Editing AIPAC (section)

====Spying allegations====
{{Main|Lawrence Franklin espionage scandal|United States v. Franklin}}

In April 2005, AIPAC policy director [[Steve J. Rosen|Steven Rosen]] and AIPAC senior Iran analyst [[Keith Weissman]] were fired by AIPAC amid an [[Federal Bureau of Investigation|FBI]] investigation into whether they passed classified U.S. information received from [[Lawrence Franklin]] on to the government of Israel. They were later indicted for illegally conspiring to gather and disclose classified national security information to Israel.<ref>[https://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A6059-2005Apr20.html "2 Senior AIPAC Employees Ousted"], ''[[The Washington Post]]'', April 21, 2005</ref><ref>Ticker, Bruce. [http://www.pjvoice.com/v3/004aipac.html AIPAC Charges Offer Opportunity], ''[[Philadelphia Jewish Voice]]'', September 2005. Accessed March 27, 2006.</ref> AIPAC agreed to pay the legal fees for Weissman's defense through appeal if necessary.<ref>{{Cite web |title=U.S. to drop Israel lobbyist spy case.. |url=https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2009/5/1/726928/- |access-date=2024-04-05 |website=Daily Kos |language=en}}</ref>

In May 2005, the [[United States Department of Justice|Justice Department]] announced that [[Larry Franklin|Lawrence Anthony Franklin]], a U.S. Air Force Reserves colonel working as a Department of Defense analyst at the Pentagon in the office of [[Douglas Feith]], had been arrested and charged by the FBI with providing classified national defense information to Israel. The six-count criminal complaint identified AIPAC by name and described a luncheon meeting in which, allegedly, Franklin disclosed top-secret information to two AIPAC officials.<ref name=rozen>Rozen, Laura and Vest, Jason. [http://www.prospect.org/web/page.ww?section=root&name=ViewPrint&articleId=8764 Cloak and Swagger] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070415230043/http://www.prospect.org/web/page.ww?section=root&name=ViewPrint&articleId=8764 |date=April 15, 2007 }}, ''[[The American Prospect]]'', November 2, 2004.  Accessed March 27, 2006.</ref><ref>[https://fas.org/sgp/jud/aipac/franklin_facts.pdf "United States District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, Alexandria Division, ''U.S. v. Lawrence Anthony Franklin''{{-"}}],</ref>

Franklin pleaded guilty to passing government secrets to Rosen and Weissman and revealed for the first time that he also gave classified information directly to an Israeli government official in Washington. On January 20, 2006, he was sentenced to 151 months (almost 13 years) in prison and fined $10,000. As part of the plea agreement, Franklin agreed to cooperate in the larger federal investigation. All charges against the former AIPAC employees were dropped in 2009.<ref>{{Cite web |title=U.S. to drop Israel lobbyist spy case |website=[[Reuters]] |url=https://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE540463/ |access-date=2024-04-05}}</ref>