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TESTING 1-2-3 CODE NAME: AIPAC-GATE I received an email expressing outrage, "What was John Ashcroft thinking?" when subpoenas, issued last week, ordered four AIPAC officials to appear before a Virginia grand jury. The email linked to Jerusalem Post reporter Janine Zacharia's article asking, were AIPAC's four "setup" by the FBI from governmental suspicion of dual American-Jewish loyalties to Israel and the US. Pentagon analyst Iran expert Larry Franklin, co-operated with the FBI to seduce AIPAC officials he knew into accepting what Franklin described as "ticking-bomb" "classified information" "outlined in a draft national security presidential directive on Iran." Key word "classified." Franklin is alleged to have told AIPAC's staffers, at a lunch an Israeli official attended, "Iranians were monitoring and planning to kidnap and kill Israelis operating in the Kurdish areas in northern Iraq." One AIPAC official took the bait. Zacharia reports AIPAC states its employees did not believe the information, apparently circulated in other channels, was either secret or classified. Black's Law Dictionary defines espionage, dating back to ancient Egyptians as: "...gathering, transmitting, or losing.. information related to national defense, from rivals or enemies for military, or economic advantage as part of an organized effort." In the '50's, McCarthyism tested loyalty of American organizations. The Rosenbergs were executed for handing American nuclear secrets to the Soviets. 1971, Department of Defense worker Daniel Ellsberg leaked 7,000-pages of top-secret Pentagon papers. In the '80's, an FBI sting led to the arrest of members of Congress taped accepting bribes for political favors from agent provocateurs posing as Middle Eastern businessmen working for non-existent "Abdul Enterprises." 1982, US automobile executive DeLorean was found not-guilty of selling cocaine to undercover LAX police having argued " without the Government, there would be no crime," the police having threatened him with violence if he refused. In 1990, Reagan officials illegally lobbied on behalf of Wedtech, a small business defense contractor to secure lucrative army contracts. Recipe for Wedtech's success in the $117 million scam reaching up to Ed Meese was bribes, lies and friends in high places. Most prominent in espionage history is convicted spy former United States Navy Intelligence officer, Jonathan Jay Pollard, found with stacks of classified documents unrelated to his work in his office. Espionage checkers America's beginning days. George Washington's friend Continental military general Benedict Arnold V, his name now synonymous with traitor, passed information to British forces using his wife Peggy Shippen to correspond with her former suitor. In a letter to his former friend, Benedict Arnold said, "love to my country actuates my present conduct, however it may appear inconsistent to the world, who very seldom judge right of any man's actions". Parochial school students when I was in day-school would challenge classmates asking, "If Israel and America were at war with each other, who would you fight for?" There is one answer that will keep respondents out of trouble. Right hand over heart, "I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States and to the Republic for which it stands, one Nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all." (36 U.S.C. § 172) Allegiance is a duty citizens owe their country pledged in their oath to the United States of America. The United States Revised Statute, sec. 1999 acknowledges, in questions of dual loyalty, for American citizens, the United States and American law, come first. It is not un-American to offer opportunities to commit a crime but treason, for any reason, by a US citizen is a capital crime punishable by death or life imprisonment. If the sequence of AIPAC's, Franklin's and the FBI's events media is reporting are correct, at the mere mention of "classified documents" AIPAC's officials under investigation, in accordance with American law, should have asked Franklin for written clearance to review the information. None being proferred, they should have notified the FBI they were approached to receive sensitive government information, protecting the lobbying group they represent. And themselves. Individuals too often disregard legal liability not realizing their actions put others at equal risk. By taking the course of action they did, ignoring the best interests of AIPAC, disregarding a Standard of Care required of a prudent person, the individuals acting in self interest have jeopardized AIPAC's history of good work. Was the AIPAC emloyees' gamble of one cell phone call to the Feds worth the negative publicity brought upon a longstanding prominent organization headed by corporate and global leaders. A court will determine that answer. Fact remains, at least, one employee failed the United States government's And his people. BIO: Carrie Devorah, certified crime analyst, profiler and mediator, is an investigative photojournalist carded with in security by the State of California. Her areas of focus are faith, homeland security and terrorism. And everyday people.