|
|
August 20, 2004/Elul 3 5764, Vol. 56, No.48
Questions remain in McGreevey resignation
RON KAMPEAS
Jewish Telegraphic Agency
WASHINGTON - Golan Cipel is the petty officer who said he fought terrorists while in the Israeli army, the Israeli Consulate information officer who called himself a counter-terrorism specialist, the homeland security honcho who couldn't get security clearance.
Now that people close to New Jersey Gov. James McGreevey have identified the Israeli as the gay lover who brought the governor down, Cipel is saying he is neither gay nor a lover to McGreevey.
The Democratic governor's apparent relationship with Cipel, who served for a time as McGreevey's liaison to the Jewish community, led to the governor's admission last week that he is gay - and to his resignation.
McGreevey admitted to a relationship with a man, but did not go into details; staff members have named Cipel.
"I realize the fact of this affair and my own sexuality, if kept secret, leaves me, and most importantly the governor's office, vulnerable to rumors, false allegations and threats of disclosure," Mc-Greevey said at a televised news conference announcing his resignation on Aug. 12. "So I am removing these threats by telling you directly about my sexuality."
In an interview this weekend with the Israeli daily Yediot Achronot, Cipel, 35, vigorously denied a consensual affair with the 47-year-old governor.
"It doesn't bother me that it is said I am gay, but I really am not, I'm straight," Cipel said. "He hit on me over and over. It got to a point where I was afraid to stay with him alone."
On Aug. 17, Cipel arrived home in Israel.
"I have come to Israel to be with my family at this time," Cipel told reporters.
Later he released a statement saying he would return to the United States in a few weeks "to make sure justice will come to light."
It's not the first time in his career that Cipel has been at the center of contradictory accounts, nor is it the first time that such accounts rocked McGreevey's administration.
Much of the murkiness had to do with Cipel's experience with the Israeli military and later with the foreign service.
Cipel was dogged by controversy within weeks of his appointment in January 2002 as homeland security adviser by the just-installed McGreevey administration.
The substantial experience in public security the Mc-Greevey administration attributed to Cipel appeared on closer look to be at best inflated, according to investigative reporting in 2002 for Gannett's New Jersey newspapers and the daily Ha'aretz in Israel.
Among other presumed qualifications cited by Gannett reporter Sandy McClure in a letter from McGreevey's chief counsel to the immigration service were his experience as chief information officer at the New York Consulate General.
In fact, he dealt with the media and was never involved in anything related to ter-rorism, then-consul general Colette Avital said, according to the newspaper investi-gations.
"As a Naval officer in the Israel Defense Force, Mr. Cipel functioned as a special operations officer and was appointed as media adviser, disseminating data on military operations and anti-terrorism measures to the media while insuring that sensitive information was not disclosed," the letter said.
Cipel indeed served in the Navy, Melman told JTA, but the "media adviser" des-cription ap-parently re-ferred to his reserve duty on the home-land, which, according to Melman, is "basically considered one of the lowest commands in the Israeli general staff."
When the investigation came to light, Republicans and some Democrats were soon on the warpath.
"He wasn't going to be able to pass the simplest of four-way background checks to be a state trooper," Guy Gregg, a Republican state assemblyman, said at the time.
Cipel resigned his position with the McGreevey govern-ment in August 2002.
McGreevey's friend and campaign donor Charles Kushner - himself now the target of a federal in-vestigation involving alleged blackmail - helped find Cipel work.
He went through a quick round of highly paid public relations jobs. He lost them, reportedly, because he kept failing to turn up for work.
The contradictory ac-counts of Cipel's career continue to pile up. McGreevey's staff accuse Cipel of trying to extort as much as $50 million from the governor, according to news reports.
Cipel could not be reached for comment.
Washington correspondent Matthew E. Berger, New York staff writer Rachel Pomerance and Jerusalem correspondent Dina Kraft contributed to this report.
|
|
