Grant F. Smith: How big is the Lobby and what does it do? An overview of the 501(c) universe.

The following is a presentation made at the 2015 Israel Lobby Con held at the National Press Club.

Grant F. Smith is the director of the Institute for Research: Middle Eastern Policy (IRmep) in Washington, DC. He is the author of two unofficial histories about the American Israel Public Affairs Committee–America’s Defense Line: The Justice Department’s Battle to Register the Israel Lobby as Agents of a Foreign Government and Foreign Agents: AIPAC from the 1963 Fulbright Hearings to the 2005 Espionage Scandal.  Smith is also the author of the books Divert!, Spy Trade, Deadly Dogma and Visa Denied, and editor of the book Neocon Middle East Policy. 

Jeff Stein of The Washington Post designated Smith “a Washington, DC author who has made a career out of writing critical books on Israeli spying and lobbying.” Nathan Guttman of The Jewish Daily Forward recognizes Smith as leading a public effort to “call attention of the authorities to AIPAC’s activity and [demand] public scrutiny of the group’s legal status.”

Smith has initiated lawsuits against the Department of Defense and Central Intelligence Agency under the Freedom of Information Act for public release of files officially acknowledging Israel’s clandestine nuclear weapons program and unprosecuted weapons-grade uranium diversions from the United States.

Since 2015 the annual IsraelLobbyCon conference series at the National Press Club explores the latest research, innovations and tactics for countering the Israel lobby’s damaging policies in the U.S. and around the globe.

The conference is solely sponsored by the American Educational Trust, publisher of the Washington Report on Middle East Affairs, and the Institute for Research: Middle Eastern Policy (IRmep).