...Although CIA's damage assessment claims Pollard's handlers "concentrated on providing Israel with US intelligence on the military forces and equipment of Arab and Islamic states and on Soviet military forces, equipment and technology" many such bullet points and assertions are followed by other large censored sections that leave readers wondering what other tasking was documented by the CIA. It may be that the blanked-out sections refer to other American assets run by Rafael Eitan � an Israeli spymaster who has probably done more damage to United states than any other Middle Eastern spy � that were better situated to deliver the goods. Pollard is far from Israel's only successful spy. Eitan himself visited the Nuclear Materials and Equipment Corporation (NUMEC) in 1968, a facility that "lost" more weapons-grade uranium than any other nuclear fuel processor in the US. Eitan would have likely relied on NUMEC president Zalman Shapiro and other helpful American colleagues for advanced hydrogen bomb designs and other assistance in the early 1970s. Eitan's involvement in obtaining source code of the PROMIS intelligence case management program, a system compromised with secret back doors that was to be installed at the Justice Department and various foreign intelligence services, would have been a good source for "dirt" the CIA report claims Eitan wanted but that Pollard's more sensible handlers vetoed...

Full analysis

The Zionist Organization of America (ZOA) was ordered on seven separate occasions to register under the 1938 Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA) according to newly declassified Department of Justice (DOJ) files. On October 17, 2012 the National Archives and Records Administration released under FOIA the long-secret files, now available online at the Israel Lobby Archive.

ZOA incorporated on April 14, 1920 in New York. DOJ officials determined in 1947 that ZOA was controlled by the World Zionist Organization (WZO), a global entity composed of dues-paying members committed to the Zionist program for a Jewish state in Palestine. ZOA activities, negotiations with governments and NGOs were all subject to WZO approval. ZOA regarded WZO as the ultimate disciplinary and dispute resolution authority. ZOA was also beholden to WZO orders for unspecified "political actions of another kind."

In 1956 ZOA Pittsburgh chapter President Zalman Shapiro incorporated the Nuclear Material and Equipment Corporation (NUMEC) which operated a nuclear processing facility on the Apollo Industries steel site. Future ZOA national president Ivan Novick was an original Apollo Industries founder. The FBI investigated excessive NUMEC losses of weapons-grade uranium and Shapiro's 1960s interactions with Rafael Eitan, an Israeli spymaster who later ran Jonathan Pollard against the United States. NUMEC established a joint venture with the Israel Atomic Energy Commission, later revealed by researcher Avner Cohen to be a front for Israel's clandestine nuclear weapons program. A 2001 Energy Department audit found that NUMEC lost more weapons-grade uranium (337 kilograms) than any other facility in U.S. history. Declassified CIA and FBI files reveal US officials believed NUMEC illegally diverted nuclear material to Israel...     More

The Israel Lobby Archive releases newly declassified internal Justice Department files revealing an unsuccessful but long-running effort to compel the Zionist Organization of America to openly register and declare its activities as an Israeli foreign agent.

The ZOA, which has long functioned as one of the most extreme Israel lobby organizations, recently lost its IRS tax-exempt status for reasons that are still largely unknown.  More

On September 10 the IRS responded to a mass letter-writing campaign alleging Israel trips organized by an American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) front organization were illegal. Citizen letters to the IRS Tax Exempt Organization commissioner copied to both the Attorney General and US Attorney for the District of Columbia claimed:

"�Ever since the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) emerged from the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs in 1951, it has clashed with U.S. law enforcement. AIPAC and its predecessors have been investigated for election law violations, secretly laundering overseas funding into U.S. public relations and lobbying activities, use of tax-deductible donations to lobby, improper acquisition and circulation of classified U.S. government information, and Foreign Agent Registration Act violations�

�AIPAC's latest scheme is to use its tax-exempt alter ego, the American Israel Education Foundation (AIEF), to channel tax-deductible funds into its non-exempt lobbying activities. Please investigate and shut down future AIPAC-AIEF funded junkets to Israel! My member of Congress was elected to work for my neighbors and me, not a foreign country's lobby�"" More Discussion at Mondoweiss Complaint filing Israel Lobby Archive documents

...Although WINEP's founding myth is that its "scholars" simply wanted to do serious research independent of AIPAC (while funded by AIPAC's major donors), history indicates that survivability is a more compelling reason for its quiet launch in November of 1984. In a worse-case scenario, espionage or theft of government property indictments would have likely destroyed either AIPAC or WINEP � but not both. Splitting up was the same survivalist strategy that led to the spinoff of AIPAC just six weeks after its parent organization, the American Zionist Council, was ordered to register as an Israeli foreign agent in 1962 � which brings this latest Israel lobbying and covert action saga full-circle...More. Analysis on the Scott Horton Show Listen

Israel has never officially admitted to possessing nuclear weapons; however, it is widely believed that Israel has run an active programme since the 1950s, and assembled its first device in 1967 on the eve of the Six Day War. Because of the unofficial nature of the programme, and Israel's status as a Non-proliferation Treaty (NPT) outlier, illicit procurement has been one of the ways that Israel has sought the sensitive technology to supply its programme. This case study looks at an instance of illicit procurement undertaken in the early 1980s where Israel attempted to acquire Krytron tubes from a US Company. Recently released FBI files, the 2011 biography of Israeli film producer Arnon Milchan and press reports from the time allow a relatively detailed picture to be built up of allegations about the transfer of approximately 800 krytrons. The case study goes to highlight the deceptive methods used by those seeking to illicitly procure sensitive technologies. More

"...However, the package also requires the U.S. president to issue to the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations and House Committee on Foreign Affairs a report on the status of Israel's �qualitative military edge� by Jan. 23, 2013. It is finally time for some hard truths. An honest presidential response to this AIPAC-mandated reporting rider would wipe clean all current and future U.S.-taxpayer-funded obligations to Israel. A truthful presidential assessment would finally tell the American people the following: 'Israel has deployed a clandestine nuclear arsenal with some components and materials stolen from the United States. Our foreign aid laws therefore make Israel ineligible for further taxpayer dollars.'" More

Grant F. Smith, Research Director at IRmep.org, joins James Corbett to discuss the secret Israeli espionage program that smuggled nuclear materials out of the United States to help start the Israeli nuclear program in the 1960s. They go over the declassified documents tying Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu (PDF) to a nuclear technology smuggling ring targeting the U.S. in the 1980s, and explore Smith's book, Divert!: NUMEC, Zalman Shapiro and the diversion of US weapons grade uranium into the Israeli nuclear weapons program.

AIPAC founder Isaiah Kenen had the following to say about political platforms in the July 15, 1960 Near East Report: �The importance of Platforms. Many people are skeptical about political platforms. But skepticism is unjustified. Platform declarations have a positive value in the clarification and implementation of our national policies. They help to mold public opinion at home because they inform and guide candidates, who stand for election on their party's program. They have importance abroad because they transmit to other governments the views of the American people. Sometimes our foreign policy is expressed more forcibly and plainly in a platform than when masked in the language of diplomacy. �

Kenen (ten years before an employee of the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs) was being paid by the Jewish Agency (a quasi governmental Israeli organization with access to tax revenue and review powers over Knesset legislation) to publish the Near East Report. He directly participated in Democratic Party platform negotiations. This was a couple of years before Walter Pincus noted (as a Senate investigator of foreign agents) that the Jewish Agency/Israeli government were essentially writing some US legislation. In this case, the Jewish Agency was �expressing the views� of the �American People� through a party plank few would ever know about. An Israel lobby platform plank to predetermine the status of the contested city of Jerusalem was not approved for inclusion as a Democratic platform plank on September 5, 2012. But the Democratic Committee chair pretended it passed as delegates booed.

,,,AIEF is a non-profit charitable organization openly affiliated with the American Israel Political Action Committee (AIPAC). Shortly after last year's trip in question, claims were made against AIEF (PDF) for it accepting tax-deductible contributions, then forwarding that money to AIPAC.

Earlier this year, Scott was required to refund some of the money he received related to attending another political organization's conference, and because he brought one-too-many guests with him...  More

...the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers continues its attempt to deal with NUMEC's toxic waste dump in Parks Township by soliciting broader input and information about what really happened at NUMEC. USACE was forced to halt material removal in October of 2011 after a contractor encountered unexpected materials and dangers at the site, now patrolled by automatic weapons-toting government agents. On June 26, 2012 USACE hosted a public meeting to collect and document the concerns of local residents affected by the toxic cleanup � which could cost up to half a billion dollars if it is allowed to proceed. On June 21, 2012 USACE representatives attended a status meeting in the Eisenhower Executive Office Building in Washington. Representatives from the CIA, FBI, National Security Council, NSA, Justice Department and EPA were also in attendance. Although no details of the secret discussions have yet been publicly revealed, the agencies involved signal that the nagging decades-old question of what really happened at NUMEC is once again a top-level concern in Washington.

Neither the USACE nor civil suit plaintiffs have yet to publicly ask the four basic questions that might allow them to understand the NUMEC crisis. Why was NUMEC � a flyspeck among industry giants � even created? Why was NUMEC located in the heart of a quaint borough in such tragically inadequate facilities? Who brought it into being? If environmental and worker safety were of no concern to NUMEC's operators (picked up on wiretaps discussing illegal storage leading to spills) what was its core hidden purpose? More

"...About the same time that NUMEC sustained unaccountable losses of HEU-235, the FBI notes, NUMEC was developing and manufacturing food irradiators for Israel. According to Smith there is no single smoking gun that Shapiro diverted HEU-235 to Israel � but many smoking shell-casings. They include:

In 1965 a NUMEC employee walked near the NUMEC loading dock and encountered people he could not identify loading cans about the size of HEU-235 canisters onto a ship that was headed to Israel. The employee detailed the event in 1980 when interviewed by FBI agents. Based on the number of reported canisters, Smith estimates up to 346 lbs of U-235 could have been shipped to Israel in this single incident.

In 1968 NUMEC invited and received Israel's elite nuclear weapons development officials and its top spy under the cover of being "thermo electric generator specialists." They included Avraham Hermoni (technical director of Israel's nuclear bomb project), Ephraim Biegun (head of the Israeli technical department of Israel's Secret Service from 1960-70) and Rafael Eitan (long-time Mossad and LAKAM operative who later directed spy Jonathan Pollard's spy program against the U.S.).

 In June 1978 Department of Energy investigators told former Atomic Energy Commissioner (AEC) Glenn T. Seaborg that traces of Portsmouth U-235 � the government-owned material primarily delivered to NUMEC for processing into fuel � had been picked up in Israel. Seaborg, who frequently defended Shapiro during his time as AEC chief, later refused to be interviewed by FBI investigators..." More

"...It doesn't seem to matter what Israelis do. For example, Arutz Sheva, the nationalist Israeli press, reported that �declassified FBI documents from a 1985-2002 investigation implicate Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu in an initiative to illegally purchase United States nuclear technology for Israel's nuclear program.�Netanyahu was allegedly helped by Arnon Milchan, a Hollywood producer with ties to Israeli prime ministers and U.S. presidents.� More

"...One also wonders what role Bibi was playing in Heli Trading. If the company was serving as a conduit for illegal arms deals with the U.S., what other skullduggery was it involved in, and how did Bibi fit in? What precisely might have been his relationship at the time with Israeli intelligence? As a fluent English speaker and son of Vladimir Jabotinsky's former personal secretary, Bibi would've been a desirable catch.

Of course, it wouldn't be the first time an Israeli prime minister aided his country by engaging in acts of dubious moral or legal merit. Begin and Shamir were terrorist commanders who ordered the assassination of UN and British diplomats, and massacred unarmed Arab villagers in pre-State days. At least one can say on Bibi's behalf that he merely aided and abetted espionage, rather than murdering people in cold blood. Though were he Iranian and doing the same thing, it might earn him a Mossad bullet in the head or a sticky bomb on his windshield..." More

Declassified FBI documents from a 1985-2002 investigation implicate Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu in an initiative to illegally purchase United States nuclear technology for Israel's nuclear program.

Netanyahu was allegedly helped by Arnon Milchan, a Hollywood producer with ties to Israeli prime ministers and U.S. presidents. Milchan's involvement in Israeli intelligence and arms dealing has been the subject of reports for some time, and was described in an unofficial biography published last year. More.

On June 27, 2012, the FBI partially declassified and released seven additional pages[.pdf] from a 1985�2002 investigation into how a network of front companies connected to the Israeli Ministry of Defense illegally smuggled nuclear triggers out of the U.S.* The newly released FBI files detail how Richard Kelly Smyth � who was convicted of running a U.S. front company � met with Benjamin Netanyahu in Israel during the smuggling operation. At that time, Netanyahu worked at the Israeli node of the smuggling network, Heli Trading Company. Netanyahu, who currently serves as Israel's prime minister, recently issued a gag order that the smuggling network's unindicted ringleader refrain from discussing �Project Pinto.� More

WASHINGTON--(BUSINESS WIRE)--The U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency has just released an internal briefing video that is now available online on both Vimeo and Youtube. The IRmep Center for Policy and Law Enforcement obtained release under the Freedom of Information Act.

Jonathan Pollard was sentenced to life in prison in 1987 after he was caught selling large amounts of highly classified documents to Israel. The 14 minute video "Jonathan Pollard: A Portrayal" produced by the Threat Countermeasures Branch of the DIA emphasizes that "eighty percent" of the documents obtained by Pollard were DIA files.

The video encourages American government employees to overcome inhibitions and proactively report suspicious activities. Actors portray "Susan" (a pseudonym for the actual DIA employee who first reported Jonathan Pollard to the Office of Security) and Jonathan Pollard. "Susan" heard Pollard's elaborate stories of lavish European vacations, obsession over the Middle East and tales of elegant restaurant excursions. When she discovered Pollard was also transporting large amounts of classified material to his home she notified security. A librarian also warned of Pollard's prohibited use of a briefcase to transport large quantities of documents.  More

"...There is little indication that the U.S. Department of Justice will unleash the FBI to aggressively pursue Israeli espionage. On May 4, the author confronted U.S. Attorney Ron Machen on public radio that his public statements that the Nozette prosecution thwarted leaks of classified information to Israel were demonstrably false. Even as Machen ducked the question, Israeli subsidiaries, front companies, lobbying organizations and lone-gun foreign agents continue penetrating America's military-industrial infrastructure. The FBI's capacity to field politically sensitive counter-espionage operations will likely be tested to the limit. Less than a month after Nozette's sentencing, IAI subsidiary ELTA Systems announced it would soon open a 100-person operation in Maple Lawn, Maryland." More

"...Less widely known is that Israeli front company Telogy was caught in the summer of 2010 illegally shipping nuclear weapons components out of California to Israel. When such crimes occurred in the past � such as in the case of MILCO smuggling nuclear triggers out of California to Israel � the US at least criminally investigated Israel's US operatives even while carefully steering around the true masterminds such as Arnon Milchan and high Israeli intelligence officials. In the case of Telogy, the Obama administration simply leaked tidbits of the export violations to friendly press, helpfully allowing Telogy to quickly roll up its illegal US operations. Rather than raids, arrests, publicity and prosecutions, Israel's only punishment for Telogy was a mild admonishment (PDF) issued by former weapons inspector David Albright from his perch at a think tank almost singularly devoted to analyzing Iran's � but not Israel's � nuclear program in the establishment news media...." More

...By knowingly turning a blind eye on Weizmann's assistance to Israel's clandestine nuclear program and refusing to hold Israel and its US collaborators responsible for NUMEC diversions, the US has violated Article 1 of the NPT. It states, "Each nuclear-weapons state undertakes not to transfer, to any recipient, nuclear weapons, or other nuclear explosive devices, and not to assist any non-nuclear-weapon state to manufacture or acquire such weapons or devices." It is clear that the Justice Department did not follow the Weizmann investigation through to its logical conclusion, even after discovering the US weapons-funding front. The key conclusion of a recently declassified General Accounting Office report is that the US government similarly failed to properly investigate the NUMEC uranium diversions. Taxpayers, who must pay extra revenue to the US Treasury because of the Weizmann Institute's unjustifiable tax deductible status, have long been made involuntary accomplices in Middle East nuclear proliferation. Given these tragic US failures to uphold rule of law, it is now time for the International Atomic Energy Agency to take notice of the true violators of the NPT�.More     Israel Lobby Archive

Declassified files from long-running investigations of the Nuclear Materials and Equipment Corporation (NUMEC) over alleged illegal diversions of US government-owned weapons-grade uranium to Israel are now available online at http://www.IRmep.org/ila/numec

The 733 pages of information obtained under the Freedom of Information Act for the new book Divert! NUMEC, Zalman Shapiro and the diversion of US weapons-grade uranium into the Israeli nuclear weapons program include:

A 1980 FBI interview of an eyewitness (PDF) of NUMEC executives stuffing U-235 canisters into sealed equipment shipped to Israel.

CIA Director of Operations Carl Duckett's 1978 testimony about NUMEC (PDF) before the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.

Atomic Energy Commissioner Glenn T. Seaborg's reaction (PDF) to news that traces of Portsmouth U-235 of the type supplied to NUMEC had been picked up in Israel...More                  Archive

Shapiro told the appellate judges that AIPAC fired Rosen and invoked "standards" "to get the DOJ off AIPAC's back." But AIPAC had in fact "lauded" Rosen "for the same behavior in the past," Shapiro said.

In an amicus brief, the Washington, D.C.-based Institute for Research: Middle Eastern Policy argued that "AIPAC's observable standard for employees is 'solicit, obtain and leverage classified information without being criminally indicted.'"

AIPAC had acknowledged a lack of written standards, according to the appeals court. But its deputy executive director, Richard Lee Fishman, testified that there was an unwritten, "assumed standard that people would obey the law ... with regard to classified information or any other illegal activity." More

A Washington-based research group has posted clips online that underscore how the powerful American Israel Public Affairs Committee endangers the US and its people...The use of the words ''endanger America'' was evocative, clearly demonstrating that both American interests and American people are being endangered by these policies....This places America in the cross-hairs of both sides: Those who believe that terrorism is the primary threat to US security, and those who believe that terrorism has its root causes, specifically the long-standing Israeli occupation of Palestine and the role played by Aipac in ensuring that the US government and political leadership continues to favour Israel even while publicly claiming to be an ''honest broker''. More

AIPAC History  Proto-AIPAC's incubation in the Israeli embassy in 1948.  Strategic direction-setting by the Mossad and Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Confrontations with the Eisenhower and Kennedy Administrations and the secret battle over registration as an Israeli foreign agent.  FBI espionage investigations of AIPAC.  AIPAC and the clandestine Israeli nuclear weapons program. The grassroots fight for transparency, regulatory oversight and accountability. Presented by Grant F. Smith, Director of IRmep.  http://vimeo.com/40544530

AIPAC Political Power US politicians and the Israel lobby campaign finance network.  Why Israel political action committees use confusing and misleading names.  How ostensibly independent political action committees are coordinated to avoid contribution limits imposed on other industries.  How AIPAC has directed PAC contributions to chosen candidates.  How to track stealth Israel PAC contributions to your representative.  Presented by Janet McMahon, Managing Editor of the Washington Report on Middle East Affairs. http://vimeo.com/40563081

AIPAC and the Media Why establishment media outlets consistently fail to present an accurate picture of Palestinian vs Israeli casualties in the ongoing conflict.  Why the background and motives of key Middle East reporters prevents Americans from receiving accurate reporting.  Enduring myths about Israel's value as a US ally.  How to counteract the disinformation network. Presented by Alison Weir, President of the Council for the National Interest and Founder of If Americans Knew. http://vimeo.com/40562968

Promoting Islamophobia  AIPAC's role in promoting Muslim "otherness."  The Clash of Civilization policy framework, why is it of strategic value to Israel, especially after the Cold War? Who funds Islamophobia in the United States?  What can be done about it? Presented by Hatem Bazian. http://vimeo.com/40588460

Exposing, Challenging and Stopping AIPAC Why aren't operatives and their organizations (WINEP, FDD, FPI, AEI, JINSA) ever properly identified in the mainstream media?  Are AIPAC and the larger network of organizations vying to operate as an "alternative government?"  How can proven tactics to confront dangerous policy be implemented in the Internet age? Presented by Jeffrey Blankfort. http://vimeo.com/40627216

"Occupy AIPAC" and "Move Over AIPAC" are annual Washington DC gatherings of over 100 organizations organized by Code Pink to challenge and present alternatives to dangerous and costly Middle East policies.  The Institute for Research: Middle Eastern Policy (IRmep) is a Washington, DC based organization that studies US Middle East policy formulation.  The Council for the National Interest works for U.S. Middle East policies that serve the national interest.  If Americans Knew is dedicated to providing Americans with everything they need to know about Israel and Palestine. The Washington Report on Middle East Affairs is a magazine published to provide the American public with balanced and accurate information concerning U.S. relations with Middle Eastern states. 

During Feb. 14, 2012 oral arguments before a three-judge panel in the District of Columbia Court of Appeals, attorney David Shapiro argued passionately that the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) has a long history of obtaining and using classified U.S. government information. The fiery Shapiro clashed with AIPAC's legal team, headed by employment and labor law expert Thomas McCalley. The $20 million question before the judges was whether AIPAC defamed its former top lobbyist, Steven J. Rosen, after it fired him in 2005�but before Rosen, along with his colleague Keith Weissman, was indicted by the Department of Justice under the Espionage Act. AIPAC repeatedly told establishment media outlets that Rosen's "behavior did not comport with standards that AIPAC expects of its employees..."

...Chief Judge Eric Washington seemed to warm to McCalley's arguments until Shapiro let loose an impassioned rebuttal. Shapiro argued that Rosen's standing in the Jewish community had been forever tainted by AIPAC and that he must be "allowed to present his case before a jury."

Judge John M. Ferren demonstrated his acute awareness of the connection between the criminal Espionage Act case�dropped by the Obama administration in 2009�and Rosen's near simultaneous defamation suit filing.

A public interest appeal has also now entered the fray. The day following the oral arguments, the court granted special permission for the Institute for Research: Middle Eastern Policy's motion to file an amicus brief. The 76-page brief, citing recently declassified State Department and FBI investigation files, argues that "AIPAC's observable standard for employees is 'solicit, obtain and leverage classified information without being criminally indicted.' AIPAC is never held publicly accountable for these types of activities which harm governance and public perception of rule of law." The full brief, and AIPAC's last ditch attempt to block it, is available online....(PDF)  More

Radio host Shelton Walden of WBAI's "Walden's Pond" interviews Grant F. Smith about the Israeli nuclear weapons program, why US presidents cannot openly talk about it and the diversion of weapons-grade uranium from a plant at Apollo, PA..

How would the conversation about war with Iran change if Americans knew Israel had a vast arsenal of deployed nuclear weapons?  Did Israel build nuclear weapons in the early 1960's with US material? Why couldn't the United States properly investigate, indict and prosecute those responsible for stealing its most vital military asset?  What can be done to inform more Americans about the coercive nature of US-Israel relations?  MP3 available at WBAI

FBI files detailing Israel's stealth acquisition of U.S. nuclear triggers were declassified and released on Dec. 28, 2011. The FBI's secret Portland and Los Angeles inter-office communications were originally scheduled for release in the year 2036. Their availability today reveals how Israel's elite spy networks acquire U.S. nuclear technologies while evading criminal and diplomatic consequences...

...The declassified details of Smyth's and Milchan's flight, elite influence networks, and near complete lack of accountability over the krytron case fits neatly into a larger emerging set of attributes common to many major Israeli espionage efforts in the United States. As happened during NUMEC's diversion of weapons-grade nuclear material to Israel, apparently more time was spent exploring Milchan's elite connections than figuring out how to indict LAKAM's nuclear technology operative. As in the case of the Lawrence Franklin AIPAC espionage affair, the mysterious figures who offered to spirit the main operative out of the United States to overseas safe houses were never apprehended or even publicly identified. More

An espionage ring smuggled 800 krytrons to the Israeli Ministry of Defense for use in the clandestine Israeli nuclear weapons program according to newly declassified FBI files. The secret documents were originally scheduled for public release in the year 2036, but were obtained under appeal to the Justice Department by the Institute for Research: Middle Eastern Policy (IRmep). The documents available online at http://www.IRmep.org/ila/krytrons reveal new details about the failed effort to indict the nuclear smuggling ring's masterminds. More

...The 1938 Foreign Agents Registration Act is supposed to deter the most egregious foreign meddling in America.  It does so through transparency.  FARA doesn't prohibit any foreign government from launching US public relations campaigns or lobbying initiatives.  It only insists that the agents of the foreign principal behind such endeavors publicly reveal the control relationships, campaigns, and funding flows...

An amendment to FARA allows an attorney general to admit defeat and formally exempt a foreign principal from all FARA oversight. Since the 1960s white shoe law firms such as Covington & Burling, where Eric Holder was once an attorney, have worked diligently to gut FARA and water down its investigative and enforcement mechanisms. If it wasn't written for Israel, it's hard to say who the exemption is for. Crudely abbreviated it reads, �The Attorney General may, by regulation, provide for the exemption..[if the AG] determines that such registration�is not necessary�� More

Internal Revenue Commissioner Douglas Shulman is being asked today to examine the tax-exempt status of the American Committee for the Weizmann Institute of Science. According to a U.S. Department of Defense study performed by the Institute for Defense Analyses, the Weizmann Institute of Science in Israel has actively engaged in nuclear weapons research.

The 1987 IDA study documents Weizmann scientists developed a cutting- edge high energy physics and hydrodynamics program "needed for nuclear bomb design." Weizmann also worked on advanced methods for enriching uranium to weapons-grade through the use of lasers. The U.S. worried that Weizmann's supercomputers, if networked with other American-purchased supercomputers, would be used to reduce the size of warheads enough to fit on Israel's long range missiles...

The IRmep complaint asks Commissioner Shulman to investigate how Weizmann's tax-exempt U.S. fundraising branch finances Israeli nuclear weapons development. On January 11, 2010, IRmep Research Director Grant F. Smith and several callers confronted Shulman on NPR over lax IRS enforcement over U.S. tax-exempt organizations funding illegal West Bank settlements. Shulman publicly promised that "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." According to outside reports, the IRS began screening new applications for tax-exempt status of organizations potentially involved in settlement funding. According to IRmep Director Smith, "Charitable funding laundered into clandestine nuclear weapons that destabilize and endanger the entire region simply has no place in America."  More

�...Last year we galvanised the Palestine crowd but no one else seemed very interested,� says 24-year-old student Sasha Gelzin, one of the coordinators of Occupy AIPAC. �This year you've had the Arab uprisings and Occupy, you've had the thousands of activists making connections between domestic policy and foreign policy...�

"...AIPAC has long been understood to have had a great deal of unelected influence over US foreign policy and "de facto immunity" from investigation, as author Grant F Smith put it in a speech to the conference. The shadow of past, present and future wars in the Middle East has hung over the Occupy movement from the start, and activists are quite clear what they are here for: to prevent another war." More

WASHINGTON-Declassified FBI files reveal details of the founder of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee's (AIPAC) early coordination with the head of Mossad and the Israeli Minister of Foreign Affairs. The 198-page file, released under the Freedom of Information Act to the Institute for Research: Middle Eastern Policy (IRmep), is now on the Internet at: http://www.IRmep.org/ila/kenen

According to the FBI, on July 18, 1949 Mossad founder Reuven Shiloah and Foreign Minister Moshe Sharett ordered AIPAC founder Isaiah L. Kenen to implement urgent public relations strategies to boost Israel's economic and military might. At that time Kenen directed the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affair's Israel Office of Information (IOI) in New York which was tasked with receiving encrypted cables from Israel for decoding and placement into prominent U.S. print publications such as Reader's Digest and Cosmopolitan. According to the formerly secret FBI report, IOI established a network of such offices. More. Documents

AIPAC's Washington policy conference next month is drawing intense scrutiny and unprecedented resistance. AIPAC has worked quietly for years to tripwire the United States into war with Iran. Soon it will �ask� Congress and the president to define �nuclear weapons capability� as the threshold for war, essentially demanding an immediate attack. Because Iran presents no military threat to the United States, many Americans wonder exactly where such costly and potentially disastrous policies are formulated. Recently declassified FBI files reveal how Israeli government officials first orchestrated public relations and policies through the U.S. lobby. Counter-espionage investigations of proto-AIPAC's first coordinating meetings with the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the head of Mossad provide a timely and useful framework for understanding how AIPAC continues to localize and market Israeli government policies in America. More

The American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) is attempting to block a brief filed by Director of the Institute for Research: Middle Eastern Policy (IRmep) Grant F. Smith in the DC Court of Appeals on February 3, 2012. The 78-page IRmep filing asserts "AIPAC has never abandoned its original role as an arm of the Israeli government in the United States." http://www.IRmep.org/ila/rosen

Citing declassified criminal investigations, IRmep underscores the public's interest in the outcome of the case. "AIPAC's observable standard for employees is 'solicit, obtain and leverage classified information without being criminally indicted.' AIPAC is never held publicly accountable for these types of activities which harm governance and public perception of rule of law."

Exhibits include State Department files declassified on January 20, 2012 revealing in detail how former AIPAC Director Morris Amitay endangered US national security when he obtained Department of Defense secrets in 1974. The IRmep brief also analyzes ongoing financial damages from a 1984-1987 incident. The FBI investigated how AIPAC acquired an International Trade Commission report full of still-classified confidential business information... More

Author Norman F. Dacey made powerful enemies. He turned the cozy estate-planning industry upside-down after publishing How to Avoid Probate in 1965. The book sold 2 million copies as Dacey barnstormed [.pdf] the country advising Americans how to structure their estates to avoid the costs, delays, and publicity of probate by setting up trusts. Dacey engaged in fierce battles with various bar associations who tried to shut down publication of the book by claiming he was practicing law without a license. The tenacious Dacey returned fire, filing scores of libel and First Amendment lawsuits.

Newly declassified U.S. State Department documents reveal a lesser-known but equally intense battle fought by Dacey. The chairman of the American Palestine Committee and close confidant of �Rabbi Outcast� Elmer Berger nearly succeeded in having American Israel Public Affairs (AIPAC) Director Morris Amitay prosecuted for trafficking classified national defense information in the mid-1970s. More                  Declassified documents

AIPAC Director's Use of Classified Missile Data Harmed National Security - State Department

WASHINGTON--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Newly released US Department of State investigation files reveal how the American Israel Public Affairs Committee's (AIPAC) acquisition of classified US national defense information harmed national security. (Web documents) In 1976 the Ford administration proposed selling improved Hawk anti-aircraft missiles to Jordan. The Senate Foreign Relations Committee and House Foreign Affairs Committee received a classified Department of Defense notification of sale. AIPAC's Director Morris Amitay reviewed the classified document after being informed "secretly by aides of Senator Clifford P. Case, Republican of New Jersey, and Representative Jonathan B. Bingham, Democrat of New York" according to the New York Times.

Criminal investigation files released on January 20, 2012 confirm the disclosure to AIPAC was "unauthorized" and included the dollar amounts and quantitative configurations of the missile system. The State Department found that "�specific details of Jordan's military equipment needs are information provided us in confidence by that government. The classification of the documents in question was, in our view, substantively proper."  More

...Rosen's core legal shortcoming is that he stopped short of deposing former AIPAC legislative director Douglas Bloomfield during defamation suit proceedings. During the 1980s document caper, Bloomfield found the classified trade report so valuable he duplicated it for AIPAC's use before returning the original by order of the U.S. trade ambassador. For his part, in 2009 Bloomfield defended Rosen in the press during his defamation suit by subtly threatening to reveal how AIPAC functions as a foreign agent of the Israeli government if it didn't settle up with Rosen as promised. Rosen likewise declined to broadly depose Ester Kurz, who also handled the classified trade report in the 1980s. This would have been unsettling to the lobby, since in 2010 Kurz was still holding a top-level job at AIPAC and even received Secretary of State Hillary Clinton at the annual D.C. conference... More  Latest court filings

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