Q Daily?
A There were times where I viewed pornographic images daily. There were other times where I didn't view them at all for long blocks of time.
Q And you know we have a copy of your hard drive, correct?
AI assumed it. I didn't really know that.
Q And for how many years did you do this?
A That I really don't know.
Q Did you do it in 2005?
A May well have. Don't know.
Q Did you do it in 2004?
A Maybe. I don't know.
Q 2003?
A I've already answered you that I have no recollection of the time periods.
Q When is the first time you viewed pornographic material using the company computers at work?
A I don't know.
Q You have no idea?
A No. Mr. McCally, I have no idea. worked there 23 years. I really don't know.
Q Number 30. "Request for admission: Admit that plaintiff Steven Rosen used his AIPAC computer to view pornographic images. Response: Admitted."
How often did you view these pornographic images?
A Didn't we just discuss that a moment ago?
Q No, that was browsing. You said sometimes daily.
A I'm sorry. I don't know the difference between browse and view. What is the difference?
Q Browsing is surfing the web to find -- you answered the question, sir, with the help of your attorney, I assume.
It goes on like that for a while (see Page 55 below). At one point Rosen remarks in his defense, "I told you earlier, I witnessed Howard Kohr view -- he's the executive director -- pornographic images on AIPAC computers. I witnessed his secretary do it repeatedly, and call people over to see it, including Howard Kohr. I witnessed other members of staff do it. And the Nielsen report you wouldn't let me speak of before said 27 percent of American employees look at pornographic images on office computers. And to my knowledge that's probably a good estimate at AIPAC too."
(Rosen at one point also claims that Kohr "routinely used locker room language every single day.")
The putative purpose of the porn line of questioning was to establish that Rosen had not comported by AIPAC's standards for employees. Less clear is why AIPAC's attorney asked the married Rosen about his sexual encounters with men found on Craigslist. From Page 68:
Q If you had browsed the web for sexual encounters with gay men while at AIPAC , would that in your opinion be a violation of the computer usage policy at AIPAC?
A First, a technical correction. I actually sought married men like myself, not gay men, or I don't know what you mean by the word "gay men," but not men who were primarily living the life that's referred to as the gay community and so on.
There are revelations of political interest in the documents, as well. As M.J. Rosenberg notes http://bit.ly/doHVAq , Rosen reveals that "immediately upon being told by the FBI that he was in serious trouble, and being warned by AIPAC's counsel to come immediately to his office and talk to no one in advance, he immediately ran to meet with the #2 at the Israeli embassy!"
We've posted the full document below. Shoot us an e-mail if you see anything of interest. [email protected]
This is not over: Rosen told (16 nov) the Forward that he plans to inflict maximum embarrassment on AIPAC in his next filing. http://scr.bi/aLTgcT
http://bit.ly/cSauwe 21 nov 2010, 20:36 , Respect -
Maria 18 nov 2010
Declassified Preliminary Report: Senate Investigates Foreign Agents - 1961-1963
Documents
On October 21, 2010 the National Archives and Records Administration released Box #1 (of 67) from sealed US Senate records about the activities of non diplomatic representatives of foreign governments active in the United States.
The formerly classified documents reveal the rationale for extensive investigations and Justice Department enforcement actions in 1962-1963.
Top US lobbying firms, public relations consultants and foreign lobbying groups were ordered to submit records under threat of subpoena to Senate Foreign Relations Committee researchers.
A declassified March 17, 1961 three-page memorandum outlines why the Senate Foreign Relations Committee focused intensely on the Jewish Agency, the American Zionist Council and the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (then functioning as the AZC's lobbying division, before incorporating): http://bit.ly/9pndCl
In recent years there has been an increasing number of incidents involving attempts by foreign governments, or their agents, to influence the conduct of American foreign policy by techniques outside normal diplomatic channels..there have been occasions when representatives of other governments have been privately accused of engaging in covert activities within the United States and elsewhere, for the purpose of influencing United States Policy (the Lavon Affair).
The "Lavon Affair" refers to a false flag Israeli terrorist bombing plot code named Operation Susannah against US and other targets in Egypt. It was designed to reverse US policy pressuring British withdrawals and reverting control of the Suez Canal to Egypt. http://bit.ly/dm4ivq
Israeli agents infiltrating as Arabs were discovered, arrested and criminally prosecuted in Egypt when their explosives malfunctioned, leading to a crisis in the Israeli government and relations with the US.
The Senate Foreign Relations Committee, which mentioned the Lavon incident twice in three pages, expressed caution about investigating such sensitive matters. There would undoubtedly (even with care) be instances which would lead to foreign governmental protests, to violent attacks by special groups in the United States...
The declassified Senate memo suggested three avenues for Senate investigation.
I. Public receipt of testimony from Department of Justice and Department of State.
II. Public receipt of testimony from selected law and public relations firms.
III Executive (perhaps public) receipt of testimony on the Lavon Affair, and similar grey area activities.
The Senate record of the May 23 and August 1, 1963 hearings on Israel lobbying outline covert activities, but many were heavily redacted at the insistence of the Jewish Agency and its allies in Congress. No testimony on the Lavon Affair or any other false flag attacks was ever given during the investigation. http://bit.ly/bSBPJm
03/17/1961 Confidential Staff Report to Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chair J.W. Fulbright http://bit.ly/d4vLsS
"In recent years there has been an increasing number of incidents involving attempts by foreign governments, or their agents, to influence the conduct of American foreign policy by techniques outside normal diplomatic channels..there have been occasions when representatives of other governments have been privately accused of engaging in covert activities within the United States and elsewhere, for the purpose of influencing United States Policy (the Lavon Affair).
Internal http://bit.ly/dfbDWl Library of Congress - Staff report on whether Foreign Agent material was on file at Library of Congress as required by 1938 Foreign Agents Registration Act http://bit.ly/amyCO5
"Lenvin [Nathan Lenvin, head of the FARA Section at DOJ] told me that the Library [of Congress] had set aside a room to handle all the material that was flowing up there, but everything turned out to fit on just a few shelves. The man in the stacks who has jurisdiction over the material said I was the first person who had ever come to look at it."
05/10/1961 Letter from DOJ FARA Section Chief Nathan Lenvin to John Newhouse, Senate Foreign Relations Committee listing all FARA related prosecutions from 1/1/1950 to 5/5/1961 http://bit.ly/bJnAf1
..."U.S. v. Hector Garcia Soto On May 3, 1960, an indictment was returned in the Southern District of Florida against Hector Garcia Soto for a willful failure to register under the Foreign Agents Registration Act. The case went to trial and the defendant was acquitted by the jury...."
07/21/1961 http://bit.ly/9GhwQU
Internal Memo from Carl Marcy, chief of staff
"When we get into the lobby hearings, JWF (J. William Fulbright) would like to obtain from the Zionist outfits a list of individuals who have spoken to them in the past, and how much they got paid?"
09/29/1961 http://bit.ly/9mcQLn Outline of Further Staff Investigation into Influences of Foreign Governments and Other Foreign Groups Upon U.S. Foreign Policy through Non-Diplomatic Channels
"1. To what extent is United states foreign policy being influenced through nondiplomatic channels by foreign governments and other foreign groups?
2. To what extent are the following - and other - channels being used by foreign governments?
3.To what extent are the following - and other - practices employed by foreign governments?
4. Is the Foreign Agents Registration Act adequate to protect the American public against improper influences by foreign governments and parties?
5. Do traditional international concepts of t1improper interference in internal affairs" require review? At what point does the need of the U. S. Government to influence foreign governments and public opinion impose a limit on U. S. restraints on propaganda and public relations activities of foreign governments here?
6. To what extent are intelligence and internal security agencies of the U. S. Government cognizant of propaganda and public relations activities of foreign governments and parties? To what extent do such agencies facilitate or sponsor such activities?"
10/05/1961 http://bit.ly/9cI61v Memorandum for the Record: "Timing of further staff investigation regarding non-diplomatic influences by foreign governments."
"The chairman decided today that he liked the attached outline [9/29/1961] of a further staff investigation on this subject and the idea of hiring Walter Pincus to help John Newhouse, but he also decided that the start of such additional staff work should be delayed until 1, April of 1962."
07/1962 http://bit.ly/cNhclo Confidential Committee Print NONDIPLOMATIC ACTIVITIES OF REPRESENTATIVES OF FOREIGN GOVERNMENTS - A Preliminary Study - Prepared by the Staff of the Committee on Foreign Relations of the United States Senate
Archive http://bit.ly/cQBApC Justice Department Orders the American Zionist Council to register as an Israeli Foreign Agent - partially based on Senate Foreign Relations Committee preliminary work.
Archive http://bit.ly/bSBPJm ACTIVITIES OF NONDIPLOMATIC REPRESENTATIVES OF FOREIGN PRINCIPALS IN THE UNITED STATES
Redacted Senate report on Israel lobbying.
In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this material is presented without profit for research and educational purposes, most importantly understanding how government functions during law enforcement actions involving Israel and its lobbyists.
The Israel Lobby Archive has no affiliation whatsoever with the originator of the content nor is it endorsed or sponsored by the originator.
http://www.irmep.org/ila/forrel/ 21 nov 2010, 20:38 , Respect -
Maria 19 nov 2010
Ex-AIPAC official got at least $670,000 from donors
By Jeff Stein
The latest episode of the AIPAC spy scandal turned sordid last week, with the pro-Israeli lobby releasing its deposition of fired official Steven J. Rosen in which he confesses he engaged in extra-marital sex and watched pornography on his office computer.
But largely buried beneath such tawdry details was an admission arguably far more damaging to Rosen's drive to prove the organization ruined his professional life: that major Jewish donors supported him with hundreds of thousands of dollars during the four years after his dismissal in May 2005.
Lawyers for the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, or AIPAC, argue that such financial support, as well as continuing references to Rosen as an influential figure in Middle East policy circles, shows that his firing hasn't materially affected his life.
Indeed, many of the dozen benefactors Rosen named, including entertainment mogul Haim Saban and Slim-Fast billionaire Daniel Abraham, are also major donors to AIPAC, which fired him after the Justice Department charged him with illegally giving classified information to Washington Post reporter Glenn Kessler and an Israeli Embassy official.
During his Sept. 22 deposition, AIPAC's lawyer alleged that Rosen had received "over $1 million in gifts or severance or payments of benefits between '05 and '09." Rosen detailed gifts that amounted to $670,000.
One philanthropist bundled about $200,000 for him, Rosen said. Saban gave $100,000 to him, his wife and children. Another supporter, philanthropist Lynn Schusterman, paid off Rosen's daughter's $18,000 college loan, he said. In all, about a dozen supporters gave him $670,000, according to his testimony, which AIPAC released last week.
The payments stopped in 2009, Rosen says, when the government dropped its case against him and another AIPAC official, saying it couldn't make an espionage case against them.
During its deposition of Rosen, AIPAC's lawyer Thomas L. McCally clearly tried to make his confessions of pornography and philandering the central issues in his dismissal. Rosen shot back that he had "witnessed" AIPAC's executive director Howard Kohr "view... pornographic images on AIPAC computers," as well as "his secretary do it repeatedly, and call people over to see it, including Howard Kohr." He said he "witnessed other members of staff do it," too.
Kohr did not respond to a request for comment on Rosen's pornography allegation. AIPAC spokesman Patrick Dorton declined to comment on that allegation but said his suit had no merit.
Rosen portrays the pornography issue as a red herring, contending that government attorneys stampeded the organization into firing him by playing its officials a selectively edited portion of a wiretapped conversation that made him look like he knew he was illegally trafficking in classified Pentagon documents.
Within hours, the organization announced it was firing Rosen because such alleged behavior did not comport with standards that AIPAC expects of its employees.
Rosen says his actions were common practice at the organization. He said his next move is to show that AIPAC, Washington's major pro-Israeli lobbying group by far, regularly traffics in sensitive U.S. government information, especially material related to the Middle East.
I will introduce documentary evidence that AIPAC approved of the receipt of classified information, he said by e-mail. Most instances of actual receipt are hard to document, because orally received information rarely comes with classified stamps on it nor records alerts that the information is classified.
But Rosen said he would produce statements of AIPAC employees to the FBI, internal documents, deposition statements, public statements and other evidence showing that [the] receipt of classified information by employees other than [himself] ... was condoned for months prior to being condemned in March 2005 after threats from the prosecutors.
AIPAC, he said, will make denials. The jury will have to decide who is telling the truth -- I am.
http://bit.ly/dlVrtp 21 nov 2010, 21:04 , Respect -
Maria 20 nov 2010
AIPAC: Fighting for survival
With the flailing lobby distracted by a legal battle with a former employee, peace may just have a chance. MJ Rosenberg
The latest Aipac (American Israel Public Affairs Committee) scandal has not found its way into the mainstream media, although the Jewish media http://bit.ly/cqYMom has done a great job in highlighting this very explosive story. (LATE UPDATE: The Washington Post http://bit.ly/dlVrtp is now reporting on the story.)
The good news is that it does not much matter whether the New York Times runs the story or not. The Rosen vs. Aipac case is grinding its way through the courts and could well destroy the lobby without ever making its way on to the front page. Aipac is under siege, and is spending millions to stay alive. But that will not be easy - even if Steve Rosen ultimately accepts a payoff from the organisation and refrains from telling what he knows.
There is no need to recapitulate the story here. Nathan Guttman in the Forward http://bit.ly/bQbh6P explains it well. The bottom line is that Steve Rosen, Aipac's former #2 guy, who was indicted under the Espionage Act and then fired, is now suing the organisation for $20mn.
Ironically, the organisation spent $4.5mn to save their former employee from imprisonment (and more money than that to save itself). In the end, the government dropped the case probably because it believed it would not prevail in court, especially with Aipac's buddies http://n.pr/brUGzJ in congress breathing down the justice department's neck.
Nonetheless, Rosen, off the legal hook, was furious. How could Aipac have fired him when, in the end, the government could not prove its case? His life was in tatters thanks to being terminated, in his opinion, without cause.
Aipac argues it had cause. In fact, in a 2008 http://nyti.ms/aPSCcI New York Times story, it stated that Rosen was fired because his behaviour "did not comport with standards that Aipac expects of its employees".
But Rosen maintains that everything he did, or was accused of doing, was standard operating procedure for Aipac. It fired him not because he did anything of which Aipac disapproved, but as a peace offering to the government: take Rosen and leave us alone.
Personal attack
I doubt there is a single person who knows Rosen and/or Aipac who does not believe Rosen is telling the truth about simply doing his job. I know Rosen and I know Aipac. And if there is any daylight between the two, I have never seen it.
Unfortunately for Aipac, Rosen has 180 documents which could prove that Howard Kohr, Aipac's executive director, and probably the Aipac board as well, knew exactly what Rosen was doing. Worse, Rosen is now in court demanding that Aipac pay him $20mn or he will release everything he has.
The ugliest aspect of the case so far is that Aipac has decided to win by destroying Rosen personally. I have no use for the guy and consider him to have been, in his time, instrumental in helping to destroy Israel's chances at achieving peace with the Palestinians. Rosen was so effective as a peace-wrecker that in 1992 Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin himself told Aipac to fire Rosen. He did not want Rosen to be in a position to thwart Israel's efforts to make peace with its neighbours. In the years since, he has been a key advocate of war with Iraq and, even now despite his disgrace, is an agitator for war with Iran. He is also an extreme Islamophobe, now teamed with Daniel Pipes http://bit.ly/dvINyb at his anti-Muslim hate organisation.
Nonetheless, I think Aipac's game here is pretty despicable. Desperate that its true modus operandi not be revealed, Aipac has set out to silence Rosen by exposing his sexual activities. (Rosen notes, in response, that Howard Kohr is no choir boy either.) This is causing great merriment throughout Washington, but the merriment should not just be over the "dirty parts". http://bit.ly/8Y351w
Cause for celebration
There is great cause for celebration in Aipac's fight to stave off extinction because a bleeding, flailing Aipac is far less dangerous than an Aipac riding high (which is where it usually rides).
Here is what Aipac would like to be devoting its energies and financial resources to right now. One, making sure that President Obama is unable to pressure Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu to freeze settlements and move to final status negotiations. And, two, boxing the president in so that he has no choice but to either strike Iran's nuclear facilities or, more likely, let Israel do it. In fact, it is already planning its huge spring "policy conference," slated to be devoted to warmongering over Iran followed by congressional passage of Aipac-drafted Iran-must-be-stopped resolutions.
These are immense undertakings and they take lots of money and lots of time.
But, thanks to Rosen, Aipac is spending $10mn of its donors' money on legal fees. Its top people are working with lawyers virtually nonstop. And the whole place is in the grips of fear - fear that one former employee who has the goods on Aipac will bring the whole house down.
Fighting for its life was not what Aipac expected to be doing in 2011. But that is precisely what it will be doing, taking precious time away from its regular agenda.
At long last, Aipac, in its own way, is giving peace a chance. Congress may just have to start figuring out the Middle East on its own.
MJ Rosenberg is a senior foreign policy fellow at Media Matters Action Network. The above article first appeared in Foreign Policy Matters, a part of the Media Matters Action Network.
The views expressed in this article are the author's own and do not necessarily reflect Al Jazeera's editorial policy.
http://bit.ly/bD855F 21 nov 2010, 21:16 , Respect -
Maria 21 nov 2010
Ex-AIPAC official threatens to uncover mass spying at Israel lobby
Top AIPAC officials visited prostitutes, regularly watched porn at work: claim
Is US's most influential advocate for Israel about to implode?
A former foreign policy chief for the largest Israeli lobby in the US is threatening to provide evidence members of the organization regularly traffic in classified US government information.
The claim comes in the midst of an increasingly ugly lawsuit in which parties have alleged or admitted to mass viewing of pornography among senior staffers at AIPAC as well as extra-marital affairs.
Steve Rosen, who was in charge of foreign policy issues at AIPAC until 2005, is suing his former employer for $20 million, alleging that AIPAC defamed him when they fired him. Rosen and colleague Keith Weissman were charged in 2004 with espionage for allegedly pressuring a Washington Post reporter into running classified US government information they had obtained about Iran. The charges were dropped last year, evidently due to lack of evidence.
But AIPAC fired Rosen years before the charges were dropped, http://bit.ly/cqYMom on the grounds that Rosen's "conduct did not comport with what AIPAC would expect of its employees."
But Rosen disputes this, and his lawsuit aims to prove that what he allegedly did was standard practice at AIPAC. The Washington Post's Jeff Stein reports: http://bit.ly/dlVrtp
Rosen says his actions were common practice at the organization. He said his next move is to show that AIPAC, Washington's major pro-Israeli lobbying group by far, regularly traffics in sensitive U.S. government information, especially material related to the Middle East.
I will introduce documentary evidence that AIPAC approved of the receipt of classified information, he said by e-mail. Most instances of actual receipt are hard to document, because orally received information rarely comes with classified stamps on it nor records alerts that the information is classified.
But Rosen said he would produce statements of AIPAC employees to the FBI, internal documents, deposition statements, public statements and other evidence showing that [the] receipt of classified information by employees other than [himself] ... was condoned for months prior to being condemned in March 2005 after threats from the prosecutors.
"Unfortunately for AIPAC, Rosen has 180 documents which could prove that Howard Kohr, AIPAC's executive director, and probably the AIPAC board as well, knew exactly what Rosen was doing," reports M.J. Rosenberg at Al-Jazeera. http://bit.ly/bD855F
He suggests that Rosen's threat to reveal AIPAC trafficking of data is meant to intimidate the lobby group into settling out of court. Making the lawsuit go away "will not be easy - even if Steve Rosen ultimately accepts a payoff from the organization and refrains from telling what he knows," Rosenberg writes.
Other elements of the lawsuit could prove embarrassing, if not politically toxic. Lawyers for AIPAC got Rosen to admit he viewed pornography on work computers, but Rosen has countered that the head of AIPAC and his closest colleagues openly watched porn at work. The Jewish Daily Forward reports: http://bit.ly/bQbh6P
I witnessed [AIPAC executive director] Howard Kohr viewing pornographic material, [Kohr's secretary] Annette Franzen viewing pornographic material, probably a dozen other members of the staff, Rosen said in his deposition. He added that, according to a Nielsen survey, more than a quarter of Americans regularly view pornographic websites at their workplace.
Later in his deposition, the former lobbyist also said he had heard from directors at AIPAC about their visits to prostitutes and he claimed Kohr had routinely used locker room language at the AIPAC offices.
Rosenberg posits that the lawsuit "could well destroy the lobby without ever making its way on to the front page. AIPAC is under siege, and is spending millions to stay alive."
http://bit.ly/cjf1J8
Israeli press is censoring the truth away
By Gideon Levy
Many of us bow our heads in surrender and self-censorship, which is immeasurably worse than government censorship.
We're meeting in Eilat this week for our annual conference; let's use it for some soul-searching. There are many reasons to be proud of what we write, broadcast, uncover and express. Not everywhere can you find such a lively press, especially such a free press. But this freedom of ours is in great danger, friends, a freedom we don't take proper advantage of. A dangerous fire is burning around us, and even if it hasn't reached us, it's on the way, yet we are complacent. The monster is coming, and there is no one to stop it.
Journalists are not being assassinated here yet, but some people are insinuating that this should happen. We are not being gagged yet, but some people preach openly that this be done. Shockingly, some journalists call for us to be curtailed, to be prevented from whispering an opinion, not to mention one that is subversive or a minority view. Too many of our colleagues don't understand their function; they confuse public relations with journalism, propaganda with the truth, true patriotism, which means doing our job, with false patriotism, which means serving propaganda.
The house is burning, friends, and people on the inside are adding fuel to the fire. Outside, dangerous laws are being passed that are aimed at nonprofit organizations, Arabs and other minorities, but will eventually strike at us, the acclaimed life's breath of democracy, which too few truly understand.
There is hardly any censorship or pressure from the government, army or other powerful groups in Israel that we cannot withstand. The problem is that many of us bow our heads in surrender and self-censorship, which is immeasurably worse than government censorship. Too many have joined the Israeli propaganda service, a press that has not been drafted, but has joined up.
Ostensibly no one ideology rules: The editorial pages are full of a wide variety of opinions, but one line is taking us over: the need for our readers to like us, not to make them unnecessarily angry, not to tell them what they don't want to know, but to move them and entertain them as much as possible; to sell.
We have brought down presidents, ministers and prime ministers with our investigations and reports, yet the rarest commodity among us is courage. Do people not want to know about the occupation? So we won't tell them. Do people not want to hear the truth about Operation Cast Lead? We won't let them lose any sleep over it. There is no need for the IDF Spokesman's Office, it's within us. Most of the ghosts that are emerging from the terrible attack on Gaza, a handful of tardy investigations and trials, are not the result of our uncovering them. We were put to sleep and misled in Operation Cast Lead. Some of us called for it to take place and then willfully blurred what happened there.
The government has closed Gaza to us since November 2006 and scandalously, no one defies it. It's hard to believe that only one courageous reporter, Amira Hass, has managed to be there to report without being part of an army unit, while the rest of the press has given up the task. The activists of the Turkish flotilla to Gaza were called terrorists in the media without fitting that description, because that's what our government called them, that's what our readers want, and that way we can justify killing nine of those activists.
A press that excels in many ways has shirked its task in covering the occupation; it's the occupation's greatest collaborator. It helps Israelis feel that there is no occupation. Without the dehumanization campaign in the press, Israelis would feel less self-satisfied, and perhaps more moral doubts would be raised about what we are doing.
In ignoring matters and serving propaganda, the press is not carrying out its task and is allowing this cruelty to continue not far from our homes, distancing it light years from our awareness. We should talk about this in Eilat, between reception and flowery speech. Over a gin and tonic, we should ask ourselves if we are reporting the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth.
http://bit.ly/9vEcYQ 27 nov 2010, 07:25 , Respect -
Maria 22 nov 2010
Most Israeli media publish press releases as straight news
By Shuki Tausig, 7th Eye Hebrew original here http://bit.ly/fp0RgQ and http://bit.ly/eU2RIq
Netanyahu's office has an original technique for marketing its messages, senior Yedioth Ahronoth columnist Nahum Barnea wrote in his Friday column http://bit.ly/fHhHzl .
Briefings are emailed every few hours to reporters and commentators. The condition is that the information not be attributed to Netanyahu, his advisers, his circles or his associates. This way, the Prime Minister's Office achieves broad circulation for its messages without having to answer questions and without taking responsibility for the facts. It is a wonderfully convenient technique.
One of these email messages, a perfectly standard one sent to reporters last week, has reached The 7th Eye. It's an example of the said technique in action; and a review of reporting related to the email message also demonstrates just how convenient the technique is http://bit.ly/euyrVQ and http://bit.ly/fYP9JR
The message, sent from the Prime Minister's Office, describes itself as an off-record factual background briefing, and includes detailed instructions, a user's manual: The content of the briefing must be published as information by the reporter, without naming the source under any circumstances. A reference may be made to a diplomatic source in Jerusalem, where the briefing says as much.
The actual content of the briefing concerns the delays in the formulation of the agreement (the American letter) between the Israeli prime minister and the American Administration concerning the renewal of the moratorium of construction in the Territories (the freeze.) According to the Prime Minister's Office, which is to say, according to that off-the-record statement issued by the PMO in the middle of last week, the letter is being delayed because of the Palestinians, who are arguing to the Americans that the agreements between the State Department and Netanyahu makes them look bad.
In other words: The agreement is delayed not because Netanyahu spilled the beans on it too early (as it would transpire later in the week), but because Netanyahu got such a fantastic deal, and the Palestinians are now trying to undermine it http://bit.ly/dXRzFQ .
The email was sent in the middle of the day and its content spread quickly across the media: First on the internet, then on broadcast media, and finally, the next morning, in print.
Within half an hour of the email, Atilla Somfalvi reported information relayed by a diplomatic source, on YNET;http://bit.ly/foXOGL after another half hour, the content of the briefing appeared on NRG http://bit.ly/ifNTLM (Ma'ariv), Walla! http://bit.ly/gfyHny and Haaretz http://bit.ly/huL3xr , and then on Nana10 http://bit.ly/hD85Ys and on other websites.
The web edition reporters (on Haaretz and on NRG they were print-edition reporters Barak Ravid and Eli Berdenstein, respectively) follow the instructions of Nir Heffetz, head of the Prime Minister's spokesman's office, to the letter. The information is sourced to the reporter himself, to a diplomatic source and to a diplomatic source in Jerusalem. The message is quickly absorbed, and the headlines on the websites are all variations on the claim that the Palestinians are delaying the freeze.
In the evening, on the Channel 2 main news program, Udi Segal implied the same claim in his report, while on the main news program on Channel 10 Chico Menashe reported on the talks without mentioning the PMO's anonymous spin.
The next morning, Guy Varon reports the content of the briefing on Army Radio, and like the web reporters, quotes parts of it and sources them to a diplomatic source in Jerusalem. Israel Radio's Ran Binyamini does the same. Later that day, it appears the political reporters in Ma'ariv and Yediot ignored the information disseminated by PMO and obtain clearer and different information. In Haaretz and Yisrael Hayom, Barak Ravid and Shlom Tzezana quote most of the statement verbatim, sourcing it to a senior Israeli official with knowledge of the talks (Haaretz) and a senior diplomatic source in Jerusalem (Yisrael Hayom).
The political correspondent of Yisrael Hayom not only stayed true to the exact phrasing by his source, but much of the report under his byline consisted of phrases written in the prime minister's office, with suitable headlines: (The Palestinians are stirring the pot?, one subhead asked.)
So is the prime minister's technique working?
Does it secure broad circulation for its messages without having to answer questions and without taking responsibility for the facts? An overwhelming Yes.
The success is particularly helped by the fact that the web reporters who, in some cases, are also the print reporters are committed to constantly feeding the information monster, and are frequently compared by the editors to their counterparts on competing websites. In the case of Yisrael Hayom, the success of the technique is also helped by the fact a major media outlet in Israel sounds as if its political reports are composed directly in the Prime Minister's office.
The problem is that in the absence of a father, the facts tend to run wild, Barnea wrote in his column. In the absence of a father, even the instructions the father leaves behind are not always clear to those who are supposed to follow them. And so, for example, Marlen Aviva-Grinfiter reports in the Hebrew edition of the Epoch Times, an esoteric publication by the Falon Gong, part sect, part dissident movement in China which, for some reason, runs a global newspaper network: The Prime Minister's Office released a statement by a diplomatic source who did not wish to be named, which shed some light on the matter.
Shuki Tausig is the editor of the website of The 7th Eye, Israel's pre-eminent media magazine.
Update: The author's 7th Eye colleague and Israeli uber-blogger Ido Kenan is inviting editors and journalists to leak him communiques such as the one analyzed in this article. The idea: To monitor which reporters are most susceptible to spin http://bit.ly/fhMmEj .
http://bit.ly/gLWyjX 27 nov 2010, 07:27 , Respect -
Maria 23 nov 2010
Internal Revenue Service Asked to Revoke AIPAC's Tax Exemption
An 1,389 page filing, demanding that the American Israel Public Affairs Committee's (AIPAC's) tax exempt status be revoked, was received by the Internal Revenue Service, on Tuesday, the Middle Eastern Policy Institute for Research in Washington told The Middle East Monitor.
The IRmep Center for Policy and Law Enforcement, a unit of the Middle Eastern Policy Institute, submitted the complaint which encompasses nearly 60 years, from the time AIPAC's founder left the employment of the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs up to now.
Two core charges are contained in the filing. Firstly, the FBI has conducted several investigations against AIPAC which is currently in a lawsuit over the ongoing gathering and movement of U.S. government classified information. According to the filing, such activities show that AIPAC does not function as a "social welfare" organization with a charitable purpose.
Secondly, AIPAC's original application for tax exemption contained fraudulent representations and omissions. There is no mention in the application that AIPAC's parent organization, the American Zionist Council (AZC) was closed down by a U.S. Department of Justice Foreign Agents Registration Act order in 1962. Six weeks later, AIPAC merged and applied for tax exempt status however failing to disclose that the majority of its initial funding originated from Israel via the AZC.
IRmep director, Grant F. Smith, and callers interrogated IRS Commissioner, Douglas Shulman, on National Public Radio, last January 1, 2010, over lax IRS enforcement toward some Israel-related non-profitable organizations, known to commit illegal acts overseas and violate U.S. tax laws.
Shulman stated, assuring the American public: "If a charity is breaking the tax law, is engaged in activities that they are not supposed to be engaged in, we certainly will go after them. Every year we pull 501(c)(3) charity status from a number of charities. We've got thousands of audits going on regarding charities, and so we don't hesitate to administer the tax laws and make sure that people are following the rules."
"By publicly filing this 13909 complaint with the IRS, we encourage concerned Americans and misled donors to monitor whether the IRS takes appropriate action. The clock is ticking." Smith declared.
http://www.imemc.org/article/59986 27 nov 2010, 07:28 , Respect -
Maria 15 nov 2010
Zionist Congress and Jewish Supremacism - Dr. Edward Fields
(5:07) Zionist Congress and Jewish Supremacism - Dr. Edward Fields 1 x viewed
18 nov 2010
The Pornography of AIPAC
The American Israel Public Affairs Committee has long been the target of conspiracy theories about its influence on American Middle East policies. But even those prone to viewing AIPAC with skepticism must be taken aback by the latest turn in the Steve Rosen and Keith Weissman saga. The government's charges of espionage against this duo, both of whom worked for AIPAC, were dropped a year ago. But the fallout from the case threatens to harm AIPAC badly.
The heart of the matter, at this point, may not be spying, but internal bickering at AIPAC. It turns out to be a far more interesting place than anyone could have imagined. In March 2009 Rosen filed a civil lawsuit alleging defamation by AIPAC, which fired him in 2005. Rosen was not acquited of espionage--prosecutors simply dropped the charges. Rosen says his superiors were aware of his actions and that he shouldn't have been fired. Rosen's defense raises the question of whether, in fact, AIPAC is knowingly engaged in activities that constitute spying--as Grant Smith of AntiWar.com puts it, http://bit.ly/eCkbIl
If Rosen proves in court that AIPAC has long handled classified information while lobbying for Israel, the worn public pretense that AIPAC is anything but a stealth extension of the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs--from which it emerged in 1951--will end forever.
Rosen is demanding no less than $20 million. AIPAC had already spent a bundle--close to $5 million--to defend Rosen in court. AIPAC filed a motion on November 8, 2010 in DC Superior Court asking Judge Erik Christian to dismiss Rosen's claim.
If Rosen, smarting from being fired at AIPAC, is out to pressure his former employer to cough up more millions. AIPAC seems out to follow a scorched earth policy. It's intent on blackening Rosen's name. Rosen, for his part, is making sweeping allegations about the behavior of staffers at the organization. Instead of devoting their energies to promoting Israel, it seems that AIPAC employees had another work occupation--watching pornography. The real danger that AIPAC adversaries may now face isn't that they confront a formidable foe. It's that they may die from laughter after they learn what's really transpiring at the organization.
According to the Jewish Daily Forward,
AIPAC claims that Rosen, who was director of foreign policy issues at the lobby and one of its most senior and well-known employees, had engaged in viewing pornography on AIPAC computers at the lobby's Washington offices. Partial transcripts of the lengthy videotaped deposition of Rosen, which were made public as part of AIPAC's motion, show Rosen admitted to surfing pornographic websites from work. But AIPAC's lawyers insisted on more details. http://bit.ly/bQbh6P
Q: What type of pornography?
A: Sexual pornography.
Q: What type? Man on man, man on woman?
A: Anything. Anything that occurred to me.
Rosen also added more details than, perhaps, the attorney for AIPAC had bargained for.
I witnessed [AIPAC executive director] Howard Kohr viewing pornographic material, [Kohr's secretary] Annette Franzen viewing pornographic material, probably a dozen other members of the staff, Rosen said in his deposition. He added that, according to a Nielsen survey, more than a quarter of Americans regularly view pornographic websites at their workplace.
Later in his deposition, the former lobbyist also said he had heard from directors at AIPAC about their visits to prostitutes and he claimed executive director Kohr had routinely used locker room language at the AIPAC offices.
AIPAC did not seem deterred from getting dragged into a dirty debate. It also chose to include in its court filing an issue relating to Rosen%u2019s personal life with only a vague connection to the lobby's claim regarding Rosen's actions being below AIPAC's standards. AIPAC's lawyers questioned Rosen in detail about his attempts to find male sexual companions through Craigslist, an act Rosen referred to as sexual experimentations. This information came up in one of Rosen's divorce cases he has been married five times and was supposed to remain under court seal.
AIPAC obviously believes that it can ride out this scandal. Maybe it can. It's a well-established organization. But for his part, Rosen doesn't appear ready to back down. He told Haaretz that
he saw AIPAC as a "very important organization. I believe in it in 150%, and it has a very important role," but added: If I am guilty, they are guilty. What I did for years they knew all about it. They knew it in advance, they knew details. So pretending that I was some sort of renegade or bad apple it'' s nonsense."
One thing thus seems clear: this ugly affair is about to get a lot uglier.
http://nationalinterest.org/node/4439 24 dec 2010, 01:26 , Respect -
Maria 26 nov 2010
AIPAC Spying, Why Is The FBI Looking The Other Way?
Has AIPAC Made The FBI The "FBE," Federal Bureau Of Espionage?
AIPAC is a sham. The group has, over the years, destroyed anyone who has tried to have it named what it really is, a dangerous foreign lobby and nest of spies. AIPAC is the most feared organization in Washington and most powerful, above any law. A former employee of AIPAC, Steve Rosen, who AIPAC claims was a spy, more appropriately a "caught" spy, now claims his former employer does nothing but spy.
Rosen stands to get $20 million in his defamation lawsuit against AIPAC. He isn't without motive but we have also learned that Rosen has considerable documentation of AIPAC receiving and disseminating classified information, received from, well, we have to call them traitors, inside the US government.
He also says the FBI can help him prove it because they have known about it all along.
Jeff Stein, at the Washinton Post, reports the following:
Rosen says his actions were common practice at the organization. He said his next move is to show that AIPAC, Washington's major pro-Israeli lobbying group by far, regularly traffics in sensitive U.S. government information, especially material related to the Middle East.
"I will introduce documentary evidence that AIPAC approved of the receipt of classified information," he said by e-mail. "Most instances of actual receipt are hard to document, because orally received information rarely comes with classified stamps on it nor records alerts that the information is classified."
But Rosen said he would produce "statements of AIPAC employees to the FBI, internal documents, deposition statements, public statements and other evidence showing that [the] receipt of classified information by employees other than [himself] was condoned for months prior to being condemned in March 2005 after threats from the prosecutors."
Are we reading this correctly? Not only is Rosen claiming that AIPAC, the organization every American politician, every president bows to on a daily basis, spies against the United States, also on a daily basis, but that the FBI seems to be, well, a part of it?
Funny thing here, OK, not really funny, but what we don't see asked is WHAT INFORMATION is being stolen? America learned, long ago with the infamous Jonathan Pollard case, that secrets going to Israel end up in the hands of America's enemies. America's most vital Cold War defense information, nuclear technology, air defense systems, classified weapons and even NATO defense plans in case of a Soviet invasion of Western Europe, all went to Russia as part of an arrangement between the Soviets and Israel. Pollard is doing life in prison for this.
Now we find the same thing is going on but the new FBI doesn't arrest Israeli agents like it used to. Why is that?
WHAT WE DO KNOW
We know that a vast spy ring operates in Washington and that Israel is the center of it. We also know that Israel, Turkey, India, Pakistan, China and Russia trade American secrets back and forth like baseball cards. We know that AIPAC is deeply involved in this spying.
We know that AIPAC claims to hold signed letters of unconditional support from 80% of the members of congress, all of whom received campaign contributions arranged by AIPAC, with many elections financed almost entirely by AIPAC, a group involved, according to the Washington Post and Steve Rosen, in spying on the United States with seeming complicity by the FBI itself.
We know that the majority of policy makers in both the Bush and Obama administrations have been AIPAC members, actual citizens of Israel itself and are responsible for formulating and driving the disastrous policies that have brought America to near extinction as a force in the world.
If AIPAC is, as we are told, as spy organization, then can we not safely assume that every national secret goes to AIPAC?
WHAT WE CAN SAFELY SURMISE, THAT WE ARE NOT SAFE AT ALL
The two biggest enemies the Israeli lobby had in Washington, "had" being the operative term were John and Robert Kennedy.
Both were murdered.
Senator William Fullbright spent his life trying to have AIPAC reined in, classified as a foreign lobby and put under controls he felt were necessary to keep America free. He saw them as that big a threat.
We know that AIPAC members and those allied to AIPAC fill the Pentagon, State Department, SEC, Department of Justice, the Supreme Court and congress. In congress, they control every committee and have power over every action of congress, every policy, every bill and every investigation.
In fact, despite the open admissions of spying, there will be no investigation of any kind, not by the FBI, not by congress, no grand jury, no local prosecutor, no federal judge, nothing will be done.
What does this tell us?
NEWS THAT WILL NEVER BE REPORTED
AIPAC has full veto power over any story reported by the mainstream media. Thus, no question about what information was stolen or where it went was asked.
The most important, the most basic questions were turned away from, not just by the press but the authorities tasked with keeping America secure.
There are no treaties of any kind between the United States and Israel. We pay Israel money, they take the money, do as they will and spend much of what we give them to pay Americans into giving them more money.
There is only one organization in the world with a similar 'rat wheel' business model and that is the Federal Reserve System and we know what they have done to America.
What we will never know is how America's security is compromised. We can only trust our lives with Israel, believing they have our best interests at heart and, as they seem to control America's government, congress, the White House, law enforcement, our courts, that they will, somehow, do a better job than.than.
than they have been doing for the past 40 years.
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http://sabbah.biz/mt/archives/2010/11/26/aipac-spying-fbi-looking-other-way/ 12 jan 2011, 17:09 , Respect -
Maria 5 dec 2010
GORDON DUFF: AIPAC ORDERED BUSH TO ATTACK IRAN
A LOOK BEHIND THE CURTAIN
By Gordon Duff STAFF WRITER/Senior Editor
(Media Appearance Note: Senior Editor Gordon Duff will appear on The Hour, the flagship Current Affairs Program of IQRA TV. 8.30-9.30 pm BST, on Sundays at Channel 826, on Sky. This program offers a serious analysis of political, social and cultural issues for a mature viewership.)
In a unique interview with an official at the highest policy levels of the Pentagon, White House and, eventually, CIA, we are offered a unique behind the curtains look at areas of policy making during the period between 1999 and 2007. Extensive notes have been taken of meetings with President Bush and all his top policy advisers. This is only a teaser.
A highly placed source within the White House and CIA confirmed, in an interview, that the invasion of Iran was scheduled for 2006 but planned in 1999. We have heard some of this before but not with so many pieces and, I am told, more to come. In an interview with a Bush administration policy official:
Q. What is the first thing that comes to mind when you think of your work at the White House? You have read my articles, what do you think of my take on things?
A. You are closer than anyone else in understanding how things worked, the only person willing to simply put it out there. You also come at things like the Pentagon people I have worked with, the ones who stood against Bush, Cheney and the AIPAC gang at the NSC (National Security Council.) I can also see that you don't have background material that you need. Some of it you have wrong, particularly the motives for Iraq. It was always Iran, Iraq was simply a door.
The Iraq invasion was a done deal in 1999, but not as you thought to steal oil and bilk billions, that was all gravy. Iraq, the entire Bush presidency, had one purpose, to remove Iran from the picture.
Q. You talk about journalists. What has your experience been?
A. I have good friends at the New York Times, Time Magazine, the Washington Post and others. They know all of this. They aren't fooled. They could write anything but it would never hit print.
Q. Back to the 2000 election. The first impediment was, I am told, removing John McCain from the picture. Was this the case?
READ ABOUT SEX, LIES AND VIDEO TAPE, 9/11, IRAQ AND NEOCON AMERICA
A. He was enemy # 1, stubborn, unpredictable and already tarnished by the Keating 5 scandal, with all his faults, he didn'9t have the serous skeletons in his closet that would fit the bill. McCain couldn't be blackmailed like Bush, thus McCain is a risk. Unless you can be controlled, blackmailed or bought or both, you will go nowhere in Washington.
McCain is a womanizer, the real thing. For a war hero, with McCain's charm that's nothing, he would never fall into the kind of trap Clinton did. Rove was assigned the job of getting rid of McCain. We all saw what was done in South Carolina. It was a masterful job.
Q. When you talk about McCain not being vulnerable, he certainly was in South Carolina, a few rumors and smears and he was gone. You say Bush is more vulnerable?
A. A window into a lot of this can be found in the the Rosen-AIPAC lawsuit . Bush has serious issues, let's just leave it at that. http://bit.ly/fi7Stq
As for Rosen, he just wasn't an AIPAC lobbyist, he sat inside the National Security Council until 2005 as the Rand Corporation's Director of Foreign Policy. When the press talks about an AIPAC employee and spying, he didn't join AIPAC until later, after his arrest.
The FBI investigation and his indictment for spying covered a time when he was at the center of the Bush administration, a key policy formulator at the highest levels of government. Rosen, indicted in 2004 for spying for Israel, was responsible for formulating American policy in the Middle East and largely responsible for the fate of the Palestinian people, a bit of a conflict of interest for an Israeli lobbyist and accused spy. http://bit.ly/c7ClAk
Q. Rosen has made some accusations, says AIPAC spies all the time and that they do nothing but watch pornography there. You worked with this guy, what do you know?
A. Rosen has dirt on absolutely everyone. His divorce depositions are fascinating reading. They are sealed now but there are copies out there. I know that reporters at Time Magazine have them, others too. The FBI has tons, they were after Rosen for years. As for AIPAC, Rosen told me of their spy operations many times, but nobody needed telling, they were more than obvious to all of us.
Q. You talk about Rosen and his black book, that he has dirt on everyone. The news stories mentioned only porn. That doesn't sound so serious. Dirt, not just porn, what kind of dirt?
A. Mostly sex stuff, gay bondage, clubs, expense money being spent on sex, liasons in public restrooms, that kind of thing. Many of the key people around the president are involved and there is FBI surveillance, massive amounts of it, photographs, videos, and one or more undercover informants recorded conversations with top National Security Council members. Spying, nuclear secrets passed to Israel, this was common place.
I witnessed, with two others, the top Bush counter-terrorism official, actally primary advisor to Bush on counter-terrorism, who had served Clinton and others, pass nuclear weapons plans to an Israeli agent, like it was nothing.
Q. Did the FBI know about this?
A. For years, FBI agents, I have a list of names, worked to stop this. Then I learned that the Department of Justice killed the prosecution, Rosen's lasted into the Obama administration before it was dropped. Witnesses were threatened with prosecution and the guilty, the spies, were allowed to keep doing what they are doing. This is what Rosen knows and what he is talking about when he says AIPAC was involved in spying. It isn't just that AIPAC is said to receive information it is that it came from top administration officials.
Q. Let's get back to the sex thing. How high up does it go?
A. One famous joke around the NSC, there was a photo of someone kissing Laura Bush on the cheek and shaking hands with President Bush. The same person had, not that long before, using those same lips and hands in a men's restroom.
Q. What do you know about 9/11?
A. 9/11 was planned as early as 1999 or before, to be executed as soon as the Bush team was in place. One meeting in April 2001, a meeting outlining the invasion of Iraq, may have been the green light. Chalibi was in place early on, from day number one. I remember telling them he was a known crook, totally disreputable and that things in Iraq would fall apart immediately. Nobody in the National Security Council ever spoke about what they would do once Saddam was overthrown. Nobody really seemed to care.
Of course, none of those people have real experience with military issues or, in fact, much of anything else.
Q. How was the Iran invasion supposed to work?
A. This is where so many have it wrong. In fact, there was never serous discussion about terrorism or Al Qaeda or bin Laden. These things weren't even a sideshow. The only talk about any of it was how it could be used to justify going into Iraq and then attacking Iran.
Q. The intel on Iraq, we all know it was wrong. When was that learned?
A. The administration didn't believe false intelligence, it created it, order it in place before the election to be ready for, well I guess, 9/11. Silencing Plame and Joe Wilson, those were the same people who planned the creation of the phony intelligence. There was never a discussion of a serious terrorist threat against the United States. These guys would have fallen off their chairs laughing themselves to death. It was all a joke to them, 9/11, the Iraq invasion, all of it.
Q. Back to Iran, how was the invasion to start?
A. Everything was going to happen in Bahrain. Plans were to attack Americans, blow up clubs, restaurants. There were plans to stage a "Tonkin Gulf" type attack and blame it on Iranian torpedo boats. Guys in the military were aware of this and there was strong opposition. Marine Colonel Joe Molofsky was the real hero here. He did more to scramble administration plans than anyone else, Molofky and General Mattis. These were really straight shooters, how I learned to trust the Marine Corps.
The government there, their security services, I believe they were deeply involved. It would have been good to see something about this in Wikileaks.
Q. You said that war had to start by 2006. Was there a timetable?
A. Absolutely. General Petraeus was sent to Iraq to quiet things down, not to win a war or create a lasting peace, nothing like that. His job was to shut things down so an operation against Iran could be staged from Iraq.
Q. But that never got off the ground
A. No kidding, and Bush was enraged. It was the only reason he was put in office in the first place, as long as Iran survived, he was a failure, no matter what happened to the US.
Q. Didn't they know that war with Iran would have driven oil to $300 a barrel and collapsed the American economy?
A. There were never briefings on that like there were never briefings on stabilizing Iraq. Nobody cared, nobody noticed and it was never discussed. It was really all about Iran and orders came in and people did what they were told like good little soldiers.
Q. Orders? From where?
A. All of it, all foreign policy issues, were out of AIPAC, they ran everything in the Bush administration. That was the whole point of it. We never were told why we had to destroy Iran only that it had to be done. Nobody ever asked why. Nobody ever believed Iran had a credible nuclear program and, eventually, we were all very certain they never would. There was never an issue about Iran being a threat or not. There was never an issue of motive of any kind. These were orders, plain and simple, the administration that will come into office in 2001 will be tasked with destroying Iran, tasked by AIPAC who will control all key position in the administration.
Q. Was there talk about Lebanon and the threat of Hizbollah?
A. There really weren't talks at all, only planning on how to follow policy, never on what policy should be or what was right or wrong. There was never a discussion about the United States, what was good for America or bad for America. People were generally oblivious to there being an America.
http://bit.ly/fAD5JP 12 jan 2011, 17:10 , Respect