Miss Israel will Ask for Jonathan Pollard's Release
Miss Israel to Ask for Jonathan Pollard’s Release
Signs, hecklers, and protests urging the spy’s release continue
Leading up to and now carrying through President Obama’s visit,
one inescapable name has been that of convicted American spy Jonathan
Pollard. American and Israeli politicians have filed pleas asking for
his release, a petition has garnered 175,000 signatures in Israel, Gilad
Shalit has spoken out along with several members of the Knesset.
With Obama in Israel, an array of signs, protests, and other forms of
public notice have cropped up to bring Pollard’s cause to the
forefront, even as Obama has issued a statement saying that he has no
immediately plans to release him. Today, during the President’s speech
in Jerusalem, a heckler added his voice to the chorus:
The
most sensational expression of the dual loyalty issue in America in recent
years was the 1987 case of Jonathan Pollard, an American-born Jew who worked
in a sensitive position in the U.S. Navy. Pollard became a spy for the
Israeli government and passed along more than 800 "top secret" documents
to his "first loyalty," the Jewish State. For seventeen months he had been
in daily contact with Israeli co-conspirators, two of whom were later given
military promotions in Israel. The government prosecutor in the case, Joseph
di Genova, has stated that Pollard's spying "was the largest physical compromise
of United States classified information in the twentieth century." The
Defense Secretary at the time of Pollard's arrest, Caspar Weinberger, wrote
a 46-page document to the Federal Court stating that he "could not conceive
of greater harm to national security" than Pollard's spying. [Image: Jonathan
Pollard.]
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