DOJ asked to register AIPAC as Foreign Agent

News release: 

http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/us-department-of-justice-asked-to-regulate-aipac-as-a-foreign-agent-of-the-israeli-government-88190712.html

 

***************************Release************************************

 

US Department of Justice Asked to Regulate AIPAC as a Foreign Agent of the Israeli Government

 

Washington, DC - The US Department of Justice has been formally asked to begin regulating the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) as the foreign agent of the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs.  A 392 page legal filing presented by a four person IRmep delegation in a two hour meeting with top officials of the Internal Security Section substantiated the following case for AIPAC's immediate registration:

 

1.    AIPAC is a spinoff of an organization already ordered by the DOJ to register as an Israeli foreign agent.  In November of 1962 the American Zionist Council was ordered by the Attorney General to begin filing disclosures as an Israeli foreign agent under the 1938 Foreign Agents Registration Act.  http://www.IRmep.org/1962Order.pdf  Six weeks later, former AZC  employees incorporated the American Israel Public Affairs Committee in Washington, DC, taking over the AZC's lobbying activities.  http://www.IRmep.org/AIPAC.pdf  AIPAC did not register as a foreign agent. 

 

2.    AIPAC's founder Isaiah L. Kenen was the chief information officer for the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs in New York and for a time duly registered in that role.  http://www.IRmep.org/Kenen.pdf The Justice Department ordered Kenen to personally re-register after he formally left the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs to head up private lobbying and publicity for the Israeli government at the nonprofit American Zionist Council.  Kenen never complied with the order. http://www.IRmep.org/order.pdf 

 

3.    Espionage related FBI investigations in 1984 and 2005 reveal AIPAC's ongoing stealth foreign agency activities.  Declassified FBI files released on the Internet last week reveal that in 1984 AIPAC and the Israeli Ministry of Economics were investigated for jointly obtaining and circulating classified US economic data to obtain favorable trade benefits for Israel.  http://www.irmep.org/ila/economy In 2005 Pentagon Colonel Lawrence Franklin pled guilty and two AIPAC employees were indicted for obtaining and circulating classified US national defense information to Israeli government officials allegedly in the interest of fomenting US action against Iran.

 

4.    AIPAC's executive committee consists of the original member organizations of the AZC in addition to newer members.  The Conference of Presidents of Major Jewish Organizations, the umbrella group of AIPAC's executive committee, is housed in the same New York office as the World Zionist Organization - American Section, a registered foreign agent that is heavily involved in illegal settlement expansion according to Israeli prosecutor Thalia Sasson.

 

According to Grant F. Smith, director of IRmep, the case for reregulating AIPAC as a foreign agent immediately is compelling.  "AIPAC was designed to supplant the American Zionist Council  as the arm of the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs in the United States after the DOJ ordered the AZC to register as a foreign agent.  As such, Americans should have full public access to biannual FARA registrations detailing AIPAC's publicity campaigns, lobbying expenditures, funding flows,  activities of its offices in Israel and internal consultations with its foreign principals-particularly over such controversial issues as illegal settlements and US foreign aid."

 

Concerned organizations and individuals who wish to supplement the Department of Justice filing or participate in future negotiations with law enforcement officials should contact the Institute for Research: Middle Eastern Policy, Inc. at [email protected] or 202-342-7325.  IRmep is a private nonprofit that studies how warranted law enforcement and civil action can improve U.S. Middle East policy.

 

Comments

[Anthony]

Seems like a document from 1962.

[William R. Cumming]

Does this filing imply that NO self-initiated reveiw of AIPAC by DOJ for registration has ever occurred?

[Sidney O. Smith III]

Be curious to know the legal mechanism upon which these irmep folks rely. There most definitely is one available and it is notated somewhere in the backpages here at sst.

[Phil Giraldi]

This a a good initiative that has been tried before. It will likely drop down some deep bureaucratic hole never to be seen again, however. I would respectfully submit that certain fellow travelers in the US media should also be required to register as Israeli agents. Earlier today the so-called Quartet roundly criticized Israel's settlement expansion plans. The headline reporting it in the Guardian was "Quartet Blasts Israel over East Jerusalem Settlements." The AP reported it as "Diplomats urge resumption of Mideast talks." But the Wash Post won the prize for its energetic pro-Israel spin - headlining it "Clinton: Netanyahu responds with 'useful, productive' ideas to defuse crisis." Lest the message be lost on anyone, the editorial page also featured a piece by the ubiquitous Charles Krauthammer laying all the blame for the Biden incident on Washington's overreaction to a situation that has ultimately been caused by Palestinian intrasigence.

[Clifford Kiracofe]

Good development.

IMO, the last 60 years demonstrate that is not possible to change present US foreign policy in the Middle East without neutralizing the Jewish Zionist and Christian Zionist wings of the pro-Israel Lobby.

While pressure to this end from Liberal elements of the American Jewish community may develop, I believe gentile attitudes (secular, mainstream Christian, other) may well harden over time. The Christian Zionist bloc, while strong, still represents only perhaps 10-15 percent of the population.

The gentile majority in the US -- white, black, Hispanic, Asian -- have yet to connect the dots between Israel and many of our foreign policy challenges and national security threats not to mention unnecessary loss of blood and treasure.

Within this context, the influence of the pro-Israel press and pro-Israel Hollywood over the long term could, it would seem, diminish as awareness increases. Thus the ability of these two engines to manipulate public opinion in support of pro-Israel policies could diminish.

It would be lamentable if hearts harden as political attitudes harden but I would not rule that out over the long term. We have seen this elsewhere.

[Patrick Lang]

Anthony

Why 1962? pl

[zanzibar]

Clifford

How do you believe the gentile majority here in the US will even become aware of the pernicious influence of the Likudnik lobby on US foreign policy disasters? They have a hard time getting past American Idol and the latest Tiger text message.

Unless SST goes mainstream of course!

[Stanley Henning]

And how many billions are American taxpayers expending on aid to Israel while we are stretched to the limit in all directions?

[Ken Roberts]

With reference to point #1 above, Isaiah Kenen's entry in "Who's Who in World Jewry", 1965 edn, says he was exec dir of AIPAC since 1954. The incorporation of AIPAC did not, it would seem, coincide with its founding.

This topic is not a big deal for me, and I haven't looked at much background material from IRmep or other sources in any detail. Just wanted to pass along that one datum.

[Charles I]

Zanzibar, again I urge one and all to carry the debate beyond the confines of this wonderful place. Provide your peers with simple cited fact sheets and correspondence inviting and enabling them to share their thoughts with their legislators.

Ask them to think for a moment what they would like their names, reputations or souls associated with, and just exactly what they are willing to countenance by their apathy.

All very annoying, but most are woefully ignorant and many amenable to mild moral suasion upon review of the current situation.

That is how I go about answering your question, and I beg you to get at it as well.

[KHarbaugh]

Talking about investigations:
Given that the leak of the status of Valerie Plame Wilson
was investigated so thoroughly,
why was not the leak that
AIPAC and its employees Steve J. Rosen and Keith Weissman were under investigation
itself investigated?
Broadcasting to the world the news that they were under investigation
surely blew any chances to go deeper into the probe.
Therefore, this seems to me (a non-lawyer) to be
a textbook case of obstruction of justice.
Why was it not investigated,
and why did no one in the media call for said investigation?
(Unlike the media hounds who demanded an investigation of the Plame affair.)

[Clifford Kiracofe]

Zanzibar,

I hope SST goes mainstream, that would be great! But it's also fine as underground samizdat in "zog" land.

As for the public here waking up, I imagine as was the case in Europe down through the centuries. Somehow the light bulb goes on once in a while. Things do get extreme but that is how it has been in the past.

David Habakkuk in an earlier thread noted Prof. Kevin Macdonald's rather controversial work. The California professor writes within the context of "evolutionary biology."

We have been talking about tribalism per the Afghans and Middle East and all that so perhaps Macdonald's controversial take on tribal behavior fits in somehow.
http://www.kevinmacdonald.net/

Personally, I think Michael Grant's book, Jews in the Roman World is solid and non-controversial background. And there is an excellent bibliography.

Increasing unemployment, economic hard times, endless treasure and blood expended for pro-Israel crusades...it will sink in at some point, if history is any guide.

I hear that many African-American political types are quite upset with Obama for a number of reasons ...there are various rumblings out there.

The B'nai B'rith's Gestapo (the Anti-Defamation League) is already predictably after Petraeus it seems. Abe Foxman is doing his usual foaming at the mouth.

Maj. Robert H. Williams (MI, Reserve) wrote a pamphlet on the Anti-Defamation League back in 1947. It turns up here and there and is rather interesting. I imagine the old CIC had a sense of the situation...probably some old archival records somewhere.

[Patrick Lang]

All

I have no idea what "going mainstream" means. pl

[Byron Raum]

This is fairly anecdotal, but it seems to me that American Hispanics, Asians and blacks all are far less sympathetic towards Israel's rampages than American whites. As America trends toward becoming more multi-ethnic, the demographics are less favorable to the zealots.

[Sidney O. Smith III]

CP
Law in Modern Society, chapter 3 or thereabouts. I can’t remember why I read the book. I can assure you it wasn’t for career advancement. Maybe to avoid studying for a law exam or some such.

If you find it a worthwhile read, please share your thoughts. Maybe I can use the book to help me with a client -- let‘s call him Devon. You see, Devon got locked up for a battery but, best I can tell, his girlfriend’s mother, let’s call her Clineisha, has a problem with crack, so she took after Devon with a knife one morning around 4 am and then called 911. One thing has led to another, and now both Devon and I are having to deal with a prosecutor in misdemeanor land who, apparently, has never committed a misdemeanor in her life nor even thought of one. And as an immaculately conceived prosecutor -- one that the woman judge (a great judge too!) thinks is an idiot as well -- she wants to see Devon locked up and the key thrown away, although not one witness will support the state’s case.

Meanwhile, while I am sitting there during calendar call (praying that Devon was able to catch the right bus to make it to court on time, thus avoiding a bench warrant and it was close…damn close but I covered for him well) I keep thinking to myself, “Wait, what about David Addington, why isn’t he standing before a judge in an orange suit in felony land dealing with a sure enough prosecutor who can separate the wheat from the chaff. And then I look around the courtroom and I see all these people and I start wondering, “Geez, what if they started thinking the same thing, then they may lose faith in our system” And so on.

And it is during those times that I recall that Unger book.

BTW, the case against Devon was nolle pros’d. The arresting officer, an extremely qualified African American woman, didn’t even show up.

Sir Charles I
You have a law degree, right? Have you consider ghostwriting briefs? I do the same and absolutely love it. Just to try to pique your interest in the idea: I just finished over 100 pages of briefs in a complex government whistleblower case. Fascinating case. Breaks all stereotypes. And on a strictly personal note, lo and behold, an ex girlfriend is overseeing the litigation from the other side, so tension rising, as they say. Apparently, I can still rattle her cage, at least so I have been told.

Give the idea some thought. You may like it. You are not filing an entry and basically hired for legal research, so I don’t see why you cannot do so but, of course, I cannot say for sure as I don’t know the rules up there in beautiful Canada.

[JohnH]

Perhaps IRmep was quietly assured that its application would be entertained after Biden's fiasco in Tel Aviv?

[Cloned Poster]

Is this a "Healthcare" Obama move?

[GregB]

Col. Lang,

I think what the poster meant by going mainstream was the hope that the ideas and opinions expressed here in a sober, rational and sensible way were to reach a much larger American audience.

Unfortunately noting the track of the current discourse in America makes such a thing unlikely.

[Arun]

Byron Raum: in various places you will find claims that there is a Jewish/Hindu collaboration where the Jewish Lobby is helping place Indian-Americans (who are Hindu) into Congressional internships, etc., with an eye to expanding their future lobbying power; as there are common interests and phobias. I don't know how true these claims are.

-Arun (a Hindu Indian-American).

[Clifford Kiracofe]

"Mainstream", well I think a national SST television network with international satellite feeds would be a good starter...

Murdoch delenda est...

Meanwhile the samizdat in "zog" land is welcome.

[isl]

IMO mainstream blogs, like daily kos, are worse then useless - a complete waste of time. Instead I hope (but dont expect) reporters will regularly parrot SST ideas and discussions.

[Jackie]

Sir,
Yes, I know, I'm a broken record, but I have never heard an explanation of why the Palestinians have to suffer for what the Germans did to the Jews. I realize there is the biblical b.s. about the home of the Jews, but the Bible isn't their book of religion.

As an Irish-Swiss American, where am I supposed to go, according to the Bible?

I just don't think you can use biblical references to settle injustices of the past. (I know, "life is not fair").

[Redhand]

Lest the message be lost on anyone, the editorial page also featured a piece by the ubiquitous Charles Krauthammer laying all the blame for the Biden incident on Washington's overreaction to a situation that has ultimately been caused by Palestinian intrasigence.

Does anyone take the WaPo editorial page seriously anymore?
It's a neocon elephant's graveyard, and yes, the party allusion is intentional.

[confusedponderer]

I couldn't help but notice the coincidence that this happens at about the same time legislation has been introduced in Israel to force NGOs to disclose who is funding them. Well, what's good for the goose is good for the gander.

For more on that, read Harper's Scott Horton on Lawfare Redux.

[N. M. Salamon]

Colonel:

I know you would never do it, but your blog would get large readership on Al Jazeera English - and possible in Canada if and when Al Jazeera [English] TV becomes more availble.

Note that Juan Cole and German Judge were presented today [see Juan Cole's blog] a very intersting discussion on Iraq.