$68 billion Israel aid fraud: Espionage Allegations Intensify Battle for Israel’s Technion Nuke File

11/21/2014 IRmep v DoD in court today over nuke cover-up

Espionage Allegations Intensify Battle for Israel’s Technion Nuke File

Is the Justice Department Obstructing Justice?

Israel’s oldest university – Technion – is under an intensifying legal spotlight over stunning new allegations of espionage and a transparency-law fight to reveal its clandestine role in nuclear weapons development. According to information made public in a civil harassment suit filed on November 13, 2014 in the Superior Court of the State of California for the County of Los Angeles an Israeli scientist transferred information to Technion – Israel Institute of Technology in violation of the Arms Export Control Act from the Jet Propulsion Lab at the University of California Los Angeles. According to court filings, Dr. Amir Gat – an Israeli national – executed a Technology Control Plan (TCP) under the International Traffic in Arms Regulations (ITAR) registration in order to participate in the U.S. taxpayer-funded JPL “Electrospray” space propulsion project at UCLA. The TCP obligates signers not to disclose ITAR – restricted technical data to foreign persons or countries without prior approval from the US State Department. Failure to comply is supposed to trigger criminal fines and penalties.... Adding insult to the “failure to prosecute” injury, the Justice Department is also vigorously fighting a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit filed in September in the District of Columbia Federal Court aimed at publicly releasing that “Current Technology Issues in Israel” report on Technion and other Israeli nuclear proliferators. Since 2003, Technion has received tax-exempt funding from US donors averaging $87 million annually, despite the fact that overseas nuclear weapons programs and espionage against US facilities do not fit any IRS definition of a “social welfare” charity. Under the Symington and Glenn Amendments to the US Foreign Aid Act, Israel should have been ineligible to receive any of the $82 billion in US taxpayer-funded foreign aid delivered since 1987 when it was found to be operating a clandestine weapons program outside the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty. On November 19 Justice Department lawyer Laura Jennings revealed defendants will use all available tactics to delay (PDF) and possibly thwart public disclosure including claiming “perpetual non-disclosure agreements” were signed during development of the 1987 report. The legal tactic has been recently employed to prohibit open government law attempts to obtain public release of information about law enforcement agency use of so-called “stingrays” and “dirt boxes” to mass intercept cell phone transmissions. More

10/28/2014

Lawsuit spotlights U.S. charities that fund Israel's secret nuclear weapons program

WASHINGTON, October 28, 2014 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- A federal lawsuit seeks immediate release of a closely held government report about how American branches of Israeli charitable and educational institutes fund secret nuclear weapons research and development programs. An unclassified 1987 study conducted for the Department of Defense titled "Current Technology Issues in Israel" discovered Technion University technicians developing nuclear missile re-entry vehicles and working at the Dimona nuclear weapons production facility. Hebrew University computer scientists working at the Soreq nuclear facilities were "developing the kind of codes which will enable them to make hydrogen bombs." Israel's Weizmann Institute "studied high energy physics and hydrodynamics needed for nuclear bomb design, and worked on lasers to enrich uranium, the most advanced method for making the material dropped on Hiroshima in 1945" say sources attributed to the report cited in the lawsuit. IRmep filed suit for the report in the DC District Court as part of a public-interest drive to obtain long overdue enforcement of the Symington and Glenn Amendments to the Foreign Assistance Act. The laws prohibit U.S. foreign aid to nuclear weapons states such as Israel that are not signatories to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. A recent Google Consumer Survey (PDF) reveals that despite longstanding Israeli and US government gag orders on publicly discussing the arsenal, 63.9 percent of Americans now believe Israel possesses nuclear weapons. 60.7 percent of Americans oppose sending the largest share (9 percent) of the U.S. foreign aid budget to Israel. Israel's Weizmann Institute, Technion, and Hebrew University raise substantial tax-exempt charitable funding through affiliates in the United States creating a "tax gap" that must be financed by individual American taxpayers. According to their most recent IRS filings, American branches of the three organizations raise a combined $172 million in annual U.S. tax-exempt funding. IRmep's "request for determination" filings with the IRS reveal that secret foreign nuclear weapons development has no recognized U.S. tax-deductible "social welfare" purpose. Defendants Department of Defense, the DC US Attorney Office and Attorney General have until October 30 to respond to IRmep's public interest lawsuit demanding release of the explosive report. The Center for Policy and Law Enforcement is a unit of the Institute for Research: Middle Eastern Policy in Washington. Inquiries about the lawsuit or opinion poll results may be directed to Grant F. Smith at info@IRmep.org or 202-342-7325. Download lawsuit (PDF) Lawsuit news release Scott Horton Show interview on what's at stake in the lawsuit. New

Source irmep.org