The US government is to drop charges against two officials of the US’ most powerful pro-Israel lobby group accused of spying for the Jewish state because earlier court rulings had made the case unwinnable and the trial would disclose classified information.
The two accused men, Steven Rosen and Keith Weissman, worked for the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), which helps drives major funding for some US members of Congress.
They were accused of providing defense secrets to Naor Gilon, the chief political officer at the Israeli embassy in Washington, about US policy toward Iran and al-Qaeda in league with a former Pentagon analyst who has since been jailed for 12 years.
Dana Boente, who was prosecuting the case in Virginia, said the case was dropped because pre-trial court rulings had complicated the government’s case by requiring a higher level of proof of intent to spy.
The court said the prosecution would have to prove not only that the pair had passed on classified information but that they intended to harm the US in doing so.
Rosen and Weissman argued they were merely using the back-channel contacts with government officials, lobbyists and diplomats that are common in Washington.
The defense intended to call former US secretary of state Condoleezza Rica and other officials to establish that the government regularly used AIPAC to discreetly send information to Israel.
A former Pentagon analyst, Lawrence Franklin, has already pleaded guilty to disclosing classified information to Rosen and Weissman.
The dropping of the charges will come as a relief to AIPAC because the case threatened to overshadow its annual conference this weekend at which it parades support from US politicians. It was also an embarrassment which laid the lobby group open to charges of putting Israel’s interests above those of the US.
The case has been further complicated by allegations that a member of the US Congress, Jane Harman, told an Israeli agent that she would pressure the justice department to reduce spying charges against the two former AIPAC officials.
A report in the political publication Congressional Quarterly said the Israeli agent allegedly offered to get a wealthy donor who helps fund election campaigns for Nancy Pelosi, the then minority leader in the House of Representatives, to pressure Pelosi to appoint Harman to a senior position on the congressional intelligence committee.
Harman reportedly finished the discussion with the Israeli spy by saying: “This conversation does not exist.”
Congressional Quarterly obtained a transcript of the tape recorded by the National Security Agency, but Harman has denied the allegations.
An FBI investigation of Harman was dropped after the intervention of then-president George W. Bush’s attorney-general, Alberto Gonzales.
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