Pollards ask Israel to take responsibility
January 2nd, 2009 From
>Date: Thu, 30 Oct 1997 14:57:19 -0800
>From: Mike Potter
>Organization: Artecon, Inc.
>X-Mailer: Mozilla 3.01Gold (WinNT; I)
>To: mahan@microworks.net
>Subject: Pollards ask Israel to take responsibility
>Precendence: bulk
>Sender: mahan-owner@microworks.net
>Reply-To: mahan@microworks.net
>
>[Suppose the Israeli government takes responsibility for Pollard’s
>actions: would they then find it easier also to take responsibility for
>attacking USS =Liberty= as a known US asset?]
>
>Convicted spy makes plea to Israel
>__________________________________________________________________________
> Copyright © 1997 Nando.net
> Copyright © 1997 The Associated Press
>
> JERUSALEM (October 29, 1997 08:22 a.m. EST http://www.nando.net) —
>Convicted spy Jonathan Pollard asked Israel’s Supreme Court on Wednesday
>to force the government to acknowledge him as its agent, taking
>responsibility for his espionage against America.
> Israeli leaders have maintained that Pollard, a former U.S. Navy
>intelligence analyst, passed secret U.S. military documents to Israel in
>the mid-1980s without official Israeli sanction.
> During Wednesday’s closed-door hearing, a three-judge panel ordered
>the government to grant Pollard’s wife meetings with senior security
>officials during the next two months, then return for another hearing.
> “The government seems to be beginning to realize that it’s got to
>deal with this,” Esther Pollard told reporters outside the court.
> Pollard’s lawyer, Larry Dub, said an Israeli acknowledgment that
>Pollard was an agent could clear the way for his client’s release.
>Pollard has served 13 years of a life term in a U.S. prison.
> “There is a price to be paid for the release of Jonathan Pollard,”
>Dub said. “The first installment on the price is the admission that
>Jonathan Pollard is an agent. The Americans are waiting for the Israelis
>to come clean, and to tell the truth.”
> President Clinton rejected a clemency plea by Pollard in 1996, citing
>the enormity of his crime, his lack of remorse and the damage he caused
>to U.S. security.
> Pollard has complained that Israel abandoned him, and that Israeli
>leaders, including Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, have done nothing
>to press for his release, despite many promises.
> He reiterated the complaints in tape-recorded telephone conversation
>that his wife played back for The Associated Press. In it, Pollard cited
>the prisoner releases with which Israel won the freedom of two Israeli
>agents captured after a bungled attack in Jordan last month.
> Israel “got them out in a couple of days, these guys, these two
>agents. They didn’t have to rot for years in a foreign prison,” Pollard
>said.
>
> AP-ES-10-29-97 0755EST