http://www.israelnationalnews.com/news.php3?id=68367 "A special mid-summer recess Knesset session next week will be highlighted by a discussion of ways in which the release of Jonathan Pollard might be attained." ...and... "Pollard activist Eli Yosef explained why the coalition of students and veteran activists decided that now was the time for a coordinated effort on Pollard's behalf: "The Hebrew month of Elul is one of repentance, and so we as a nation must make amends for the way we have neglected Jonathan Pollard in prison." But not to the United States or the people who were its intelligence assets in the USSR and who were killed after Pollard's espionage was shared with Moscow.
These words were written, in passing and as something clearly understood, by none other than Henry Kissinger, pages 484-485 of his memoirs Years of Upheaval. (I guess Dr. Kissinger is an anti-semite too ) Much has changed since 1973, all of it favoring an even greater voice and influence by Israel in what passes as news and policy in the US. But with the rise in political power of the Likud in Israel since then, and the rise in prominence of right wing Likudniks in Washington, what was once a worrying issue has taken on horrifying dimensions. For the US -- and even for Israel's real interests.
Please. Nobody denies that supporters of Israel have influence*. Get back to me when Kissinger talks about how AIPAC is involved in the biggest scandal in the history of America (which we probably won't find out about because the Jews will cover it up). *https://secure.aipac.org/aipacform/join.cfm
Looks like he was right Ben. http://news.ft.com/cms/s/344aa23c-0103-11d9-9d96-00000e2511c8.html "An FBI investigation into suspected security breaches involving Pentagon officials and Israel is unlikely to result in prosecution of senior figures following pressure from the White House, according to people familiar with the case." http://www.thehill.com/news/090804/spy.aspx "Soon after media outlets reported on the scandal late last month, American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) lobbyists and their political liaisons across the country asked Democratic and Republican lawmakers to issue public statements in support of America’s premier pro-Israel group. "That intense and frantic lobbying effort, which began on the eve of the GOP convention and continued unabated in New York, led dozens of lawmakers of both parties to testify to AIPAC’s integrity before they had been briefed by the FBI investigators on the details of the case." Well, that's being objective. "In many cases, AIPAC lobbyists have been very specific about how they wanted the lawmakers’ statements to be phrased." And that's thinking for themselves. http://www.counterpunch.org/christison09062004.html This is a list of neocons in our government who the authors question for their dual loyalty.
Hardly. The leaked "evidence" was ridiculously flimsy, almost laughable, and yet IM said it was worse than Watergate. It was designed to weaken certain "neo-cons" like Feith (partly because he was bypassing the CIA). As usual, you don't have any evidence to back up your claims, just wild speculation. We have a leak about an investigation about close to nothing and perhaps another leak that the "case" will be dropped. Well done, a direct hit on AIPAC at no cost.
I think you quoted the wrong sentence. You meant to quote: "Looks like he was right Ben." Right? Otherwise your follow-up makes no sense. But to your point: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A2149-2004Sep7.html "The Post then reported that the two-year-old probe was broader than just one person and that investigators are looking into whether other defense officials had given sensitive materials to AIPAC and Ahmed Chalabi, the former Iraqi dissident who enjoyed support in areas of the Pentagon before the war." I don't think the FBI would spend two years investigating "flimsy evidence." Do you?
It was handled by the FBI's counter- espionage division, which is normally designed to prevent espionage from being carried out. The fishing expedition didn't come up with much. If they had something better, that would have been leaked. Anyone with half a brain would realize that the AIPAC angle was too clever by half. Why in the world would Israel risk that valuable asset when others could push papers for them?
Here's a quote from a recent NY Sun article by Eli Lake: "On August 27, the day word of the investigation found its way into the press, Attorney General John Ashcroft referred the case to the U.S. attorney for the eastern district of Virginia, Paul McNulty, effectively stalling arrests the FBI were prepared to make in the coming days." http://www.nysun.com/article/1381 If there's no evidence of any wrongdoing, why would Ashcroft feel the need to refer the case to a political appointee to slow the investigation down, and why would the FBI have been preparing to make arrests? Another quote from the article: "Last week, the staff of the Joint Chiefs of Staff refused for two days to share classified papers with officials working for Mr. Feith, sources say. Cooperation between the two offices only resumed after individuals at the highest levels of the Pentagon ordered the Joint Chiefs of Staff to cooperate." If the Joint Chiefs' staff are refusing to share classified information with the staff of the Pentagon's No.3 official, I'd say that's a pretty clear sign that there may be something serious going on.
Slow a 2 year investigation down? We don't know there were going to be arrests, it is rumor reported by the New York Sun compounded by interpretation, probably from the same sources that leaked the Franklin info. What we do know is the ADL wants to find out the source of the leaks. If we can find that out, it would clear up a great deal. It's been well documented that they despise Feith. In fact, many people believe this entire affair is a struggle between the "neo-cons" and military and intelligence professionals. The bottom line is that this weakens the "neo-cons" and hurts AIPAC (whose involvement makes absolutely no sense). Mission accomplished.
Regretably, by being allowed to couch their activities as merely "supporting Israel" the "only democracy in the Middle East", by resorting to slanderous charges of anti-semiticism to quiet anyone who dares speak out, by flexing their muscle in even more pernecious ways when the slanderous charges don't work, a huge scandal that involves a lot of things that most Americans wouldn't support is being hidden away. I am sure that if there is a real investigation into the issues raised by this case, spending even half the time, money and energy spent on bogus investigations such as "Whitewater" and "travelgate", the results will astonish the American public. The scandal is a huge one, with the only impediment to it the fact that it cuts deep into the current administration and spills across party lines due to Aipac's involvement. I hope there are enough true patriots in and around the US government to make sure this issue is not buried. Right now, Aipac and its cronies, in conjunction with the neocons and the Christian evangelicals, are all working hard to silence and stiffle any effort to get to the facts. Why? Because if the true facts were revealed, it would stand to indict all of them. By the way, the contours of this scandal are already well understood by anyone who wants to take the time to research the evidence. That evidence includes: * Evidence of a campaign to distort intelligence, and spin tales, via various organizations in and out of government, working in coordination with the so-called Office of Special Plans , aimed to promote the Likudnik agenda. That evidence is so clear that, in the words of a Washington Post column, US embassies around the globe have been cabbled about how a "cabal of Likuniks have taken over US foreign policy". That evidence is clear enough for a even a former Bush administration special envoy to the Middle East, General Zinnie, to speak out against this hijacking of American foreign policy. * Evidence of a host of connections between the neocons, Aipac and the Israeli government. Much of these connections are propelled through one of the following means: think tanks established by money from right wing extremists (of the Jewish variety); contract with Israeli defense related firms for some out of work retired generals and other American officers to buy their loyalty; consultancy fees paid to some prominent American ex-politicians by Israeli and Israeli affiliated firms; work created for others by various media outlets beholden to these groups, including at Fox, the Weekly Standard, Commentary magazine, to name a few. All this builds on a layer of ideological support that exists, fueled by traditional "special interest" politics of Aipac, and aided by the alliance with Christian evangelicals and those in the "military-industrial complex" looking for a new grand strategy to justify large funding for military projects now that the Soviet Union is gone. *Evidence that existed even before this case against some of the prominent members of the neocon cabal betraying US secrets to Israel. That evidence includes what was learned, coincidentally, during the wiretaping episode going back to the Vietnam era and the investigation of leaks regarding the Pentagon Papers. Coincidentally, even then, one of these folks were noticed passing US intelligence to Israel. The fuller picture is presented in the Counterpunch special report I linked earlier. *The largely indisputable fact that you cannot take a policy position in the Congress at odds with Aipac's script without paying a heavy price politically; in conjunction with the fact that Israel's "tune of the day" gets "mysteriously" repeated by American policy-makers and media personalities in what are supposedly "spontaneous" expressions -- all happening at the same time! (Almost always, with Aipac and Israel behind the scenes working their roller desk numbers, fax machines and now days emails). The real issue is how to get these facts to come to the fore, center-stage, for the American public to know what is going on in their government? How to do so given the same alignment of political forces that has given this group the power and influence they enjoy?
ROTFLMAO! The "facts" (more accurately, unsubstantiated allegations) have been repeated, and reported, ad nauseum. Both with respect to the "espionage" story and the purported influence of the Jews...er neocons...er, Likudniks, in the Bush administration. When the anti-Israel crowd in the government didn't like that they were on the losing end of a debate of ideas, they leaked information of Israeli "espionage" which at this juncture appears to be nothing of significance. As Ben points out, the anti-Israel crowd got exactly what they wanted. Without any credible evidence of wrongdoing, they smeared their rivals in DOD, and got in a smear of AIPAC while they were at it. But because pogroms haven't broken out yet, their voice hasn't been heard. Poor dears.
Lets look a little carefully at who these necons who have reached the highest levels in the most sensitive departments in government are? Lets begin with Douglas Feith and his profile: http://rightweb.irc-online.org/ind/feith/feith.php Besides the fact that Douglas Feith is a Likudnik with clear financial, ideological, political, and professional ties to the extreme right wing groups in Israel, he is also someone whose past actions would ordinarily prevent him from getting a security clearance for even a minor job at the Pentagon dealing with classified information-- much less being entrusted with the number 3 position in DOD! But, when you look carefully, the neocons have created their own network: it runs back and forth between the same group of individuals hiring each other! Anyway, here is one of the clearest reasons why Feith should never have been in this position to begin with: His actions while in office, even before the current scandal, should have seen him fired a long time ago:
Not slow down the entire multi-year investigation - the idea is that Ashcroft stepped in to forestall upcoming arrests related to the Franklin incident, which is recent. Politically speaking, Eli Lake is pretty much a neocon himself, isn't he? Given that, I doubt he would mention that detail if it was just a baseless rumor provided by unreliable and self-serving sources. Yes, finding out who leaked the investigation and why would be helpful. Bureaucratic and ideological warfare within the administration is certainly a big part of the story, but that fact doesn't automatically absolve the participants of having done something wrong. Keep in mind the scope of the overall investigation - several years, including surveillance, wiretaps and searches, some of which would require warrants and probable cause and so forth. And, as we know, Rice and Hadley were advised of this investigation way back in 2001. I admit that I'm not very familiar with how these things work, but somehow I doubt that such a degree of action by law enforcement and counterintelligence could be easily conjured up for purposes of bureaucratic infighting - at least, not without some seriously suspicious behavior or circumstances to justify it. Very good post on this issue from Matt Yglesias here: http://www.prospect.org/weblog/archives/2004/09/index.html#003982 I agree with everything he says, in particular about how the entire affair reflects on the Bush administration's foreign policy process.