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The
spy who loved me – and Israel By
Anthony C. LoBaido Jonathan
Pollard – who has spent 16 years in a U.S. prison for spying for Israel,
and whose release has for years been a political football with the U.S.
and Israeli governments – is in seriously declining health, according to
his wife, Esther Pollard. "Jonathan's
immune system had been destroyed by his years in solitary and his
protracted incarceration under harsh conditions," Mrs. Pollard told
WND. As a result, she said, her husband suffers from high blood pressure,
digestive and muscular disorders, growths in his sinus cavities, severe
chronic headaches, nausea, vertigo, sinusitis, recurrent infections,
severe gall-bladder attacks and severe chronic arthritis, serious back and
disk problems, as well as early signs of glaucoma and diabetes. The
Pollard spy case, one of the most celebrated of the 20th century, never
fails to touch off a firestorm between supporters and detractors: ·
During the 1998 Wye Plantation Mideast conference, then-President
Clinton promised Israeli leaders he would carefully reconsider clemency
for Pollard. ·
In the 2000 Senate race in New York, both Democrat Hillary Clinton
and Republican challenger Rick Lazio stated that they would look into
getting Pollard released from prison. Famed Harvard law professor Alan
Dershowitz even took up Pollard's case for a time in the early 1990s. ·
Successive Israeli prime ministers have tried to get Pollard –
the harshness of whose sentence is unprecedented among those convicted of
spying for an ally – released from the prison in Butner, N.C., where he
is incarcerated. ·
Pollard's case has been the recurring focus of pleas for clemency
in Israel and among U.S. Jewish groups. A consortium of 55 Jewish groups
– The Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations
– called publicly for Pollard's release, claiming his spying didn't
amount to treason since Israel is a long-time close ally. Religious
organizations, including the Reform Union of American Hebrew Congregations
and the Orthodox Union, have also called for an end to Pollard's
incarceration. But
then there's the other side. ·
Rep. Porter Goss, R-Fla., a former CIA agent who is chairman of the
House Select Committee on Intelligence, authored an unprecedented House
resolution urging that Pollard never be freed, saying: "He is one of
the worst traitors in our nation's history. There is absolutely no reason
to let this guy out of jail. None." ·
When Clinton promised to review Pollard's case, CIA Director George
Tenet threatened to resign in protest, claiming it would "demoralize
the intelligence community." ·
Attorney Joseph diGenova, who prosecuted Pollard, told "This
Week with Sam Donaldson and Cokie Roberts" back in October of 1998:
"Pollard ranks among the four most serious cases of national security
damage in the history of this country. Nothing matches what he did in
terms of the compromise of the technical intelligence capability of this
country, and he put at risk human lives." Who
is Jonathan Pollard? Is he, as many Israeli and American Jews believe, a
faithful Jew who risked all to save the women and children of Israel when
the American intelligence community, inexplicably and perhaps illegally,
was intent on denying Israel information about Saddam's
weapons of mass destruction – intended to destroy Israel? Is
he the traitor that Goss, Tenet, diGenova and other U.S. officials claim
him to be? Or
is Pollard a much more complex character, filled with both dark and light
– a man whose acts of espionage, though illegal, were understandable in
the context of the Middle East strategic reality at the time? No
matter what one chooses to believe when considering the universe that is
the Jonathan Pollard spy case, there can be no doubt that it is filled
with adventure, cloak-and-dagger mystery, multiple betrayals and
international intrigue. Add to that a lost romance of childhood days
rekindled. Regarding
the latter, there can be no doubt that Pollard's second wife, Esther -–
a Jewish-Canadian school teacher formerly known as Elaine Zeitz -– is
his staunchest advocate and ally. "Yes,
Jonathan broke the law. But I wonder if you are aware that the
'unforgivable' crime that Jonathan committed was his warning Israel about Saddam
Hussein's plans to scorch the Jewish state. Yet his sentencing does
not match the indictment. He was not allowed to challenge the agreements
made in secret. No other man has been so betrayed and so slandered. It
would never dawn on Jonathan to betray others." The
indictment against Pollard charged him with violating 18 USC Section 794c,
the federal law that makes it a crime to deliver defense information to a
foreign government "with intent or reason to believe" that the
information is to be used in one of two ways: "to the injury of the
United States," or alternatively, "to the advantage of a foreign
nation." The
spy who loved me
"Jonathan
and I knew each other as kids back in 1971," Mrs. Pollard told WND.
"We attended a youth camp in Israel in the summer. There we discussed
our mutual love for Israel. But he went back to America and I went back to
Canada and we forgot each other." Years
later, while teaching English at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem,
"through a strange series of events I came into possession of an old
newspaper which was given to me by a woman I had only recently met,"
said Esther. "I put the newspaper in my backpack and then one day I
took a bus trip to Haifa. I had nothing else to read. "There
was an ad in this newspaper which spoke about Jonathan and his plight. I
always kept a lot of aerograms in my purse, and so I wrote him a letter.
At this time, I did not recognize him as my childhood friend from the
summer camp in Israel." After
returning to Canada, she said, "One day I received two envelopes in
the mail. One was with information on Jonathan's case, the other was a
personal letter from him. I read over the case information first, then the
personal letter. The personal letter was not bitter, but filled with love
for Israel, its land and people." After
meeting with Jonathan in prison between 1990 and 1991, they were married
in 1993 – in prison. "I
have no regrets about marrying him," she said. "I had never
lacked for male companionship, dates or attention from men, but I was
always lonely till I met Jonathan. And then that terrible emptiness in my
life ended. Despite a zillion and one hardships placed on us, including
all the privations of simple intimacies all couples enjoy – we can hold
hands only, and visits are an accumulation of points, so many for a
weekday or weekend – in spite of all of that, Jonathan has made me feel
like the most loved, valued and treasured woman in the world." Pollard's
health declines
"Jonathan
spent the first seven years in solitary confinement," says Esther of
her husband's 16-year confinement. "When he was finally moved in 1993
to open population prison in Butner, N.C., they wanted to study him
because they had never seen anyone do so much time in solitary and come
out so clear, so focused and so whole. Jonathan is a deeply religious
person and it is clear that God has been with him throughout this ordeal.
From the time that Jonathan originally entered USP Marion where he did the
bulk of his time in solitary confinement in a dungeon cell three stories
underground behind 13 locks and keys, he was constantly told that he would
never leave Marion alive. While he was in prison, the Mossad came to him
twice and said 'do the honorable thing and kill yourself.'" "But
Jonathan never accepted that, and he lived to prove them wrong. The plan
was for Jonathan to die in Marion during the first year. If he had died,
the U.S. would always have their boogeyman." Jonathan's
job in prison is cleaning toilets. But that was better than working with
chemicals that damaged his health in the past, said Esther. As
a result of his long incarceration, much of it under what she calls
"harsh conditions,' Esther Pollard says her husband's "immune
system had been destroyed." After
recounting a multitude of serious medical problems, Esther said simply,
"He is always sick." Unlike
other prisoners, Pollard cannot readily be transported to hospital
emergency centers during a medical crisis, said Esther. "Jonathan
cannot be moved without special permission from Washington, and only in
the company of a convoy of armed vehicles commanded by a heavily-armed,
bullet-proof jacketed SORT team," she told WorldNetDaily. "This
is fabulously expensive, so the prison is unwilling to seek the permission
from Washington even when it is appropriate. "Because
of his weakened immune system, medical problems simply keep occurring and
compounding each other. Time is running out. Jonathan simply does not have
the physical stamina anymore to survive endlessly in a system that does
not afford his physical body any respite or any real relief from the
numerous ailments he is suffering from." What
did Pollard do wrong?
The
stand taken by the pro-Pollard camp, according to his supporters and his official
website, is that, as a civilian American naval intelligence analyst in
1983-1984, he discovered that information he deemed vital to Israel's
security was being deliberately withheld by certain elements within the
U.S. national security establishment. Pollard and many other supporters of
Israel believe that the Jewish state was legally entitled to this vital
security information according to a 1983 Memorandum of Understanding
between the two countries. The information Pollard saw as being withheld
from Israel included Syrian, Iraqi, Libyan and Iranian nuclear, chemical
and biological warfare capabilities. Pollard feared that these weapons
were being developed for use against the Jewish state. It also included
information on ballistic missile development by these countries and
information on planned terrorist attacks against Israeli civilian targets.
When
Pollard discovered this suppression of information and asked his superiors
about it, he claims that he was told by his superiors to "mind his
own business," and that "Jews get nervous talking about poison
gas; they don't need to know." Pollard passed this information on to
Israeli intelligence. In
1985, the FBI caught up with Pollard. When he realized arrest was
imminent, he sought instructions from Israel. He was told to seek refuge
in the Israeli embassy in Washington. When Pollard and his former wife
turned up there, they were at first received and then thrown out into the
waiting arms of the FBI. At
the request of both the U.S. and Israeli governments, he entered into a
plea agreement, which spared both governments a long, difficult, expensive
and potentially embarrassing trial. Pollard fulfilled his end of the plea
agreement, cooperating fully with the prosecution. He even signed a
confession detailing the spying activities he carried out on behalf of
Israel. Perhaps
the biggest accusation of Pollard's wrongdoing stems from his stealing the
Radio Signals Notations manual or "RASIN" -- a staple of the
National Security Agency's satellite surveillance system -- and passing it
on to the Israelis. Israeli intelligence has been accused of passing on
that NSA data to the Russians back at the height of the Cold War in
exchange for Jewish "Refusenik" scientists held prisoner by the
former Soviet Union. Esther
Pollard claims RASIN was only a "frequency manual without the
encryption codes pertaining to the frequencies -- which my husband had no
access to and therefore could not and did not provide to Israel -- the
manual was virtually useless as a code-breaking instrument." The
former head of the KGB -- Vladmir Karyoshkov, a coup leader against
Gorbachev -- told the Israeli journal Ma'Ariv that the Soviets never
received any information from Pollard. The
RASIN manual was extremely important to the Israelis. And the U.S.
government, it appears, was outraged that Israeli intelligence would pass
it on to the Soviets in exchange for Refuseniks. At Pollard's sentencing,
the government admitted that it had officially provided a large portion of
this manual, about one third of it, to Israel. Later, when Adm. Bobby Ray
Inman and then-Defense Secretary Caspar Weinberger instituted an
undeclared intelligence embargo against Israel -- in the wake of the
Osirak strike in June of 1981 when Israeli fighter jets flew under Iraqi
radar and took out the nuclear reactor that would have given Saddam an
atomic bomb to use in Desert Storm -- two-thirds of these manuals that
Israel had officially been receiving were suddenly cut off without any
explanation. "From
the start of this affair, I never intended or agreed to spy against the
United States," Jonathan Pollard told U.S. District Court Judge
Aubrey Robinson Jr. in 1986, in a memorandum submitted prior to his
sentencing. Pollard
explained then that he had wished only to "to provide such
information on the Arab powers and the Soviets that would permit the
Israelis to avoid a repetition of the Yom Kippur War." He added:
"At no time did I ever compromise the names of any U.S. agents
operating overseas, nor did I ever reveal any U.S. ciphers, codes,
encipherment devices, classified military technology, the disposition and
orders of U.S. forces … or communications security procedures. I never
thought for a second that Israel's gain would necessarily result in
America's loss. How could it?" Pollard's
unusual sentencing
The
sentencing of Jonathan Pollard is another conundrum. Having waived his
right to a trial and confessed to his spying, Pollard and his attorneys
were shocked when then-Defense Secretary Caspar Weinberger showed up at
his sentencing in court at the 11th hour to submit the so-called
Weinberger memorandum. In
the heavily redacted version of the "memorandum" that has been
released, however, there appears the charge, for the first time, that
Pollard had endangered American lives. By disclosing to the Israelis
"sources and methods of information acquisition," Weinberger
asserted, Pollard "jeopardized ... the sources of that information,
by placing it outside of a U.S. controlled security environment." In
addition, "U.S. combat forces, wherever they are deployed in this
world, could be unacceptably endangered through successful exploitation of
this data. "This
top secret document was submitted to the sentencing judge at the last
moment. Pollard and his attorney saw the document for only moments before
sentencing, and were never given the opportunity to challenge it. Needless
to say, they believe this is unfair and a miscarriage of justice. "The
Weinberger memorandum charged Pollard with treason and recommended a life
sentence, which violated the plea bargain agreement Pollard and his
lawyers had set up with the U.S. Justice Department," says Esther
Pollard. On
March 3, 1987 – the day before Pollard was to be sentenced –
Weinberger submitted a supplemental declaration to the court, which
stated, in part: "It
is difficult for me, even in the so-called 'year of the spy,' to conceive
of a greater harm to national security than that caused by the defendant
in the view of the breadth, the critical importance to the U.S., and the
high sensitivity of the information he sold to Israel … I respectfully
submit that any U.S. citizen, and in particular a trusted government
official, who sells U.S. secrets to any foreign nation should not be
punished merely as a common criminal. Rather the punishment imposed should
reflect the perfidy of the individual's actions, the magnitude of the
treason committed, and the needs of national security." Much
of the document remains classified and unavailable to the public. Yet
Weinberger has gone on record saying that others have read the report and
discussed it. Who are these people and how did they get access to the
report? If they did, is this not a criminal breach of security and
intelligence? In
an interview with Middle East Quarterly published in late 1999, Weinberger
is quoted as saying, "Others seem to have seen it (the Weinberger
memorandum) and talk about it very freely; I don't." Says
Esther Pollard, "Government officials who have leaked information to
the media from the classified memorandum have in fact committed a criminal
offense. Yet, the government has never investigated or charged those
government sources who have done so, in spite of repeated requests by
Jonathan's attorney. Moreover, since the government has never allowed even
those with security clearance on the Pollard defense team to see the
Weinberger memorandum, there is no one in a position to rebut the vicious
leaks." "The
full document is in the hands of lawyers with redactions [blacked out
words and sentences]. It is not that difficult to reconstruct. The lawyers
got security clearance. Eliot Lauer said to the government, 'Let me go in
and read it. The government will trust us, there is no danger to national
security. The judge agreed. Both of our lawyers went to North Carolina to
the prison and talked about the Weinberger Memorandum with Jonathan to
discuss the document. They could do so because now they both had security
clearances. They were all blown away by how little [damaging evidence] was
actually in them. Jonathan said that there are two reasons why documents
are kept classified. One, they really do threaten national security. Two,
there is nothing there [within the documents]." Interestingly,
back in the mid-1980s, Weinberger reportedly thought the reason the CIA
agents in Russia were being assassinated was because of Pollard. However,
when Aldrich Ames was exposed, Pollard was cleared of that accusation. The
making of a spy
How
did Jonathan Pollard get his hands on the sensitive information he
admittedly passed on to Israel? By June 1984, Pollard worked in the
Anti-Terrorist Alert Center at Suitland, Md., in that unit's Threat
Analysis Division, which focused on intelligence concerning the Middle
East. Soon after his arrival at Suitland, however, Pollard was recruited
by Israeli intelligence. But not the Mossad. Rather, he worked for LAKAM,
the Hebrew acronym for the intelligence arm run by Israel's defense
ministry. "The
Mossad has a reputation for taking care of their own," Esther Pollard
told WorldNetDaily. "They turned on Jonathan because he embarrassed
them. He showed up the Mossad by getting intelligence that they should
have been getting. They were not doing their job [in finding out the true
extent of Saddam's weapons programs]." Pollard
was arrested in November 1985 along with his first wife, Anne, whom he had
married that same year. Convicted of unauthorized possession and
transmission of classified defense documents, Anne was given a five-year
sentence. "Their
marriage was having troubles to begin with [without the added stress of
the spy activities]," said Esther. "The incarceration hurt Anne.
Yet it also brought them closer together, but it could not make up for the
huge cracks in their relationship. Anne was not directly involved with
Jonathan's activities. Consider the case of [accused FBI agent-turned-spy
Robert] Hanssen. … Why isn't she [Hanssen's wife] on trial?" Esther
also told WorldNetDaily: "When Jonathan and Anne were both in prison,
the feds brought in horrendous Polaroid photos of Anne in pain in her
cell. They would say to Jonathan, 'If you don't tell us the name of an
accomplice' then she [Anne] won't get any medicine. They wanted Jonathan
to name names. Any name. The government did not care. They just wanted the
name of another Jew. Jonathan could not appeal his sentence until Anne was
out of jail." Pollard
and Israel The
state of Israel has granted Jonathan Pollard citizenship and accepted full
responsibility for him, now and in the future. Former Israeli Prime
Minister Benjamin Netanyahu went so far as to ask President Clinton to
release Pollard into his personal custody. Clinton
actually promised Israeli leaders he would free Pollard before leaving
office. Some believed Clinton had incentives for such a bold move. Pollard
was never charged with treason. Legally, treason refers to aiding or
abetting an enemy state in time of war. Pollard had helped a friend of the
United States and, his supporters say, not at the expense of the U.S. Some
say Clinton himself did much more to help enemies of the U.S. – at the
direct expense of U.S. national security. "This
is why Clinton lobbied hard to call China a 'strategic partner' of the
U.S.," Mossad intelligence officer Avi Rubin told WorldNetDaily.
"This was done to protect Clinton legally from a treason charge when
he sent the sensitive satellite, missile technology, warhead designs and
supercomputers to communist China during his time in office." Esther
Pollard reminds those who will listen that "Israel is an ally, not an
enemy of the United States." Pollard also confessed to his misdeeds
and expressed his remorse. "Again,
in concurrence with the results of intensive FBI polygraphing, Jonathan
Pollard was charged only with acting 'on behalf of Israel' and not against
the United States," says his wife. "Jonathan Pollard never had a
trial. He waived his right to a trial in return for a plea agreement which
the America government subsequently violated on every point, including the
life sentence." Political
football Why
then is Pollard still languishing in a North Carolina prison? Is his
sentence – an unprecedented life term for spying on behalf of Israel –
justified? Pollard was sent to prison in 1987, and for the first seven
years of his imprisonment he was kept in solitary confinement, three
stories below ground, in a basement cell. Why
has the Israeli government seemingly turned its back on Pollard? And is
there any hope to have the sentence commuted for Esther and Jonathan
Pollard? Will their new attorney, Larry Dub fare any better than the old
one, Moshe Kochanovsky? Esther
Pollard, whose health has been harmed by a recent bout with cancer, cites
an article, "Crime and Punishment," published April 3, 1998, in
the L.A. Jewish Journal, written by J.J. Goldberg. "This
article quotes sources in the Pentagon who explained to Goldberg that the
treatment of Jonathan Pollard was specifically contrived by the Joint
Chiefs of Staff to send a message to Israel and the American Jewish
community," she told WorldNetDaily. The
article states, among other things, that "high-ranking sources say
that it was the Joint Chiefs of Staff who urged the judge, through
then-Defense Secretary Caspar Weinberger, to ignore the plea agreement and
throw the book at Pollard. … Pollard is still in jail, these sources
say, not because his crime merits his lengthy sentence – it doesn't –
but because too many American Jews still haven't gotten the message."
Fighting
the odds How
does one wife, with little money at her disposal, take on the combined
might of the American and Israeli military-intelligence complex? Mrs.
Pollard told WorldNetDaily that she went to the top. "I
met the current Israeli prime minister, Ariel Sharon, when he was the
leader of the opposition. At that time," says Esther, "Sharon
promised to write a letter on behalf of Pollard, but to this day has
not." "I
am at a loss to understand this kind of attitude on the part of the
government of Israel. We are talking about a bona fide Israeli agent who
has done so much for Israel, including spending the last 16 years of his
life in an American prison on behalf of the Jewish state, and I, his wife,
have to plead for a meeting with the prime minister? Something is just not
right here." After
frantic negotiations in October of 1998, former Israeli Prime Minister
Benjamin Netanyahu appeared to have backed off from his refusal to sign a
peace deal unless he could take Pollard home with him. It was the kind of
hard-line political brinkmanship Netanyahu was criticized for by liberals
in Israel. From a diplomatic standpoint, Israel has sought to
"de-link" the issues, and thus give Clinton the space to release
Pollard at a later point. But
releasing Pollard, concluded the poll-loving Clinton, "would not be a
popular act," the Mossad's Rubin told WorldNetDaily. Indeed, a Time
poll of 13,580 respondents taken in fall of 1998 found fully 82 percent
responding "no" to releasing Pollard. Only 16 percent said
"yes," while 2 percent answered "don't know." And,
as previously mentioned, CIA director George Tenet threatened to resign if
Pollard was released from prison. The
Pollard case turned up again during the final days of Clinton's
presidency, this time in regard to Clinton's mass pardons – particularly
billionaire Marc Rich. Former Israeli Prime Minister Shimon Peres called
Clinton to lobby for Rich's pardon. And then-Israeli Prime Minister Ehud
Barak, already lobbying for Pollard's pardon, also lobbied for Rich's
pardon. Avner Azulay, Rich's point man in Israel, suggested to counsel
Mark Quinn that a pardon for Rich might make it easier for Israeli
officials to accept the rejection of a pardon for the jailed Pollard. As
one might expect, this particular brand of political football did not
please Esther Pollard. "On
his last day in office, Clinton granted clemency to 140 people. Many who
received executive clemency had been convicted of very serious offenses,
including murder, robbery and drug dealing. Some of those pardoned had
served no prison time at all before being pardoned. Among those pardoned
were Clinton's brother, and a former head of the CIA," Mrs. Pollard
said. President
Clinton's ongoing reference to "the considerable damage that
[Pollard's] actions caused our nation" and "the damage done to
our national security" were cited as prime factors in his refusal to
grant Pollard clemency. "The
unavoidable conclusion to be drawn," says Esther Pollard "is
that they simply do not want Jonathan out of prison. Why the Americans
feel this way is simple: Jonathan continues to be a convenient tool for
those elements within the administration who have no use for the
U.S.-Israel special relationship. These officials routinely exploit the
case as a means of calling into question both Israel's reliability as an
ally and the American Jewish community's loyalty. As well, successive
administrations have found the case useful for squeezing dangerous
concessions from Israel." "But
the big question is: Why is Israel cooperating?" said Esther.
"Why doesn't Israel want Jonathan out? For example, Jonathan's
release was obtained at Wye as an integral part of the Wye Accords.
According to Netanyahu and other officials who negotiated the deal at Wye,
Ehud Barak was well aware of this when he released the 750 murderers and
terrorists who were the price paid for Jonathan's release. When Barak
released the murderers, why didn't he insist that the U.S. live up to its
end of the deal? Sharon was an eyewitness to the deal made at Wye. Why
isn't he insisting on Jonathan's release?" Pro-Pollard
people in Israel are growing tired of the government's position, which
goes something like this: "Owing to the sensitivity of the Pollard
case, silence is the best approach. Any publicity given to the matter can
only hurt Pollard's chances." "For
many years," said Esther, "successive prime ministers have
claimed that they were secretly working for Pollard's release – secret
initiatives that failed." As
such, Pollard's many supporters in Israel, according to Esther, are
"wondering why the government doesn't state publicly for all the
world to hear that it has not abandoned Pollard, that it has not forgotten
him and that, in spite of any embarrassment that his case caused the state
of Israel, Israel owes him a debt of gratitude." "Jonathan's
warnings which he gave to Israel helped the Israelis to prepare years and
years into the future [against their enemies]," Mrs. Pollard told
WorldNetDaily. In
one instance, Pollard showed pictures of chemical factories in Iraq to his
handler in Tel Aviv. The same day, the Israelis had asked the Americans,
was there any such factory in Iraq. They were told, "No, there
isn't." Jonathan's handler put his head down on the desk and said,
"Oh my!" He then looked up at Jonathan and said, "Sometimes
better a reliable enemy than an unreliable ally." Asked
about her dealings with current Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, Esther
Pollard told WorldNetDaily, "Sharon is not who he claims to be. He
talks right wing and Zionist. He was elected because 60 percent of the
electorate believed he would increase security for Israelis. But under him
things are the same as Barak or worse." Not
all spies treated equally
Was
the sentencing of Jonathan Pollard fair when compared to similar spy
cases? Esther Pollard does not believe this to be so and has compared
her husband's and other convicted spies' sentences on her website. "Jonathan
received the harshest sentence possible. This is not fair when one looks
at the cases of other spies – especially those who spied for allies of
the U.S.," she said. For
instance, Michael Schwartz, a navy commander caught selling secrets to
Saudi Arabia from 1992 to 1994, received an
"other-than-honorable" discharge from the military. No fine, no
prison. Comments
Esther Pollard, "This is a spy case that both Israel and the U.S.
keep pretending never happened. Same crime as Jonathan, same indictment.
Different ally – radically different treatment. Shwartz never served a
day in prison." And
Steven Lalas, a U.S. embassy employee in Athens, was convicted of
disclosing classified military documents to Greece that identified CIA
agents operating in the Balkans. Lalas entered into a plea agreement –
the terms of which he subsequently violated – yet was sentenced to only
14 years. "This is one of the most serious offenses imaginable, and
for one of the basest motives – greed," Assistant U.S. Attorney
Mark J. Hulkower said at Lalas' sentencing hearing in the U.S. District
Court in Alexandria. Peter
Lee, convicted in 1998 of having passed highly classified nuclear
information to China, was fined $20,000.00. No prison time. He was
sentenced to 12 months in a halfway house. David
Boone, a U.S. Army code-breaker who pleaded guilty to selling the Soviets
highly sensitive documents (including code manuals and data about U.S.
nuclear targets) for $60,000 in the late 1980s and early '90s – and for
whose crimes Jonathan Pollard is being still being scapegoated in the
media by U.S. officials – was sentenced just last month to 24 years. Asked
about how she felt about the Wen Ho Lee spy case, Esther Pollard told
WorldNetDaily, "The world was shocked about the treatment of Wen Ho
Lee. The handling of his case was done to sent a special message to a
specific community. As it was with Jonathan. No one said, "Stop the
prosecution now and show the evidence." "Both
experienced an extreme abuse of the legal system." She
then added; "While America has a history of routinely betraying its
allies, Jonathan is the only spy of an ally to receive such harsh
treatment and such a draconian sentence, with no evidence to support such
a sentence. This has been verified by such notables as Sen. Charles
Schumer and Rep. Anthony Weiner who have both received CIA briefings and
seen the Pollard secret files. They are both on record that nothing that
they saw in the file or heard in the briefings supports the sentence
Jonathan received." "Nobody
outside of the intelligence world knows the whole inside story of this
very sensitive issue," said Rabbi David Eidensohn, who serves as a
consultant to Knight Ridder News Service on Jewish Issues. "Those in
the government, including President Clinton, who judged him and his chance
for parole, are not known as anti-Semites, to say the least. True, some
who were involved did not like Jews, but this is not a country where those
kind can railroad an innocent person in such a public issue. When somebody
is paid to do a job and violates the contract; when somebody is pledged to
honor their country and violates their word, we don't defend this. True,
he may have achieved some important things by notifying Israel of threats,
but can we accept a standard whereby any person can violate his duty to
America because of some perceived benefit to somebody?" "If
Jews are free to violate their promises and their countries of birth, to
help Israel, no Jew could ever work for the government. The harm that
Pollard did to Jews and Israel is far greater than any good he did. If he
did what he did out of idealism, he was wrong. If he did what he did out
of greed, he was wicked. I don't know why he did it, but anyone who
defends him, who demands that he be treated with clemency, must know the
entire story, which I don't, and be sure that they are right. The Jews,
indeed the whole world, have suffered from idealists more than from the
brutes. No Orthodox Jew, no Jew who appreciates what America means for
Jews and Israel, would ever have done what Pollard did. Those who defend
him have bleeding hearts, and compassion and kindness are good traits, but
there are more important things, like honor and not shafting your best
friend." Adds
Esther Pollard, "When I pray I sometimes pray Kadish – it is the
Jewish prayer of the highest praise for God. I praise God for making
someone as wonderful as Jonathan." "Those
who have and seek the truth will recognize it. Our hope relies on this
fact: Everything built on a lie will crumble. The lies told about Jonathan
are too big to be sustained."
http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=23552 |
