AIPAC probe intensifies

[mmonk]

(snip)
FBI agents searched AIPAC's headquarters here Wednesday, seizing files associated with two senior staffers who were interviewed in August amid allegations that a classified Pentagon document was leaked and passed on to Israel.

(snip)

http://www.jewishtimes.com/News/4374.stm

[JohnyCanuck]

1. The question that is overlooked (probably intentionally)

in MSM coverage is not AIPAC's alleged involvement in espionage in order to obtain classified US information and send it back to Israel, but did AIPAC play a role in planting the phony intelligence the White House used to start their bogus and illegitimate war on Iraq. Remember the OSP (Office of Special Plans)?

From a recent antiwar.com column by Justin Raimondo:

On November 20, Washington hit out again at the neocons' Iraqi poster boy, raiding four INC offices, utilizing the good offices of the Iraqi Ministry of the Interior and some "American contractors." Now they're bitch-slapping the AIPAC crowd with subpoenas, grilling them in front of a grand jury convened to hear evidence of Israel's American fifth column in Washington. The timing of these two raids is, as they say, no coincidence.

Wright and Ricks point out two threads of this investigation, and draw out the implications with what limited information they have been able to discern from a very close-mouthed U.S. attorney and a few anonymous insiders. These two trails – the Iranian spy angle, and the AIPAC aspect – lead to the same group of individuals, but there are plenty of sub-trails and footpaths to follow, all of which point to the very same crowd – a powerful faction in this administration, one credited – if that is the word – with steering us into war with Iraq and trying mightily to navigate us into a conflict with Iran: the neoconservatives.

Centered mainly in the upper reaches of the Pentagon's civilian leadership, and in the Office of the Vice President, the recent history of this group is defined by its fervor for a new war in the Middle East. The conquest and occupation of Iraq, and the "liberation" of the region (excepting Israel, of course) has long been the announced aim of such worthies as Paul Wolfowitz, Richard Perle, and Douglas Feith. They filled the middle reaches of the national security bureaucracy with their underlings and ideologues – like Franklin – who were strategically placed to doctor the intelligence and stovepipe lies in two directions: to the general public, and to the White House (as well as funnel U.S. secrets to Israel).

The "Office of Special Plans" (OSP) – created by Wolfowitz's command and presided over by Feith – was the locus of lies when it came to rationalizing the invasion of Iraq. Not trusting the CIA or any of the other intelligence-gathering agencies to come up with the required "proof" of nonexistent Iraqi WMD and "links" to Osama bin Laden, the War Party did an end run around the U.S. intelligence community and built up their own parallel agency, one capable of churning out the "right" answers. The INC, on the take for millions, fed them a steady diet of fables, forgeries, and the tall tales of phony "defectors." Julian Borger of the Guardian, Robert Dreyfuss (writing in the Nation), and Karen Kwiatkowski, a former Pentagon analyst who worked alongside many of these people, including Franklin, have all pointed to direct Israeli involvement with the OSP.

http://www.antiwar.com/justin/?articleid=4106

See also the article "The Spies Who Pushed For War" from the Guardian:

The OSP was an open and largely unfiltered conduit to the White House not only for the Iraqi opposition. It also forged close ties to a parallel, ad hoc intelligence operation inside Ariel Sharon's office in Israel specifically to bypass Mossad and provide the Bush administration with more alarmist reports on Saddam's Iraq than Mossad was prepared to authorise.

"None of the Israelis who came were cleared into the Pentagon through normal channels," said one source familiar with the visits. Instead, they were waved in on Mr Feith's authority without having to fill in the usual forms.

The exchange of information continued a long-standing relationship Mr Feith and other Washington neo-conservatives had with Israel's Likud party.

In 1996, he and Richard Perle - now an influential Pentagon figure - served as advisers to the then Likud leader, Binyamin Netanyahu. In a policy paper they wrote, entitled A Clean Break: A New Strategy for Securing the Realm, the two advisers said that Saddam would have to be destroyed, and Syria, Lebanon, Saudi Arabia, and Iran would have to be overthrown or destabilised, for Israel to be truly safe.

www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,2763,999737,00.html

[JohnyCanuck]

2. Kick .

[clem_c_rock]

3. OH WELL THAT'S OK ISRAEL, HERE'S ANOTHER CHECK AND A FEW MORE CATERPILLERS

Come on, can you imagine if this was a group of Arabs caught spying?

When are Americans going to grow sick and tired of bitch-assed Israel being the little cheerleader always cheering us into another war using our kids?

When are Americans going to grow sick and tired of Israel sucking up billions of dollars of our aid money (for what????) while our kids are sent to the front line partially for their benefit?

Is this anti-sematic talk? I dare anyone to make that case.

Oh-and by the way, here's something you don't hear in mainstream media:
How many jewish people are sick of zionism and Israel's policies.

Well, here's a few:

http://www.jewsagainstzionism.com/
http://www.jewishvoiceforpeace.org/index.html
http://www.ifamericansknew.org/
http://www.nkusa.org/
http://www.jewsnotzionists.org/
http://troploin0.free.fr/biblio/zajaz/
http://www.jewishpeacefellowship.org/
http://www.jatonyc.org/
http://www.whatreallyhappened.com/jews_against_zionism
http://www.btselem.org/English/About_BTselem/index.asp
http://www.jppi.org/seek_truth.html

[RedCheckShirt]

4. I don't understand how American Jews

who have been, for the most part progressive people who have been in the forefront in the fight for diversity, can support a regime that the entire world (outside the red states) sees as a racist apartheid state.

[clem_c_rock]

5. Exaclty - US and Israel #1 terrorist states

Institutionalized Terrorism = Terrorism!!

Here's a great list of Israel's UN Violations:

http://www.middleeastnews.com/unresolutionslist.html

[RedCheckShirt]

6. Has the US ever voted against Israel at the UN

during Chimpy's presidency?

[JohnyCanuck]

7. To answer your question.

If this was a group of Arabs being investigated for spying on the US and possibly planting bogus information to get US troops involved in an illegitimate war, this thread would be inching past the 300 post mark by now

[KamaAina]

8. Oh sure, throw 'em to the wolves now that the election's over

couldn't have had a nice juicy spy scandal in October, now, could we? </sarcasm>