"The Obama Justice Department moved Friday to drop all charges against two former pro-Israel lobbyists who had been charged under the Espionage Act with improperly disseminating sensitive information... Steven J. Rosen and Keith Weissman, who were lobbyists with the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, a leading pro-Israel lobby, were charged with violating the World War I-era Espionage Act... The case was fraught with deep political dimensions, as it raised delicate issues of behind-the-scenes lobbying over Middle East policy and the role played by American Jewish supporters of Israel...

Representative Jane Harman, a California Democrat [and Jewish multi-millionaire] long involved in intelligence matters, was overheard on a government wiretap discussing the case [in 2005]. Ms. Harman was overheard agreeing with an Israeli intelligence operative to try and intercede with Bush administration officials to obtain leniency for Mr. Rosen and Mr. Weissman in exchange for help in persuading Democratic leaders to name her the chairman of the House intelligence Committee."

-- New York Times

"The mainstream media, which is where most Americans still get their news, has trivialized their stories and has no desire to grapple with issues like Israeli espionage and the establishment of a de facto Israeli loyalty test for the holders of high office... If there had been any spine or even a shred of conscience in the media, then all of this might have gone in another direction, leading to a serious inquiry into how a tiny foreign power [sic] has managed to create the most powerful lobby in Washington...

Harman was on the receiving end of an intelligence operation. Her phone conversation was recorded because she was talking to someone who was working with Israeli intelligence, which was the target of the investigation... Once such favors are exchanged, the intelligence officer has leverage to demand more because his new agent will cooperate rather than have the illegal details of the relationship revealed...

If the Freeman and Harman affairs taken together do not provide convincing proof that Israel and its advocates are no true friends to the United States, then it is difficult to imagine what else can be used to make the case."

-- Philip Giraldi

"While there are complicating aspects of the Rosen-Weissman case, beginning with the fact that the Bush Justice Department failed to indict AIPAC, as an organization, on the same espionage charges, there is no question that Israel was engaged -- again -- in espionage, seeking access to U.S. defense secrets, and that the role and identities of the Israeli spy-handlers are known and proven.

On May 26, 2005, Larry Franklin was indicted on charges of passing classified material to Israel. In a superceding indictment, filed on Aug. 4, 2005, Steve Rosen and Keith Weissman were also charged. While not naming names, the indictment identified at least three Israelis who were co-conspirators with the AIPAC duo and Franklin, in obtaining classified material from the Pentagon, on the Bush Administration's internal deliberations on how to deal with presumed threats from Iran...

The three Israelis targeted in the Franklin/AIPAC probe were: Uzi Arad, Naor Gilon, and Eran Lerman. All three are intimately tied to Benjamin Netanyahu; two of the three now hold top national security and foreign policy posts in the Netanyahu government. Arad is the chief national security advisor to the prime minister, and Gilon is the chief of staff to Foreign Minister Lieberman. The third implicated Israeli, Eran Lerman, is the director of the American Jewish Committee's Israel/Middle East Office in Jerusalem."

-- Jeffrey Steinberg

UPDATE: As of late 2010, Steve Rosen is suing AIPAC for defamation, alleging that the staffers were porn freaks that "regularly trafficked in classified US government information". Sounds like business as usual.