The U.S. Justice Department is expected to file indictments against two former senior American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) staffers – Steve Rosen and Keith Weissman.
According to sources in Washington, the charges against them will be subsumed under the Espionage Act.
Both are likely to be accused of receiving classified defense information from Larry Franklin, a Pentagon official, and transferring them to the representative of a foreign country, Naor Gilon, of the Israeli embassy.
A Virginia grand jury is now examining the evidence in the case.
The classified material in question involves information about Iranian intentions to harm American soldiers in Iraq.
The fact that Rosen and Weissman, as American citizens, handed information to an official representative of a foreign power while knowing it was classified is incriminating under the 1917 Espionage Act.
