Editorial: Taking Responsibility for Pollard

Hamodia - September 7, 2009

Israel's state comptroller, retired judge Micha Lindenstrauss, last week
released a report on the country's handling of the Pollard affair. In a
nutshell, the report exonerates Israel's political leadership and blames
Jonathan Pollard's continued incarceration on the "fierce and consistent"
opposition of U.S. administration and intelligence officials. It also
recommends that Israel press the Americans to give Pollard a new trial.

The report is, to put it charitably, a huge disappointment.

For starters, it makes contradictory claims. On one hand it states
categorically that since 1996, the governments of Binyamin Netanyahu, Ehud
Barak, Ariel Sharon and Ehud Olmert acted "continuously and consistently" to
obtain the release of Pollard. "The Pollard issue challenged the prime
ministers of Israel," it states. "Their actions were continual and
consistent, and the issue was brought up in their meetings and conversations
with U.S. presidents."

At the same time, Lindenstrauss admits that Netanyahu, Barak, Sharon and
Olmert made sure that their discussions with U.S. presidents and senior
administration officials on this sensitive issue were never documented. (He
calls this failure a "significant transgression," because it makes it
impossible to reassess past efforts to get Pollard freed and try to come up
with a more successful approach.)

But if Lindenstrauss didn't have any transcripts of these meetings, how
could he be so sure that these prime ministers acted "continuously and
consistently" on Pollard's behalf?

Without going into all of the details of the Pollard case, the pertinent
facts are as follows: Jonathan Pollard is an Israeli citizen (as of 1995);
the government of Israel has recognized him as an Israeli agent (as of
1998); and he has spent the past 24 years in prison for providing Israel
with information that saved many, many lives.

In this sense, Pollard is like any other Israeli prisoner, be it Ron Arad,
the navigator downed over Lebanon in 1986, or Gilad Shalit, the IDF soldier
kidnapped at the border with Gaza three years ago. But there's one crucial
difference: While Arad and Shalit are being held in unknown locations by
terror organizations, Pollard is in the hands of Israel's closest ally, the
United States. And it is inconceivable that Israel leaders acted
"continuously and consistently" and still came up empty-handed.

How can it be that 24 years have passed - with U.S. administrations that
were Republican and Democrat; more friendly to Israel and less friendly;
with prime ministers from Labor and the Likud - and that at no time was it
possible to close a deal that would send Pollard home?

If the efforts of Israeli prime ministers were truly continuous and
consistent, if there was the proper sense of hakaras hatov to Pollard for
what he did for Israel, then surely there were ample opportunities in the
past 24 years - be it at the signing of Oslo or the disengagement or the end
of the administration of former president George W. Bush - to gain the
release on humanitarian grounds for a man who is sick and who has expressed
remorse for his deeds? (The notable exception was then-Prime Minister
Binyamin Netanyahu, who truly tried to engineer a deal upon signing the Wye
Plantation agreement on a Chevron withdrawal, only to be bitterly
disappointed by Bill Clinton.)

The inescapable conclusion is that if prime ministers raised Pollard's case
in all top-level discussions, it was done for the record, latzeis yedei
chovah. The prime minister in question raised his name, the president noted
that it had been raised and then they moved on to more "important" matters.

MK Otniel Schneller (Kadima), who chairs the Knesset subcommittee that
commissioned the state comptroller's report, refuses to join Lindenstrauss
in applauding the work of previous prime ministers. "In the test of the
result, the work surrounding Pollard did not succeed," he told The Jerusalem
Post. "The fact that Pollard is still in jail is a failure."

To be sure, there is no denying that there are forces in the U.S.
administration and among top intelligence officials who have consistently
blocked efforts to gain Pollard's release. It is also crystal clear that he
was denied due process, given an excessive prison sentence and deserves an
immediate release on humanitarian grounds due to his physical condition.

But the main problem is the way the Israeli government relates to Pollard.
All along it was reluctant to assume responsibility for his actions, waiting
more than 10 years to acknowledge that he had been acting as its agent.

Of all the prime ministers, Netanyahu is the one who has shown the greatest
willingness to accept such responsibility. In 2002, he visited Pollard in
prison. In 2007, he said that if he were elected prime minister he would
bring about Pollard's release. Now it's time for him to try to keep that
promise.

Let us keep Yehonoson ben Malkah constantly in our tefillos, and may
Jonathan Pollard be written and inscribed for a good year, one that sees him
released to Israel where, at long last, he will have a chance to regain his
health and begin life anew.