Home > Alleged Pentagon Mole For Israel ’Quietly Rehired’
By Tom Regan
4-1-5
http://www.csmonitor.com/2005/0331/dailyUpdate.html
The ongoing investigation into allegations that a Pentagon staffer
named Larry Franklin passed on classified government documents to two
members of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), a
pro-Israel lobby group, continues but with several new twists.
Over the past weekend, several Israeli papers carried a report by JTA,
the Jewish news service, that top officials of the lobby group had
appeared in front of a grand jury in "late January or early February,"
and that the two staff members who had contact with Franklin ñ Steve
Rosen, of AIPAC’s research department, and Keith Weissman, AIPAC’s
deputy director of foreign policy issues ñ have been placed on paid leave.
The same report also said that Mr. Franklin had been "quietly" rehired
at the Pentagon over the "FBI’s objections." Franklin, however, was
not given back his previous position in the Iran section, but instead
placed in a "non-sensitive" area which the report didn’t specify.
The FBI’s investigations into Franklin’s actions became public last
August when CBS reported that a "suspected mole" at the Pentagon had
passed along government documents to AIPAC staffers. The "suspected
mole" was later revealed to be Mr. Franklin.
Time reported last December that government sources said the
investigations into AIPAC had been ongoing for about two years,
looking into allegations that AIPAC was "obtaining sensitive data and
passing it along to the Israeli government."
United Press International reported on December 9 that the initial
investigations began when the FBI discovered "new, ’massive’ Israeli
spying operations in the East Coast, including New York and New Jersey."
It was later reported in the Jerusalem Post that Franklin had agreed
to help in an FBI sting. Ha’aretz reported that Franklin was told to
tell the AIPAC staffers that "Iran was planning to attack Israelis
operating in the Kurdish region in Iraq." The two men then "rushed to
pass it on to Israeli diplomats, thereby falling into the FBI trap."
Franklin later stopped cooperating with the FBI, fired his public
defender lawyer and hired one of Washington’s best known defense
lawyers. The Washington Times reported that the FBI was "hopping mad"
at this turn of events, and this was when the bureau decided to pursue
a more agressive policy, including the subpeonas of top AIPAC officials.
Some media sources have said the entire Franklin affair illustrates
some of the internal battles that have taken place over how the US
should deal with Iraq. The document that Franklin is alleged to have
given the two AIPAC staffers may have been a draft copy of a National
Security Presidential Directive written by Pentagon neocons (who
advocate a hard line towards Iran), which contained a proposal to
destabilize Iran. The directive had apparently been turned down by the
White House.
Ha’aretz reported last week that the case has reached a crossroads,
where the investigators "must decide on the suspects in the case."
Either Franklin would be charged with acting alone, or Franklin and
the two AIPAC employees, Mr. Rosen and Mr. Weissman, would be charged,
or "whether, on top of those three, the entire AIPAC organization has
acted unlawfully."
Sources close to the investigation suggested recently that it would
end in a plea bargain. Franklin would plead to a lesser crime of
unauthorized transfer of information, Rosen and Weissman would be
charged with receiving classified information unlawfully, and AIPAC
would remain unstained. Franklin’s lawyer, Plato Cacheris, yesterday
denied the reports, stating: "We have not entered any plea of defense
with the Justice Department."
AIPAC refused to say anything about the possibility of a plea bargain.
Ha’aretz also reports that the FBI’s larger goal seems to be "an
extensive examination of AIPAC itself." Since the investigation began
seven months ago, AIPAC, one of the strongest lobbying groups in
Washington, has been "struggling in two arenas": trying to resolve the
allegations against its staff members, and more important, dealing
with the "political change going on in Israel" in its relationship
with the Palestinians.
’AIPAC is simply lagging behind developments,’ said a congressional
staffer close to the issue. According to the staffer, the fact that
most of the AIPAC board is hawkish on the Israel-Palestinian conflict
makes it difficult for the lobby to accommodate itself to Israel’s new
policies.
Copyright © 2005 The Christian Science Monitor. All rights reserved.