NJ Jewish News | Cipel denies McGreevey’s account of relationship, accuses NJ Jews of abandoning him in ‘time of need’

by Gil Hoffman
NJJN Israel Correspondent

Sidebar Article: Cipel blames McGreevey for homeland security scandal

JERUSALEM — Responding to a new book by James E. McGreevey, the Israeli who served as the former governor’s homeland security adviser vigorously denied having a sexual relationship with McGreevey.

In an exclusive interview Tuesday with New Jersey Jewish News, Golan Cipel said he decided to tell his side to the newspaper because he wanted to clear his name in the NJ Jewish community that he once served as a liaison representing McGreevey.

Cipel also expressed disappointment with members of the state’s Jewish community for seeming to believe McGreevey’s account of their relationship and for not offering him a helping hand in the wake of the scandal.

“I was part of the NJ Jewish community, and I helped a lot of people, and in my time of need, they turned their back on me,” Cipel said. “I love the Jews of New Jersey but their silence was very painful for me. I didn’t get one call from rabbis, friends, or people in the [Jewish] federations asking me for my side of the story or offering help. No one said, ‘Maybe Golan is right.’”

In his memoir, The Confession, McGreevey offers details of what he describes as a consensual relationship with Cipel that began after the two met during a trip to Israel.

As he has done in a handful of interviews since McGreevey’s resignation, Cipel insisted that he was harassed sexually by the former governor.

“The release of McGreevey’s book is the unfortunate reason why I feel I must speak, because nearly everything in that book that pertains to me and my relationship with him is a complete fabrication,” Cipel said. “It deserves to become the first memoir in history to be sold in the fiction section of bookstores. McGreevey spun a tale about his struggle to come out of the closet as a gay man and his realization that he could no longer run from himself. But the reality is that this was never an issue of sexual orientation or a secret romance. The fact is that I was the victim of several sexual assaults and ongoing sexual harassment by Jim McGreevey.”

Cipel said he had no problem with homosexuality but that he is heterosexual and is seeking “a nice American-Jewish bride.” He said none of McGreevey’s stories about the two of them going on weekend excursions were true.

Cipel and McGreevey met when McGreevey visited Israel as part of a federation-sponsored New Jersey Mega Mission, when he was still mayor of Woodbridge and Cipel worked as a spokesman for the city of Rishon Letzion. McGreevey asked Cipel to join his election campaign team and after his victory, and to stay on as an adviser.

In the book, McGreevey writes that their first sexual encounter came in December 2001 at McGreevey’s condo, at a time when McGreevey was trying to find an appropriate position for the Israeli national in his administration. McGreevey describes Cipel’s response to his overtures as “immediate and loving,” after which he “spent as much free time as I could with Golan.”

Cipel tells a very different story, describing three incidents in which he rebuffed McGreevey’s aggressive advances. The first incident took place at McGreevey’s Woodbridge home after the election, said Cipel. When McGreevey’s pregnant wife, Dina Matos McGreevey, was in the hospital, McGreevey asked Cipel to go to a local bar with him, said Cipel.

“I was very surprised,” Cipel recalled. “It was fairly late at night, and I didn’t think it was appropriate for a governor to go to a bar at that time of day — if at all. I expressed my concern that drinking in a bar might damage his reputation for a number of reasons, not the least of which was that his wife was in the hospital at the time expecting the birth of their first child.”

Cipel said he reluctantly agreed to drive him to the bar but did not drink much because he does not like beer. McGreevey had two beers and bought a bottle of Jägermeister liqueur. When they returned to McGreevey’s house, said Cipel, the two discussed politics while McGreevey drank and Cipel refused offers of liquor shots. When Cipel said he was tired and asked to go home, McGreevey told him that he needed to show him something work-related upstairs.

“He started toward the den when suddenly he turned very abruptly and pushed me extremely hard into his bedroom and toward his bed,” Cipel said. “I was in shock, and I froze in disbelief. I asked him, ‘What are you doing?!’ With both his hands on my chest he pushed me back onto the bed and jumped on top of me, trying to pin me to the bed and kiss me. We wrestled, and then he just stopped. He got off the bed and was standing on one side of the room while I stood on the other. I was in total shock. I never imagined something like this could happen, had never even prepared myself for the possibility.”

When Cipel asked McGreevey why he thought he, Cipel, was gay, the governor replied, “Everyone’s a little bit gay.” Cipel decided to continue working for him, dismissing the incident as a one-time thing that happened because McGreevey was drunk and would not be repeated. McGreevey later apologized and Cipel promised not to tell anyone, according to Cipel.

The second incident occurred after McGreevey had broken his leg and was confined to a bed in his living room. Cipel’s wife and another male aide went to the kitchen and left the two men alone with McGreevey’s infant daughter.

Cipel said McGreevey proceeded to expose himself. “I was shocked and appalled, to say the least. I incredulously asked him, ‘What are you doing?! Your baby is right here in the room, and your wife is in the kitchen! What’s wrong with you?!’ He didn’t stop. He leered at me with a crazed look in his eyes, moaning and continuing to touch himself. He patted the bed with his palm and said, ‘Come sit next to me,’ and I immediately said I was leaving.”

According to Cipel, McGreevey tried to kiss him when he returned to the room but Cipel rejected the advance. Cipel then called McGreevey “a very sick man.” But he again decided to ignore the problem and hoped it would go away, fearing that he would not be able to get another visa to remain in the country and that McGreevey would try to harm him to protect his own career.

An overnight drive

The final incident took place, according to Cipel, during an overnight drive with state troopers to Washington, DC, after both McGreevey and Cipel had fallen asleep.

“All of a sudden I felt someone was pulling on my right leg,” Cipel recalled. Again McGreevey exposed himself, he said. “I quickly pulled my leg away, and then he grabbed my left leg and began to pull it toward him. I looked up at the troopers, but they appeared to be concentrating on the road and didn’t seem to be aware of what was going on. I lifted my leg and I aimed it toward McGreevey’s head. At that moment I was ready to kick him in the throat, but then he recoiled and crawled away to the far corner of the van.”

Cipel said that when he met McGreevey in Israel, he did not suspect him of being gay because his wife was pregnant. He said McGreevey would often talk about heterosexual sex and ask personal questions about the women Cipel dated.

Looking back on his decision to leave Israel to join McGreevey’s campaign, Cipel said he now believes he made a big mistake. He said he was naive and he should have found it odd that a candidate for governor of New Jersey was taking such an interest in him.

“Only after the whole thing happened did I realize that he marked me as a target,” Cipel said. “Everything he did after that was to gain my confidence and convince me to trust him and to be dependent on him for him to be able to attack me. It was the beginning of the web that he put around me.”

Cipel resigned on Aug. 14, 2002, after critics began challenging his qualifications as homeland security adviser. He then worked for a series of lobbying firms.

In his book, McGreevey writes that Golan threatened to go Golan Cipel public with their affair and to sue for sexual assault and harassment because McGreevey would not find him a position in the Statehouse: “Golan would go public, on fantastically trumped-up charges, or try to extort a fortune from me to keep him quiet. Either way, since he could no longer be a part of my administration, apparently he decided to burn it to the ground.”

Adds McGreevey: “I had never committed any sexual assault or harassment — this was only a love affair I never should have allowed myself, in a world that wouldn’t understand it, with a man who was betraying me.”

After McGreevey revealed in an August 2004 press conference that he was gay, law enforcement officials and the press began investigating revelations from the McGreevey camp that Cipel and his lawyers were seeking a financial settlement in return for his silence on the affair McGreevey called consensual and Cipel called sexual harassment.

Cipel said he returned to Israel to defend his family from the media swarm around their Rishon Letzion home. He had intended to return to the United States but stayed at the request of his family after he received a threat in the mail.

“Watch your back, we are here and we know where to find you — Jim’s buddies,” the letter read.

Cipel still lives in Israel, where he works as a consultant. He has embarked on an effort to clear his name while McGreevey is on a highly publicized book tour.

Cipel recalled a conversation with McGreevey about politicians involved in scandals.

“He said the way for a politician to handle a scandal was to face the public and ask for their” forgiveness, Cipel said. “When I said that was not enough, he said, ‘You don’t know the American people. They are very forgiving and have a soft heart.’ When I asked about the media, he said all you have to do is give them the ‘best show in town.’ That’s what he is doing with his book.”

Cipel said he was afraid that McGreevey’s book tour was his first step toward a return to politics. He accused Larry King, Oprah Winfrey, and politicians of making McGreevey look like a hero instead of the coward he thinks McGreevey is.

“He wants to get back into public life, because he needs to see people applauding him,” Cipel said. “I love America and the American people, and I think they will wake up eventually and see the truth. I don’t think they are as naive as McGreevey thinks they are. There should be zero tolerance for politicians getting away with such things. Only then will politicians like McGreevey not be able to rehabilitate their name.”

JERUSALEM — The scandal that erupted over former Gov. James McGreevey’s appointment of Golan Cipel as his homeland security adviser was all McGreevey’s fault, Cipel charged in an interview on Tuesday with NJ Jewish News.

Cipel resigned on Aug. 14, 2002, after reporters and lawmakers asked why he had not been subjected to a background check and, as an Israeli citizen, was unable to obtain clearance to see classified information from the federal government.

McGreevey caused the scandal, Cipel said, by misrepresenting his responsibilities in an effort to justify his hiring and make it look like the governor was taking steps to prevent terrorist attacks.

“The governor. bragged about me in an interview with the Bergen Record editorial board,” Cipel said. “He lied about my qualifications and inflated my responsibilities because he wanted the media to believe I had a role in the administration.”

Cipel said he had no intention of working for McGreevey beyond the election campaign. He said he told the newly elected governor that he had an offer to work for a private company and that it was a good opportunity but McGreevey would not let him leave.

“He said, ‘You are staying with me,’” Cipel recalled. “I asked how he could appoint me, and he said he could appoint whoever he wanted. He was drunk with power.”

At first Cipel was to serve as a counselor for long-term projects and as a liaison to the Jewish community. McGreevey later asked him to add homeland security to his responsibilities. When Cipel informed him that he was only a lieutenant in the Israeli navy and not an expert on anything, McGreevey said he would only act as a liaison to military officials and coordinate the governor’s visits to army bases, according to Cipel.

Cipel said he was never privy to confidential materials or expected to be involved in preventing terrorist attacks. He said the real person in charge of homeland security was Kathy Flicker, whose title was assistant attorney general in charge of the Office of Counter-Terrorism.

“I was never the security czar,” Cipel said. “I am not a security or terrorism expert. I regret taking the job. But McGreevey asked for my help, and when you ask an Israeli for help, they say yes.”

Cipel said he was shocked when McGreevey presented him as a security expert on a visit to the Record editorial board. He said that when the scandal broke, McGreevey insisted on doing all the talking and did not let Cipel defend himself.

“He lied to the press about me, and I just sat there as the guy hurt my career and ruined my life,” Cipel said. “I told him to correct The New York Times when they wrote that I was a security expert. He didn’t let me explain what my experience was. He said he ‘handled bigger things than the Golan Cipel crisis’ and that ‘we are going to win [against the media] because we are smarter than they are.’ I said lying is the wrong way.”

In his version of the story, McGreevey writes that he agreed to the Record interview to defend his appointment of Cipel. He acknowledges that he did not want Cipel to talk with reporters lest they “trick him into disclosing our secret.”

McGreevey writes that he now regrets what he said during the interview and for calling Cipel his “security adviser” in previous interviews. “What I should have done was tell the truth about Golan’s job, that as my senior counselor he advised me on a broad range of matters, including security policy. ‘Golan is just another pair of eyes on policy,’ I should have said. But saying that would have required me to retract my earlier braggadocio to the Record, and my ego rejected that.”

Cipel charges unnamed people who worked for the New Jersey media with anti-Semitism. He said the media made a point of always mentioning his $110,000 salary.

“When the media mentioned my salary, they wrote Israeli and meant Jew,” Cipel said.

Cipel said he did not see himself as an Israeli but as an American immigrant. He compared himself to Martin Indyk, an Australian immigrant who rose to become undersecretary of state and ambassador to Israel.

When McGreevey revealed in an August 2004 press conference that he was gay, he called himself “a gay American.” Cipel said McGreevey’s goal was to emphasize that Cipel was an Israeli and a foreigner and to appeal to Americans, who are against foreigners and Israelis.

“He is an actor,” Cipel said. “I was with him when he was trained to speak that way. I know how he works and how he speaks. He is repeating his messages, but that doesn’t mean they are true.”

— GIL HOFFMAN