Joseph Cannon - April 24, 2009

For big laffs, check out Marty Peretz on the dropping of the AIPAC case:

The espionage that they were supposed to have committed turns out not to be espionage but rather casual talk on insignificant topics with people friendly to the United States.

The AIPAC case is “insignificant.” Uh huh. Then why did former DOD employee Larry Franklin receive a twelve year sentence? Why was the “insignificant” information classified Top Secret? Why was the FBI tapping Saban — and others? Do courts allow legal wiretaps on unimportant matters? Why did the FBI review the late Jack Anderson’s long history of AIPAC contacts? Why has the FBI been probing AIPAC since before 9/11?

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Jeremy Scahill - April 20, 2009

This is a huge story: Representative Jane Harman, a hawkish, influential “Blue Dog” Democrat “was overheard on an NSA wiretap telling a suspected Israeli agent that she would lobby the Justice Department reduce espionage-related charges against two officials of the American Israeli Public Affairs Committee, the most powerful pro-Israel organization in Washington,” according to a report from CQ Politics:

Harman was recorded saying she would “waddle into” the AIPAC case “if you think it’ll make a difference,” according to two former senior national security officials familiar with the NSA transcript.

In exchange for Harman’s help, the sources said, the suspected Israeli agent pledged to help lobby Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., then-House minority leader, to appoint Harman chair of the Intelligence Committee after the 2006 elections, which the Democrats were heavily favored to win.

Seemingly wary of what she had just agreed to, according to an official who read the NSA transcript, Harman hung up after saying, “This conversation doesn’t exist.”

The case, known as the AIPAC espionage scandal centers around allegations that at least two AIPAC staff members passed sensitive US intelligence on Iran, provided by Pentagon official Lawrence Franklin, to Israel. In early 2006, Franklin pled guilty to espionage-related charges and was sentenced to 13 years in prison. The case against two indicted AIPAC staffers, Steve Rosen and Keith Weissman, is ongoing.

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