Ex-AIPACer Rosen suing former employer for defamation

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Written by Ron Kampeas, JTA Ron Kampeas, JTA

Published: 11 March 2009 11 March 2009

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[Perhaps spying for AIPAC "does comport with standards that AIPAC expects of all its employees"]

WASHINGTON (JTA) -- Steve Rosen, the former AIPAC foreign policy chief charged with receiving classified information, is suing his former employer for defamation, JTA has learned.

Rosen filed a civil action March 2 in the District of Columbia Superior Court seeking $21 million from the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, its officers at the time of his dismissal in 2005 and an outside spokesman hired to deal specifically with the case.

Should it come to trial, the civil case promises revelations of how AIPAC works its sensitive relations with the executive branch and allegedly capitulated to government pressure to fire Rosen and Keith Weissman, its then-Iran analyst.

Weissman, Rosen's co-defendant in the criminal case under way in a federal court in Alexandria, Va., is not a plaintiff in the civil suit. He and his lawyers declined comment, as did Rosen.

Both of Rosen's lawyers -- in the criminal case and in his suit against AIPAC -- did not return calls requesting comment.

The core of the case is the repeated claims by Patrick Dorton, the outside spokesman for AIPAC named in the suit, that Rosen and Weissman were fired because they "did not comport with standards that AIPAC expects of all its employees.”

AIPAC’s regular spokesman, Joshua Block, referred questions to Dorton. In turn, Dorton issued a statement saying that AIPAC and the others named in Rosen's suit would defend themselves vigorously.

"The complaint paints a false picture of what happened," he told JTA, adding later that "AIPAC made all decisions in this situation with a determination to do the right thing."

In seeking to prove that he was the victim of "false and defamatory statements" made on AIPAC's behalf, the complaint describes Rosen as tumbling from the heights of a cozy relationship with the highest echelons of government to being shown the door at AIPAC.

Rosen describes his own status as a high-flying conduit between foreign policy mandarins and the policy community, journalists and foreign diplomats.

In the complaint, a copy of which was obtained by JTA, Rosen says he had the "requisite experience and expertise" to deal with those "with the authority to determine and differentiate which information disclosures would be harmful to the United States and which disclosures would benefit the United States."

Rosen and Weissman allegedly received classified information having to do with Iran and its backing for terrorism. The case came to light following an FBI raid on AIPAC's offices in August 2004.

After the FBI raid, AIPAC stood by the two employees, insisting they had done nothing wrong. Rosen says he even received a performance bonus. Seven months later, in March 2005, Rosen and Weissman were fired; they were indicted in August of that year.

Rosen's suit alleges that AIPAC gave in to government pressure to fire the two staffers, casting Paul McNulty, the lead prosecutor in the case, as making threats that would not be out of place in a legal drama.

"We could make real progress and get AIPAC out from under all of us," the filing quotes McNulty as saying.

The filing draws its information from a motion by Rosen and Weissman to have the criminal case dismissed in 2007. The motion said the government violated the defendants' right to a defense by threatening to charge AIPAC as well unless it fired Rosen and Weissman and stopped paying their legal fees.

In sworn affidavits filed with the motion, lawyers for Rosen and Weissman quoted lawyers for AIPAC as saying that the decision to fire the two came under government pressure.

T.S. Ellis III, the federal judge trying the case, ultimately rejected the motion to dismiss but said its claims were credible. At the time of the May 2007 ruling, Dorton brushed aside the motion's claims.

"AIPAC made all of its decisions in this case alone based on the facts of the situation and the organization’s intention to do the right thing," he told JTA.

Within months, however, AIPAC agreed to pay Weissman's legal fees and reportedly expressed willingness to do the same for Rosen. (Rosen's lawyer, Abbe Lowell, deferred negotiating such a payment, in part because he had switched legal firms in the interim and preferred to wait until the case was completed to properly apportion fees.)

Rosen's central contention is that his actions comported with AIPAC practices, and that he provided his superiors with regular briefings about his efforts to gather information from government officials. The paragraph in the complaint outlining how AIPAC works suggests that the trial would lift the veil over exchanges with the government that AIPAC has long tried to keep under wraps.

"To be effective, organizations engaged in advocacy in the field of foreign policy need to have earlier and more detailed information about policy developments inside the government and diplomatic issues with other countries than is normally available to or needed by the wider public," the complaint says. "Agencies of the government sometimes choose to provide such additional information about policy and diplomatic issues to these outside interest groups in order to win support for what they are doing among important domestic constituencies and to send messages to select target audiences.”

The complaint also asserts that the statements made by AIPAC’s outside spokesman "might influence a jury that will hear the misdirected case brought against him by the government." The criminal trial, which has been delayed multiple times, is now set for May 27.

The filing also alleges that "through their publication of the falsehoods about Mr. Rosen, defendant achieved an increase of millions of dollars in revenue for AIPAC, whereas had they told the truth, AIPAC might well have suffered a significant decrease in fund-raising, as well as an increase in legal costs."

Sources close to the criminal case say that Weissman and the criminal defense team are not troubled by the lawsuit, but think that making the case that Rosen had been defamed would be much easier after an acquittal or after the case had been dropped by the government.

Increasing calls on the Obama administration to drop the case include most recently an editorial Wednesday in the Washington Post.

The case is now being seen to have been an instrument of Bush administration efforts to expand secrecy laws. Prosecutors charged Rosen and Weissman under a rarely cited section of the 1917 Espionage Act that criminalizes the receipt of classified information by civilians; the section has never led to a successful prosecution.

Rosen in filing his lawsuit may have felt pressed for time, as defamation suits must be filed within a year of the offending statement.

The most recent instance of Dorton, the spokesman, claiming publicly that Rosen and Weissman did not comport with AIPAC rules came in a story by The New York Times on March 3, 2008 -- a year less a day before Rosen filed his suit. The suit contends that Dorton repeated the claim to a reporter for the Forward in October; that instance apparently was not published.

A Superior Court judge set June 5 for a hearing to set a trial date regarding Rosen’s claims. By the time Rosen’s civil lawsuit comes to trial, he might have a dismissal or acquittal under his belt, increasing his chances for victory.

Rosen’s filing asserts that at AIPAC he “was one of the principal officials who, along with Executive Director Howard Kohr and a few other individuals, were expected to maintain relationships with [government] agencies, receive such information and share it with AIPAC Board of Directors and to Senior Staff for possible further distribution."

Kohr is named as a defendant, as are AIPAC's lay leadership at the time: Bernice Manocherian, then president; Howard Friedman, then president-elect (and a former president of JTA’s board of directors); and Amy Friedkin, then the immediate past president.

Also named are alleged members of an "advisory group" set up to deal directly with the case. These names reinforce the impression that a small core of members of AIPAC's board continues to take the lead in determining AIPAC's direction. They include past presidents Lonnie Kaplan, Larry Weinberg, Bob Asher and Ed Levy.

The complaint asks for $10 million from AIPAC, $500,000 each from all 12 other defendants and $5 million collectively from all the defendants.

US diplomat resigns from intelligence post over Israel criticism

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Written by Oliver Burkeman in Washington, guardian.co.uk Oliver Burkeman in Washington, guardian.co.uk

Published: 11 March 2009 11 March 2009

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Chas Freeman, a former US ambassador to Saudi Arabia, withdrew from one of Barack Obama's top intelligence positions

A veteran American diplomat has resigned as one of Barack Obama's top intelligence officials over his strident criticisms of Israeli government policy.

Chas Freeman, a former US ambassador to Saudi Arabia, withdrew before starting work as chairman of the national intelligence council, accusing his critics of libel, character assassination and "utter disregard for the truth".

The "Israel Lobby", he argued, was stifling any discussion of US policy options in the Middle East except those endorsed by "the ruling faction in Israeli politics" - a situation that could "ultimately threaten the existence of the state of Israel".

Freeman's job would have involved producing National Intelligence Estimates, the authoritative documents intended to provide the president and senior policymakers with an overview of crucial security issues.

But numerous members of Congress have questioned Freeman's ability to carry out the task objectively, citing his view that until "Israeli violence against Palestinians" is halted, "it is utterly unrealistic to expect that Palestinians will stand down from violent resistance". They also questioned his business links with Saudi Arabia and his views on China.

"His statements against Israel were way over the top and severely out of step with the administration," said the New York Democratic senator, Chuck Schumer. "I repeatedly urged the White House to reject him, and I am glad they did the right thing."

Unlike the string of prominent Obama nominees who have withdrawn in recent weeks, Freeman did not have to be approved by Congress. But his departure - coming hours after the national intelligence director, Dennis Blair, defended him before a Senate committee - will embarrass the White House, and signals how reluctant the president may be to depart from Washington's current policies towards Israel and the Palestinians.

Freeman's critics noted that he was president of a Middle East thinktank part-funded by the Saudi regime, and serves as an adviser to an oil company owned by the Chinese government. In a posting to a foreign policy email list, attributed to Freeman, he appears to back Beijing's actions in the 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre, arguing that force should have been used sooner.

"I do not believe it is acceptable for any country to allow the heart of its national capital to be occupied by dissidents intent on disrupting the normal functions of government, however appealing to foreigners their propaganda may be," the posting reads.

But in a message on the website of the magazine Foreign Policy, Freeman claimed it was ironic to be accused of improper regard for foreign governments "by a group so clearly intent on enforcing adherence to the policies of a foreign government". He had never sought money from or been paid by any overseas power, he said.

"This is a country where you can say anything you want about the president, or any other policy, and it's really important for people to understand that this is the only issue you cannot discuss openly," said MJ Rosenberg, of the Israel Policy Forum. "I think if people perceive incorrectly that the Jewish community as a whole is behind these efforts to stifle dissent on this issue, that's dangerous."

Israeli West Bank mines 'illegal'

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Written by BBC News BBC News

Published: 09 March 2009 09 March 2009

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An Israeli human rights group has filed a petition at the High Court demanding an immediate halt to Israeli mining operations in the West Bank. {josquote} "the illegal practice of brutal economic exploitation of a conquered territory to serve the exclusive economic needs of the occupying power".{/josquote} 

The group, Yesh Din, accuses Israel of breaking international law by exploiting the occupied territory's resources for its own gain.

It says Israel has never conducted a thorough review of the practice.

But Israel says the procedures are in line with both international law and agreements with the Palestinians.

Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/middle_east/7933155.stm

Published: 2009/03/09 17:00:31 GMT

© BBC MMIX

Israel annexing East Jerusalem, says EU

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Written by Rory McCarthy in Jerusalem Rory McCarthy in Jerusalem

Published: 08 March 2009 08 March 2009

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• Confidential report attacks 'illegal' house demolitions
• Government accused of damaging peace prospects

    
[Photo: House Demolitions in East Jerusalem]

40-year-old Palestinian Mahmoud al-Abbasi stands amid the rubble of his home after it was demolished by the Jerusalem municipality in the East Jerusalem neighborhood of Silwan. Photograph: Gali Tibbon

A confidential EU report accuses the Israeli government of using settlement expansion, house demolitions, discriminatory housing policies and the West Bank barrier as a way of "actively pursuing the illegal annexation" of East Jerusalem.

The document says Israel has accelerated its plans for East Jerusalem, and is undermining the Palestinian Authority's credibility and weakening support for peace talks. "Israel's actions in and around Jerusalem constitute one of the most acute challenges to Israeli-Palestinian peace-making," says the document, EU Heads of Mission Report on East Jerusalem.

The report, obtained by the Guardian, is dated 15 December 2008. It acknowledges Israel's legitimate security concerns in Jerusalem, but adds: "Many of its current illegal actions in and around the city have limited security justifications."

"Israeli 'facts on the ground' - including new settlements, construction of the barrier, discriminatory housing policies, house demolitions, restrictive permit regime and continued closure of Palestinian institutions - increase Jewish Israeli presence in East Jerusalem, weaken the Palestinian community in the city, impede Palestinian urban development and separate East Jerusalem from the rest of the West Bank," the report says.

The document has emerged at a time of mounting concern over Israeli policies in East Jerusalem. Two houses were demolished on Monday just before the arrival of the US secretary of state, Hillary Clinton, and a further 88 are scheduled for demolition, all for lack of permits. Clinton described the demolitions as "unhelpful", noting that they violated Israel's obligations under the US "road map" for peace.

The EU report goes further, saying that the demolitions are "illegal under international law, serve no obvious purpose, have severe humanitarian effects, and fuel bitterness and extremism." The EU raised its concern in a formal diplomatic representation on December 1, it says.

It notes that although Palestinians in the east represent 34% of the city's residents, only 5%-10% of the municipal budget is spent in their areas, leaving them with poor services and infrastructure.

Israel issues fewer than 200 permits a year for Palestinian homes and leaves only 12% of East Jerusalem available for Palestinian residential use. As a result many homes are built without Israeli permits. About 400 houses have been demolished since 2004 and a further 1,000 demolition orders have yet to be carried out, it said.

City officials dismissed criticisms of its housing policy as "a disinformation campaign". "Mayor Nir Barkat continues to promote investments in infrastructure, construction and education in East Jerusalem, while at the same time upholding the law throughout West and East Jerusalem equally without bias," the mayor's office said after Clinton's visit.

However, the EU says the fourth Geneva convention prevents an occupying power extending its jurisdiction to occupied territory. Israel occupied the east of the city in the 1967 six day war and later annexed it. The Palestinians claim East Jerusalem as the capital of their future state.

The EU says settlement are being built in the east of the city at a "rapid pace". Since the Annapolis peace talks began in late 2007, nearly 5,500 new settlement housing units have been submitted for public review, with 3,000 so far approved, the report says. There are now about 470,000 settlers in the occupied territories, including 190,000 in East Jerusalem.

The EU is particularly concerned about settlements inside the Old City, where there were plans to build a Jewish settlement of 35 housing units in the Muslim quarter, as well as expansion plans for Silwan, just outside the Old City walls.

The goal, it says, is to "create territorial contiguity" between East Jerusalem settlements and the Old City and to "sever" East Jerusalem and its settlement blocks from the West Bank.

There are plans for 3,500 housing units, an industrial park, two police stations and other infrastructure in a controversial area known as E1, between East Jerusalem and the West Bank settlement of Ma'ale Adumim, home to 31,000 settlers. Israeli measures in E1 were "one of the most significant challenges to the Israeli-Palestinian peace process", the report says.

Mark Regev, spokesman for the Israeli prime minister, Ehud Olmert, said conditions for Palestinians living in East Jerusalem were better than in the West Bank. "East Jerusalem residents are under Israeli law and they were offered full Israeli citizenship after that law was passed in 1967," he said. "We are committed to the continued development of the city for the benefit of all its population."