Israel conducts extensive espionage against the United States. According to the General Accounting Office, the Jewish state “conducts the most aggressive espionage operations against the United States of any ally.”

Stealing economic secrets gives Israeli firms important advantages over American businesses in the global marketplace. This imposes additional costs on US citizens.

More worrying are Israel continued efforts to steal America military secrets. The infamous case is Jonathan Pollard. He was an American intelligence analyst. He gave Israel large quantities of highly classified material between 1984 and 1985. After Pollard was caught, Israelis refused to tell the United States what Pollard gave them.

The Pollard case is just most visible tip of a larger iceberg. Israeli agents tried to steal spy-camera technology from a US firm in 1986. An arbitration panel later accused Israel of “perfidious,” “unlawful,” and “surreptitious” conduct. It ordered Israel to pay the firm, Recon/Optical Inc., some $3 million in damages.

Israeli spies also gained access to confidential US information about a Pentagon electronic intelligence program. And they tried unsuccessfully to recruit Noel Koch, a senior counterterrorism official in the Defense Department.

The Wall Street Journal quoted John Davitt, former head of Justice Department internal security section. He said “those of us who worked in the espionage area regarded Israel as being the second most active foreign intelligence service in the United States.”

A new controversy erupted in 2004. A key Pentagon official, Larry Franklin, was arrested on charges of passing classified information regarding US policy toward Iran to an Israeli diplomat. This was allegedly with assistance of two senior AIPAC officials, Steven Rosen and Keith Weissman. Franklin eventually accepted a plea bargain and was sentenced to twelve years in prison. Rosen and Weissman were scheduled to go on trial in fall of 2007.

The close relationship between Washington and Jerusalem has made it easier for Israel to steal American secrets. Israel has not hesitated to do just that. At the very least, Israel willingness to spy on its principal patron casts further doubt on its overall strategic value.

Source: The Israel Lobby and U.S. Foreign Policy