ISRAELI LOBBY A FOREIGN AGENT?

Declassified FBI files show that AIPAC, the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, which is the most powerful lobby group in Washington, was stealing U.S. secrets as far back as 1984.
While that revelation will come as no surprise to those who have closely observed more recent spying operations by AIPAC, it should nonetheless call into question why this organization still operates openly on Capitol Hill while representing a foreign power, namely the Government of the State of Israel. The new disclosures help highlight the fact that since 1984, AIPAC has grown more powerful politically. It could be argued it is in a position to shape U.S. Middle East policy. In the past, some of its leaders have boasted that it had the means to effect the appointments of Secretaries of State.
The newly declassified FBI files relate to theft of U.S. government documents in 1984, just prior to negotiations over a proposed American-Israel Free Trade Agreement. The documents provided Israel with an outline of the White House negotiating position, thereby giving Israel a decided edge in the final passage of the agreement. According to IRmep, the Institute for Research-Middle Eastern Policy, which published the FBI files online, the subsequent 1984 agreement “wrought massive economic harm to American businesses and workers.” Another assessment concluded that it was “one of the most “unfavorable of all U.S. bi-lateral trade agreements, producing chronic deficits, lack of U.S. market access to Israel and ongoing theft of U.S. intellectual property.”
The damage to the American economy happened because AIPAC “spies” linked up with Mossad agents based in the Israeli Embassy, Washington. It was a strategy that has been repeated many times since. In 1984, as the FBI quickly discovered, AIPAC members not only passed classified papers to Mossad but also circulated them to members of Congress, thereby compromising the White House negotiating position. The result was that U.S. trade barriers were lifted on all the products Israel wished to export to the American market but Israeli barriers were kept in place for many America goods. The result is that over the years that one-sided agreement led to America having an $80 billion trade deficit with Israel.
Not surprisingly, given AIPAC’s influence even in 1984, none was charged with espionage, or with the theft of the trade agreement documents. Apparently, the Justice Department concluded that espionage statutes were not broken because the material in question was not related to national security issues. As for the theft, it was not deemed serious enough to merit criminal charges. As we now know, 1984 was not to be the last time AIPAC would steal U.S. secrets. The most recently publicized example was the 2005 theft of classified Defense Department documents on Iran that found their way via two AIPAC executives to a Mossad agent at the Israeli Embassy in Washington. Charges against those executives were eventually dropped.
Grant F. Smith, director of IRmep, believes the real issue is that, for nearly 50 years, there has been sufficient evidence for defining and regulating AIPAC as the agent of a foreign government. He says the moment AIPAC “supplanted” the American Zionist Council as “the arm of the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs in the United states” it became a foreign agent. His argument is a simple one and it goes something like this. In 1962, the American Zionist Council was ordered by the Justice Department to file as a foreign agent under U.S. 1938 Foreign Agents Registration Act. Seeing the game was up with its American activities, the AZC disbanded and within six weeks morphed into the AIPAC. Its creator was Isaiah Kennen, who just happened to be the senior figure in the Israeli Ministry of Information office in New York.
Grant Smith argues that if AIPAC was forced to register as a foreign agent there would be greater public transparency surrounding its activities. In particular, the average American would be entitled to know everything about its financial dealings, including how it spent its money, the identities of its financial backers, the organizations and politicians it lobbied and the nature of the links between its American and Israeli operations. The case for registering AIPAC as a foreign agent was made by Senator William Fulbright almost four decades ago but few members of Congress have openly agreed with his view. Nowadays, it would be unheard of for a member of Congress to suggest such as thing without facing the wrath of AIPAC, which frequently posts online the political positions adopted by members of the House and Senate regarding Israel related matters.
As it stands, AIPAC is operating under the public radar, furthering its professed aim to lobby and influence Congress on all matters related to the way Israel sees the world. In recent years, it has been particularly busy behind the scenes, shaping American policy on Iran in particular. That effort has included feeding stories into the mainstream media that support Israel’s view that tougher sanctions against Iran should be followed by U.S. military action. For example, the 2005 spying episode involving AIPAC executives and Col. Larry Franklin, a Defense Dept. analyst, was centered on classified documents outlining U.S. thinking on Iran. Mossad used those documents to forge a two-tier strategy. One part of tit was to use the documents to influence members of Congress, thereby compromising White House thinking on the issue. The second part was the leaking of selected material from the documents to media outlets to inflame American public thinking on Iran. The aim was to force the White House to adopt an Iran policy more in keeping with Israel’s.
In any other nation, that kind of activity by an organization claiming to be a political lobbying body would not be tolerated. But, such is the power of AIPAC on Capitol Hill, and within some sections of the mainstream media, no one dares speak its name in vain. At its annual meeting in Washington it can command the presence of more than 120 members of Congress and prominent members of the Executive branch. Its power in ensuring Israel gets the financial aid it needs from Congress is self evident in the billions of taxpayer dollars Israel receives annually and those do not include billions in military aid. And while Congress talks about Iran’s alleged nuclear weapons ambitions, no mention is made of the fact that Israel is not a signatory to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, or that it possesses a massive nuclear arsenal built on the theft of U.S. nuclear secrets and materials.
AIPAC has ensured over decades that, no matter how often Israel steals America’s secrets, there shall be no retribution. One example of the way Israel treats espionage towards America is that it encourages AIPAC to continue to lobby Congress for the release of the Mossad spy, Jonathan Pollard, as though he were guilty of a minor infraction. The truth is that in 1985 Pollard was found guilty of very serious crimes that included the theft of America’s nuclear naval codes, as well as a manual on its global surveillance capabilities. Israel at first claimed he was part of a rogue operation and agreed to help FBI investigators if Pollard’s associates were allowed to return to Israel. The FBI agreed but Israel never kept its part of the bargain. There have been reliable reports that Israel shared some of the secrets stolen by Pollard with the Soviets in return the release of Jews held in Russia. One of the results of the deal was that the identities of CIA agents in Eastern Europe were compromised and a number of them were executed,
According to Grant Smith of IRmep, members of AIPAC’s 2010 executive committee were once leading figures in the American Zionist Council, which disbanded in 1962 after it was ordered by the Justice Department to file as a foreign agent.