On the basis of a document production from the federal government that he sought, Grant Smith at Antiwar.com predicts that Obama will pardon Jonathan Pollard, imprisoned since 1987 for espionage for Israel, so as to please the Israel lobby. The documents create a sense of a culminating campaign, Smith says. Excerpt:
June 18 could mark the culmination of a massive lobbying campaign for release. Obama’s dismal record on Israeli accountability suggests Pollard will soon walk free.
Released documents reveal that the Rabbinical Assembly — claiming to represent “1.5 million Jews worldwide” — passed a formal resolution asking Obama to commute Pollard’s sentence. Rabbi David Zwiebel of Agudath Israel of America and Moshe Kantor of the European Jewish Congress also urged Pollard’s release. Letters demanding release also continue to flood in from former and current members of the US Congress. Steve Symms, Matt Salmon, Alan Simpson, Robert Wexler, Barney Frank, and Gary Ackerman joined the ranks of fellow representatives already demanding release. Moshe Kahalon, Israel’s Minister of Communications, gushed to Obama “I have no doubt that your decision to release Jonathan Pollard now as a humanitarian expression of justice and compassion will bring great relief to many, and will remove this impediment to the friendship between our nations.” Former New York City Mayor David Dinkins is also now rooting for Pollard’s release. Upping the ante, Israeli President Shimon Peres has explicitly linked his receipt of a US Presidential Medal of Freedom during a special June 18 White House dinner to Pollard’s freedom gambit — channeling even more intense pressure on Obama to take action in a specific context, place and time.
The linkage to Obama’s reelection bid is obvious….
I presume Jane Harman is also pushing to spring the spy Pollard.
No word on freeing Shamai Leibowitz for catching a spy.
The House and Home section (page 2) of the weekend (June 9/10, 2012) US edition of the Financial Times has a flattering profile of former Congresswoman Jane Harman who is now Director, President, and CEO of the Woodrow Wilson Center for International Scholars in Washington, DC. No author for the puff piece is listed but it does not mention that Shamai Leibowitz is in Federal Prison for revealing that, as translator for the FBI he reported to his bosses that Congresswoman Harman had shared classified information with Israeli agents, going public because the FBI refused to take action against her.
I think it is safe to say that the Wilson Center was well aware that they were putting an Israeli agent in charge. That a “liberal” Democrat is in charge of a right wing foundation that supports drone warfare and promotes the notion that Arab women are losers in the Arab Spring, is something we have come to expect in our wacky world where most of Americans’ misinformation comes from the top.
What kind of reporter for the Financial Times would omit mention of Shamai Leibowitz or is the FT, like the NY Times, NPR, etc., a mouthpiece for the Israel Lobby?
link to mondoweiss.net
Check out this comparison between Leibowitz and Pollard: link to 972mag.com
Yes, all the publications you mention are parrots of AIPAC
you mean: Jane Harmon, the spy, is also pushing to spring the spy Pollard
Harmon too is one of the prominent, powerful spies for israel – clearly a Fifth Columnist who should have been investigated and tried for treason
the arrogance of israel as they flex their control over my USA is satisfying to them because they are so full of hubris but they see not that the more they squeeze the less control they have – it is all coming to a head and israel will, as usual, overplay their hand and provoke a reaction … the reaction will be Americans finally getting fed up with this awful parasite
perhaps fitting as it was Wilson who opened the Zionist floodgates in the US. pollard should have been executed, not that i’m a supporter of the death penalty. he can thank dersh for saving his a%# until the appropriate patsy comes along to pardon him.
“Shamai Leibowitz is in Federal Prison ”
What the hell?…this is the first I have heard of this. How did the guy who reported Harman wind up in jail?
Actually he is out now having served almost a year in a minimum security Federal Prison under a 20 month sentence.
Oh gee, my oh my, why oh why is there anti-semitism in the world? It’s just such an inexplicable conundrum.
There’s anti-semitism in the world for exactly the same reasons there are other sorts of discrimination – because people are stupid, scared, uneducated, intellectually lazy, vindictive etc.
It isn’t related to what jews do or don’t do.
Obviously the Pollard business is a disgrace and should be fought tooth and nail, but it doesn’t justify anti-semitism. You probably don’t mean to say it does, but since you asked the question :-)
@ Sumud:
No, I didn’t mean to say that the Pollard business justifies anti-semitism, but what I meant to get at was exactly what you wrote that anti-semitism “isn’t related to what jews do or don’t do.”
That, after all, is the monstrous chunk of baloney that’s been adopted now by so many jewish and philo-semitic authors and etc. “Oh, it’s just an unreasoning, causeless thing [unlike every single other thing in the cosmos],” thereby essentially absolving all jews from anything it seems and licensing them to act in any such manner because, after all, as you say “it’s nothing that you do or don’t do.”
No, it’s caused, by precisely this kind of shit from Frank and Ackerman and all the other so-called American jews who are plumping unashamedly (if as quietly as they can because they too know damn well it reeks of dual loyalty) for Pollard’s release.
It doesn’t justify hatred of all jews of course, nor indeed any unidentified ones, but when it does of some identifiable ones is that “anti-semitic” too?
So here’s the bottom line: Even *if* they think Pollard has served long enough you’d think Jewish folks like Frank and Ackerman ought to have the fucking good grace and care for the U.S. and us non-jewish co-citizens to remain silent so as to not give aid and comfort to the Israelis in the form of seeing the U.S. divided ethno-racially on this issue.
You know, the old “politics stops at the water’s edge” idea of patriotism and loyalty?
But they don’t. Why? Incontrovertibly it’s because they don’t give a crap about harming the U.S. by giving aid and comfort to Israel or us non-jewish co-U.S. citizens, that’s why.
And that incontrovertible evidence of what they really care about more persuades me that’s why they’re plumping of for Pollard in the first place far more than their almost certain bleating that they just happen to feel an unfairness has been worked and it just happened to fall on this jewish guy.
While certainly not true of the vast majority of American jews, there’s nevertheless a number of prominent ones who think they’re playing a cute little game if not a little war on the rest of us goyim and oh what fun they’re having. But the jewish community as a whole ought to get it’s head out of its ass and start telling these folks to knock it off because it isn’t a game when it comes to things like treason and espionage and sinking our ships and shooting our citizens and we don’t take it as a game. And apparently unlike many in the jewish community we regard killing our sailors and or citizens and committing espionage against us as a whole lot more important than being called anti-semites.
And I’d even encourage you if you were jewish to take this message to your mainstream jewish organizations and etc., except from what I can tell they do have their heads up their ass and don’t understand it because from what I see they too are all busy lobbying for Pollard’s release too.
“No, it’s caused, by precisely this kind of shit from Frank and Ackerman and all the other so-called American jews who are plumping unashamedly (if as quietly as they can because they too know damn well it reeks of dual loyalty) for Pollard’s release.”….Sin Nombre
I have to agree with SN….Jews like Ackerman and others do cause anti semitism for the reason that it’s almost impossible for the average person to ‘unwrap” the Jews.
How long has the world been schooled to think of Jews as a collective with monolithic collective interest?…….forever, for decades, for centuries.
That idea is still being pounded and pounded into people’s perceptions every day by Israel and the zionist.
Try and find a single speech or statement ever uttered by a zionist or Israel that isn’t speaking for The Jews. There aren’t any…whether they are liberal or hawk zionist.
I can’t tell you what a big mistake (and long term miscalculation) it is for even anti zionist to continue to speak to Jews on the basis of ‘tribal’ or collective interest even when appealing to “Jewish morality’ and so forth.
I have said a thousand times re the I/P and Israel issue, do not speak to Jews as a Jewish collective, speak to them in universal, individual human value terms.
@Sin Nombre I agree with you a 100%. Anti-semitism its cause and effect. Im so sick of having to walk on rice paper.Any leader from the Jewish community ,or in our Gov. that feels that we should free Pollard are traitors to the United States. There is no gray area here what pollard did,from what i read ,by people in the Defense dept put us back many years…Lets us not forget the Rosenbergs and the nukes to russia.. Gee is there a pattern here? I can go on there are plenty more Jews who sold out america when it comes to israel. For such a small % of people we are over represented when it comes to selling or giving top secrets to israel. I dont know one Jew who will defend pollard. The Jews that do defend Pollard are one of the many reasons there is anti-semitism . Cause and Effect jew4palestine
“Obviously the Pollard business is a disgrace and should be fought tooth and nail, but it doesn’t justify anti-semitism. You probably don’t mean to say it does, but since you asked the question :-)…Sumud
There needs to be some other term besides ‘anti semitism’….anti semitism isn’t a accurate way to describe the ‘resentment’ aroused against *some Jews for good reasons…although resentment against “The” Jews collectively is obviously bigoted we need a new middle term to apply to the cabal ‘within’..so far we’ve used “anti zionist” but the general public doesn’t identify with that.
I think some “leak over” of zionism on the Jews is unavoidable in the general public unless more Jews do a lot of denouncing the zionist.
And the problem there is the Jewish denouncers of zionist don’t get much if any msm coverage. About the only place you see zionist ‘targeted’ is on the net at MW and a few other mostly Jewish sites . Looking at comments all over the web most of them are aimed at “Israel First”…..the best you can do to differenate Jews from zionist is to stick with that description. While it doesn’t do the whole job, it keeps as much on a ‘political’ level instead of a Jewish level as you can hope for while zionist are claiming to speak for the Jews.
* I don’t think I have ever heard the word ‘zionist’ used in any cable news programs or by the pundits…has anyone ever heard it used?
Yes, indeed – resenting bad deeds by people who happen to be English isn’t Anglophobia. An opinion based on reason isn’t the same as an opinion based on prejudice.
Oh come on MH…you know what we are saying about how the perception of Jews as all alike in Jewish interest has been drummed into the public. We could spend all day on reason vr prejudice in the “individual” but the fact is you are dealing with “public perception”…stress on the public….as in a group also. ….individuals give way to ‘group think’ a lot of times based on their shared perceptions.
I hope Pollard is freed.
Faster please, we need the zios to go faster and further……we need them to go all the way.
More rope.
What we need is a full blown blowback against the zios…no more rope, let’s just break out the law and run them through the system in public view.
If the zios manage the news they win, if they can’t manage it they lose, it just can’t be any plainer than that.
Look at Mjayrosenberg, he surrendered and left his lofty perch which he could have used to call out the Israel firsters, but no, he decided he could do a greater good writing secret letters to himself and a handful of his followers in a dark corner of the internet rather than at media matters where his outreach would be in orders of magnitude higher than he will ever ever achieve in exile in some out of the way corner of the internet.
Let Americans see, stop playing hide the sausage, lets open it up and see what it’s contents are.
atime,
I think MJ would have been edged out if he had stayed at media matters.
Yes , it’s too bad he doesn’t have a more public platform….but this way he doesn’t have to watch what he says….which is worth a lot.
Remember the old saying…20% of the people do 80% of the work.
MJ is adding to the 20%.
American, there’s been pressure on to get Pollard released for years but the opposition by the defence/intelligence community has been massive and every administration has managed fend off Jewish and Israeli lobbying about his release. I’m wondering what has changed now? Is this administration too cowardly to stand up to the lobby or has the intelligence community swallowed the kool-aid?
Richard Falk, UN Rapporteur on Palestine, spoke in Seattle last night. He reminded us of the anniversary of the USS Liberty attack [June 8, 1967] and the outrageous government and media repression of this deliberately fatal attack on U.S. service people by Israel.
Falk basically said the current state of corruption in U.S. policies stems from cover-ups like this. Pandering to Israel is one of the worms in the rotting American apple.
He said international law is degraded by the U.S.’s unequal treatment of global actors and makes global interactions about power and might. I guess this seems obvious, but Mr. Falk is very well placed to confirm this degradation with his long career trying to uphold fairness in international law.
Please let us know if and when a copy of his talk is available. It is a great taboo in the US make mention of the USS Liberty as it is to discuss the coin Goebbels had minted in 1938 to celebrate the collaboration between the Nazis and Zionists with the Star of David on one side and the swastika on the other.
The talk was filmed and will hopefully be available. Here is a Seattle Times article on the Falk event (which several folks had to badger them to do). link to seattletimes.nwsource.com
Richard Silverstein has been doing battle with the local NPR station regarding their privileged treatment of Michael Oren’s Seattle visit. link to richardsilverstein.com
Hi, Les. Here is a link to Falk’s talk in Seattle: link to youtu.be
Thank you. I notice that the talk lasted just over an hour.
I am, of course, sharing your link with mention that he discusses the USS Liberty.
Although I am against capital punishment, I think the death penalty should be reserved for traitors and war criminals. Jonathan Pollard should have gotten the death penalty and executed by lethal injection a long time ago.
Besides, since Timothy McVeigh got the death penalty, surely the damage caused by Pollard should have warranted a similar sentence.
The problem is that the death penalty swings both ways, if you’ll forgive the word choice.
When the right wing-nuts have power, American patriots like Ellsberg and Manning are deemed to be traitors, and once executed there is no waiting for the force of history to overturn political transgressions.
For all the foul things Bush did, we must give him credit for resisting the Israeli pressure — including from that slime-ball Israel-firster Barney Frank — to release Pollard.
To the best of my knowledge, neither Ellsberg’s nor Manning’s actions constitute treason.
You make it sound like there is no judiciary in this country, as though Pollard was convicted by some rogue president with dictatorial powers.
Besides, Manning was held more than six months without charge on orders from the Obama administration.
Clearly, Avi, you’re not getting my drift.
“To the best of my knowledge, neither Ellsberg’s nor Manning’s actions constitute treason.”
Depends on how you define “treason”, doesn’t it? Ellsberg and Manning were both charged under the Espionage Act of 1917, same as Pollard. While there is a Constitutional definition of treason (and the death penalty still applies), indictable acts of espionage under the 1917 Act are also generally called “treason.” For years US politicians have been trying to amend the Espionage Act to include the death sentence.
The point is that depending on who is running the Justice Dept., when the death penalty is available, it can be sought at the whims of those in power. If they could execute Pollard, as you wish, then they could execute Manning. Unless there is an intentional loss of life directly related to the espionage or treason, I would have a problem with execution in either case.
“You make it sound like there is no judiciary in this country, as though Pollard was convicted by some rogue president with dictatorial powers. ”
Nobody’s talking about Pollard’s conviction. But now that you raise the issue of dictatorial powers, the president’s power to completely reverse the judiciary and commute or pardon those convicted by a court of law are about as dictatorial as they come. Witness Clinton’s pardon of his buddy and campaign contributor Marc Rich. Witness Ford’s pardon of Nixon before he was even indicted. Witness Carter’s pardon of Peter Yarrow on the child-rape conviction. If those are not dictatorial acts of presidents, what are they? IOW, screw the judiciary, which is what we’re going to see w/ Pollard.
Timothy McVeigh had to be executed, because he might have talked. After it became clear that the Justice Department had denied McVeigh’s defense documents that they should have been provided under the Brady doctrine, there should at least have been a repeat of the penalty phase of McVeigh’s trial. Instead, there was an indecent haste to execute the man.
Dead men tell no tales.
Avi_G,
I agree wholeheartedly. He should have fried in oil and then been lynched.
I too am opposed to capital punishment. And I don’t want to link to the Daniel Pipes’s website which is the source of this quote, but here is an excerpt from an interview with Reagan’s Defense Secretary Cap Weinberger:
“You have been quoted saying that Jonathan Pollard ‘should have been shot.’ Is this accurate?”
Weinberger: “Any traitor who did what he did should be shot.”
” Jonathan Pollard should have gotten the death penalty and executed by lethal injection a long time ago. “…Avi
It’s f****** sickening isn’t it?…….we excute people for less than what Pollard did.
I am generally against the death penalty…. period…… except in cases of true psychopaths.
From what I understand Pollard got some American agents killed.
If anyone is interested in reading the Financial Times profile of Jane Harman here’s the link:
link to ft.com
The online edition shows the author of the puff piece to be Annie Maccoby Berglof, which was not part of the print edition. Hopefully Berglof’s email is available as it often is with FT articles.
This outporing of concern for Pollard is grotesque. His guilt is beyond question. The defense secrets he stole and gave to Israel were subsequently sold to the Soviets in the height of the cold war. The breach of security alledgedly resulted in the killing of American spies. Israel niether returned, nor admitted to everything that was stolen.
And what will Obama get in return for his release? Some cash to support his re election bid, he hopes. At the very least he could demand a full investigation of Israel’s deliberate attack on the USS Liberty, but of course he won’t. This will be a no strings attached deal. Pollard will be released and he’ll receive a hero’s welcome upon returning “home” to Israel. America sinks lower still in its prostration before the Jewish State.
resulted in the killing of American spies
over 100 agents as i recall.
1000 assets and families, Annie. Richard Sale broke the story decades ago. Google Richard Sale Casper Weinberger Pollard. For how Weinberger was still frothing at the mouth and going ballistic over pollard years after Weinberger retired. Biggest breach of US security in national history. Did 10x the damage that all the other 20th C spies combined.
thanks mrw, will google/check out.
ctuttle, hey, choice quote. ;)
*heh* The Col. was none too thrilled, Annie, when I’d mentioned this prospect on his June 7th open thread…! And I quote…Any “American” who wants Pollard pardoned should emigrate to Israel with him if he is released. pl Unquote…! ;-)
Dbroncos. Obama will lose the military and vet vote if he caves, not to mention the intel agents that will resign. The latter are who threatened Clinton and Bush if they pardoned him. Pollard gets out in 3 or 4 years.
He’s lucky he’s not in a coffin, which is where he should be.
That piece by Grant Smith is a must-read. Thanks, Philip for the link.
It’s an interesting situation. If Obama is going to spring Pollard he has to do it soon. First, because he needs the shekels now. And second, he would need time for his stink-bomb to diffuse before November. There is no reason other than politics to release the vermin, so there is no point in waiting wait until after the election.
Simon Peres is getting the Presidential Medal of Freedom on Jun18, and that is almost certainly when this outrage will take place, if it does. Both of these shekel-driven faux pas will sicken Americans as much as they will delight Israel-firsters, who, by definition, are not Americans. If Obama frees Pollard the msm will portray Obama as a latter day Lincoln — a forgiving & human president — and the blogosphere will explode in expletives, including mine.
Grant Smith has an excellent point. The value to Israel of freeing Pollard is that Pollard’s incarceration is a slap in the face to Israel’s often stated infallibility doctrine: that anything Israel does anywhere in the world to protect its own interests is above all law except Israel’s. IOW Israel is a law unto itself, as readers of this blog know all too well.
I don’t care who his opponent is — if Obama pulls this Pollard stunt, I will vote against him because freeing Pollard will demonstrate that Obama is also an Israel-firster and his second term will be as bad as, or worse, than his first from the Palestinians’ point of view.
I am currently reading Stephen Green’s Taking Sides. That book says that the initial internal Israeli government report on the Lavon Affair recommended that one of those who should be fired was Shimon Peres. It looks as if Peres was already involved in nefarious doings as early as 1954.
im reading that book now too. good one
Looks like your prediction may turn out to be right: JTA: Pakistani official points to Pollard case in noting U.S. hypocrisy:
Thanks, Annie. Pollard was one of the worst spies in American history. Reagan was petitioned by the Lobby to go easy on Pollard but his Defense Secretary, Caspar Weinberger, insisted that the damage done by Pollard’s crimes warrented a life sentence (no small thing) and that no exceptions should be made to appease Israel’s supporters. Reagan took his advice and actually did what was in the best interest of America rather than Israel. Have we seen an American President act similarly in the last 25 years?
Weinberger wanted the death sentence. Not a life sentence. Dershowitz got him life with parole for good behavior after 25 years in return for Israel returning the docs which it never did.
He was an American citizen when he was charged.
That’s a good idea. As soon as Israel returns the documents that Pollard took, we give them Pollard.
The terms of Pollard’s sentence and Israel’s refusal to return the documents is never mentioned, even in internet media. At least, this is the first I’ve seen it–MRW. Do U have a source?
The material Pollard stole would fill a 12′ x 12′ room, floor to ceiling, with boxes of documents. The American rep who was sent to Israel to retrieve what had been stolen was handed a single box of documents. It was assumed that what was returned had been copied. This is what I remember reading in a book – Cursed Is The Peacemaker, by John Boykin.
American investigators were lied to by the Israelis wrt the Pollard case, as they were lied to about the USS Liberty, and Israel’s nuclear weapons program at Dimona. In all three instances the American government knew the Israeli’s were lying and they did nothing about it.
Citizen, check out Wiki. It goes into the plea deal in detail. Some interesting clips:
“When asked to return the stolen material, the Israelis reportedly only turned over a few dozen low-classified documents. At the time, the Americans knew that Pollard had passed tens of thousands of documents. When American investigators traveled to Israel they were treated with hostility from the moment they arrived in Israel to the moment they left.”
“Aviem Sella, Pollard’s initial Israeli contact, was eventually indicted on three counts of espionage by an American court. Israel refused to allow him to be interviewed unless he was granted immunity. The United States refused because of Israel’s previous failure to cooperate as promised. Israel then refused to extradite Sella, instead giving him command of Tel Nof Airbase. The U.S. Congress responded by threatening to cut aid to Israel, at which point Sella voluntarily stepped down to defuse tensions.”
[May be the last time Congress stood up to its Israel master.]
“In September 2011, Vice President Joe Biden was reported by the New York Times to have told a group of rabbis that, “President Obama was considering clemency, but I told him, ‘Over my dead body are we going to let him out before his time. If it were up to me, he would stay in jail for life.’”
[Will Biden leave the ticket over Obama freeing Pollard? Don't hold your breath. Principle always gives way to politics.]
Thanks Denis!
Citizen,
Seymour Hersh. Can’t link. On a device and it’s a PITA.
What about Pollard and/or Israel revealing the identity of Mega — the higher U.S. government official who was recommending what documents Pollard should be asked to hand over?
damn good string to attach to Pollard release, yeah, just give us Mega ID, and btw, U only gave us one box of the documents Pollard gave you–that’s not a big enough dent in the 12′ X 12′ room full of boxes he gave you; we know you copied all of them, and you got your Jews from Russia, so we want to show the American people just what all Mr Pollard gave you to trade for some Russian Jews. Remember that was a condition of the light sentence Dershie got for your hero?
There is no more explicit example of dual loyalty than barking for Pollard’s release. None.
I’m with Col Lang…..except I wouldn’t put it as politely as” emigrate”
“Will Obama pardon the traitor Pollard?
“The linkage to Obama’s reelection bid is obvious. Israel’s Chief Rabbi Yonah
Metzger brashly stated that releasing Pollard would
be good for Obama’s reelection campaign. But what makes Pollard worth
expending such formidable lobbying and political capital? Why have Israel and
its Western lobbying organizations made Pollard a key issue, almost on the same
footing as massive US taxpayer-funded aid packages and confronting Iran? The
Israel lobby effort is trying to achieve much more than simply putting Congress
and a sitting president through their paces.
Pollard’s ongoing imprisonment has uniquely and singularly defied Israel’s
doctrine of accountability. Israel’s history is replete with demands that it should never
be held accountable for any act committed anywhere — including in the US — that
is perpetrated in the name of Israel’s national security. ” Antiwar
——————————-
I was on the damage assesment board that looked at what Pollard had done for Israel and to the US.
Most of the purloined material had nothing to do with the ME and everything to do with the Warsaw Pact. The Israelis wanted the material for “trade goods.”
Pollard was 150% Israel’s guy then and now. The Israelis once again betrayed or trust. Any “American” who wants Pollard pardoned should emigrate to Israel with him if he is released. pl”
@American Correct me if im wrong,but were we not in a cold war with Russia?,and was Israel as they claim our ally in the M/E to help us stop Russian influence .I think if more people were put to death for treason I know it would be certainly at the least a huge deterrence.
jew4palestine
@Jeffrey
Yes we were in a cold war with Russia. I am just against the death penalty except in extreme, extreme cases for the reason innocent people have been executed because the justice system isn’t perfect and you can’t bring the innocent back from the dead.
Maybe excuting Pollard would have been a lesson to traitors, but then again maybe keeping him alive but in prision keeps the example of his treason alive too.
@American tbh im against the death penalty for the same reasons,but lets say we do as China does when its ceo does bad business they get taken out. DO you think Madoff, or Boskey or Milkin would have ever done the crimes they did . I can bet my life on it they would never.but low risk not a bad living sale junk bonds to retired old people. hell stick it to the people who did what they were told save ur money so you can retire,but whats more important is you can funnel money into the Jewish settlements Ironically against the Law.. Milkin ,Pollard, 20 yrs later We got Blanfkiend at Goldman Sachs raping the pension funds selling sub prime to the rest of the world. . I for one never ask why there is anti-semitism . Its our actions has nothing to do with being Jewish.,and as long as Jews support Israel,and defend people like pollard. Cause ,and Effect = anti-semitism Did i go off topic lol?
“”jeffrey says:
@American tbh im against the death penalty for the same reasons,but lets say we do as China does when its ceo does bad business they get taken out”"
Well, when I lose all patience with problem people like WS criminals and other cretins my evil twin pops up and just wants to disappear them all.
Fortunately, for me anyway..I am able to control my evil twin …but I can well understand the temptation to do it when nothing else has worked to solve the problem.
As far as Jews=Israel = anti semitism…yea there is some cause and effect I think…but there again you can’t let the evil twin throw the baby out with the bathwater.
frank’s 2010 letter calling for pollard’s release; link to jonathanpollard.org
note the co-conspirators. Hinchey? give me a break. john hall? come on!
i remember musician john hall approaching me on 1 of the “peace” trains bound for the huge iraq war protests in nyc. he was soliciting votes. i asked him where he stood with aipac.replied he didn’t know what that was. bet he knows now.
this ones for you ex-congressman john hall;
“You’re still the one — I want to talk to in bed
Still the one — that turns my head
We’re still having fun, and you’re still the one”
Pollard is not a spy. He’s a traitor. Anna Chapman is a spy.
mudder, the opposing view is that Pollard only confessed to one count of leaking classified documents, which averages, they say, a 7 year sentence. He never confessed to any traitor allegations, if they were legally charged.
I’d like to ask Barney Frank, Gary Ackeman, and the other congress critters and release petitioners and letter-writers advocating free pollard on that rational and on humanitarian grounds, what they think Bib Would do if the situation was reversed.
Would Israel release a born and bred Israeli citizen who, while in the IDF, sold secret key Israeli defense documents enough to fill a big walk-in-closet to American officials?
Because 70,000 Americans petitioned Bibi N to do so, so he could go “home” to America? link to timesofisrael.com
I can’t conceive of it since there is no 5th column of Israelis who are American Firsters–in every crack and crevice of Israel’s government agencies influencing Israeli foreign policy.
Pollard sold that information. It mapped our entire missile defense system. And he sold it during the height of the Cold War.
check treatment of Mordechai Vanunu
What about an exchange of Vanunu for Pollard?
lysias, another good idea! Imagine the publicity on such an exchange! Might even wake up Dick and Jane a tad.
The mere mention of the traitorous israel firster Barney Frank makes me wanna vomit!
Disgusting!
p.s. I’m told by an ex intelligence person that ever since the Pollard scandal, the CIA is reluctant to place known zionists in high positions in their offices – though this is NOT their ‘official’ policy.
The real issue is why is that not the official policy?
In “The Case Against Jonathan Pollard,” Seymour M. Hersh relates a conversation between the late William J. Casey, then CIA director, and one of his station chiefs, a month after Pollard’s arrest. When his subordinate asked why the CIA chief was ordering stepped-up monitoring of an Israeli delegation on a routine visit,
“‘He asked if I knew anything about the Pollard case,’ the station chief recalled, and he said that Casey had added, ‘For your information, the Israelis used Pollard to obtain our attack plan against the USSR, all of it. The coordinates, the firing locations, the sequences. And for guess who? The Soviets.’ Casey had then explained that the Israelis had traded the Pollard data for Soviet émigrés. ‘How’s that for cheating?’ he had asked.”
link to antiwar.com
Seriously, what can we expect the American people to think of Israel and it’s supporters? does any other special friend deserve more?
“The Pollard case is emblematic – but it was just the beginning of a years-long effort by U.S. counterintelligence to rid themselves of the Israeli incubus. Law enforcement was – and presumably still is – convinced Pollard was very far from alone, and that a highly placed “mole” had provided him with key information. In his quest to procure very specific information, Pollard knew precisely which documents to look for – knowledge he couldn’t access without help from someone very high in government circles.
In addition, the National Security Agency (NSA) intercepted a phone conversation between an Israeli intelligence officer and his boss in Tel Aviv, during which they discussed how to get hold of a letter by then-secretary of state Warren Christopher to Yasser Arafat. The Washington spy suggested they use “Mega,” but his boss demurred: “This is not something we use Mega for,” he averred.
The search for Mega and his underlings continues to this day, as U.S. counterintelligence attempts to rip up what appears to be a vast Israeli spy operation by its very deep roots. That’s why they went after Ben Ami Kadish, who handed over U.S. secrets to Tel Aviv and shared a handler with Pollard, and why they indicted Steve Rosen and Keith Weissman, two top officials of AIPAC, the powerful pro-Israel lobbying group. That’s why they were listening on the other end as Jane Harman promised an Israeli agent to intervene in the Rosen-Weissman case. And now a new front has been opened up in this subterranean war with the arrest of Stewart David Nozette, a top U.S. scientist who worked for the Pentagon, had access to the most closely guarded nuclear secrets, and was the lead scientist in the search for water on the moon.
Nozette’s case is interesting because of his impressive resume: he held top positions with the Department of Energy, the Department of Defense, and NASA, and he served on the White House National Space Council under George H.W. Bush. From 1989 until March 2006, he held “Q” clearance, which means he had access to “critical nuclear weapon design information” and vital information concerning 20 “special access programs” – secrets only a very few top government officials had knowledge of.
In other words, this wasn’t just some mid-level schmuck who wanted to sell out his country for cash: he was one of the big boys – the principal author of the Clementine biostatic radar experiment, which allowed U.S. scientists to discover water on the moon – a kind of J. Robert Oppenheimer figure, whose singular contributions to the U.S. space program and its military applications granted him security clearances available to a very select few.”
link to original.antiwar.com
here’s a radio excerpt from last month w/grant about nozette.
link to youtube.com
link to ccun.org
“The Washington spy suggested they use “Mega,” but his boss demurred: “This is not something we use Mega for,” he averred.”
The Mega Group, founded in 1991 by Charles and Edgar Bronfman, Michael Steinhardt, Max Fisher, and several dozen other multi-billionaires, meets secretly twice a year, and, since its founding, has sought to impose its top-down control over the “alphabet soup” of pro-Israel political action committees, self-styled civil rights organizations, and tax-exempt charities. Among the Mega Group’s institutional power bases are the World Jewish Congress, the Conference of Presidents of Major Jewish American Organizations, and the United Jewish Fund—a recent merger of the major American and Canadian Jewish charities, disbursing annual gross contributions of nearly $3 billion.
According to one Israeli source, the group has expanded in recent years, and now is made up of over 50 American and Canadian super-rich Zionist activists. The dominant figures in the group—the Bronfman brothers, Steinhardt, and Fisher—all have longstanding personal and family organized-crime pedigrees, tracing back to the Meyer Lansky National Crime Syndicate. The Canada-based Bronfman gang, headed by Edgar and Charles’ father Sam, and by Max Fisher, got their start as bootleggers during Prohibition. Fisher was a leader of the Detroit-based Purple Gang, which, in collusion with Moe Dalitz’s Cleveland-centered “Jewish Navy,” smuggled Bronfman’s illegal booze across the Great Lakes from Canada into the Midwest. The Bronfman family motto, which applies to most of the Mega Group, is: “From rags, to rackets, to riches, to respectability.”
Michael Steinhardt, like Edgar and Charles Bronfman, is the son of a Meyer Lansky lieutenant, “Red” Steinhardt, who was the National Crime Syndicate’s number-one jewel fence. “Red” Steinhardt was also a partner with Lansky in the Havana casinos prior to Castro’s takeover, and was also affiliated with the Genovese organized-crime family. According to Michael Steinhardt’s autobiography, it was his father’s ill-gotten gains that put him through the University of Pennsylvania Wharton School of Business; and it was syndicate loot that started him on a successful career as a Wall Street speculator and hedge-fund manager.
For the past 15 years, Steinhardt has been one of Presidential wanna-be Sen. Joseph Lieberman’s (D-Conn.) biggest boosters, having founded the neo-conservative Democratic Leadership Council (DLC), and promoted Lieberman as the group’s poster boy.
Steinhardt grabbed headlines in January 2001, when he played a pivotal role in conning President Bill Clinton into granting a Presidential pardon to Russian Mafiya “Godfather” Marc Rich, one of Steinhardt’s longtime business partners. Rich was a fugitive from U.S. Justice Department indictments for tax evasion and trading with the enemy (Iran). As EIR reported on Jan. 10, Rich is another source of dirty money flows into the Sharon camp, through his secret Russian Mafiya partner, Grigori Loutchansky, among others.
link to informationclearinghouse.info
I bet Rahm Emmanuel was doing more than fixing jeeps for the IDF. I think he went to Mossad finishing school, and he became Clinton’s top fundraiser immediately upon his return to the OSA.
“DAVID STEINER AIPAC: I’ve known Bill for seven, eight years from the National Governors Association. I know him on a personal basis. I have friends AIPAC. One of my friends AIPAC is Hillary Clinton’s scheduler, one of my officer’s daughters works there. We gave two employees from AIPAC leave of absences to work on the campaign. I mean, we have a dozen people in that campaign, in the headquarters.
HAIM KATZ: You mean in Little Rock?
DAVID STEINER AIPAC: In Little Rock, and they’re all going to get big jobs. We have friends AIPAC. I also work with a think tank, the Washington Institute. I have Michael Mandelbaum and Martin Indyk being foreign policy advisers. Steve Speigel—we’ve got frienDavid Steiner AIPAC—this is my business.”
“HAIM KATZ: Let me tell you, I think Joe Lieberman would have, uh, would have, if he wasn’t Jewish, that’s the only problem he has. He’s highly respected.
DAVID STEINER AIPAC: I’d like to see him on the Supreme Court.
HAIM KATZ: If Clinton is elected, has he told you who he’s going to put on the Supreme Court?
DAVID STEINER AIPAC: We’re talking now. We don’t have no commitments yet. We’re just negotiating. We’re more interested right now, in the secretary of state and the secretary of National Security Agency. That’s more important to us.
HAIM KATZ: If Clinton is elected, who do you think will be secretary of state?
DAVID STEINER AIPAC: We don’t know yet, we’re negotiating.”
link to mjayrosenberg.com
I have asked this before….does anyone know of a similar phenomenon in history where a country is so controlled and it’s government totally controlled by a group of foreign loyalist for a foreign country?
I’ve searched and searched and can’t find another example of this anywhere.
Who controls the central banks in England, France, Germany, and the US?
“I care not what puppet is placed on
the throne of England to rule the Empire, …
The man that controls Britain’s money
supply controls the British Empire.
And I control the money supply.”
What about the IMF and World bank, which have effectively left dozens of countries without real sovereignty?
This recent article from the Jewish Journal indicates Mitt Romney is slightly more likely than Obama to release Pollard:
link to jewishjournal.com
The working realistic premise, of course, is, a calculation by both Obama and Mitt as to whether the big Zionist bucks that would be added to their respective campaign coffers, and the great mainstream press accolades re their “wonderful humanitarianism” and “sense of fairness” would be offset by an angry patriotic blowback, likely led by the US IT community that led the protests originally. What a sorry state we are in.
I’ve been making purely factual comments the last few days on MW, but many of them never turn up–anyone else experiencing this?
citizen, i have been having some tech problems with the site lately but i’ve also been having computer issues so it’s hard distinguishing whether it is on my end or not. also, when i post a comment the page doesn’t comebackon it gets ‘stuck’ but when i open another page and come back to the thread my comment is there.
have you tried re-entering your comment? btw, i checked the back pages/trash..(i went back for over a week) the only comment i see of yours is a duplicate of one that was published today.
link to mondoweiss.net
Thanks, Annie. Often, in last few days, when I hit the post button, my comment does not immediately appear as it always did in the past (with notice it is subject to moderator review). Yet sometimes it does. Sometimes it appears later, sometimes not (after I go elsewhere and return, and /or reload the page. A few times I reentered the comment and later it turned up twice.
you might want to write adam and phil about possible tech issues. i have mentioned my recent problems to them (but then again w/the caveat i have been having computer issues on my end). but specifically my comment does not immediately appear as it always did in the past (with notice it is subject to moderator review), this is similar to what i am experiencing although my comments are not subject to review. i have gotten into the habit of just opening new page from my computers history function (where i was is first in line) every time i comment and then sometimes clicking the refresh.
anyway, write adam and phil, they don’t know about this stuff unless people tell them. plus, they are often very busy. last week felt hectic, so much news.
I’ve had the same glich Citizen. The comment doesn’t appear immediately then it turns up later.
Jonathan Pollard thinks he should be released because he was a Jew doing his duty. Ackerman and Frank, as Jews, agree. Does anyone seriously believe that Ackerman, Frank, and the rest of the Israel Lobby would be arguing to free the spy if he were not Jewish? Claiming to be victims of anti-Semitism for that ilk is just a sloganeer’s way of having your cake and eating it too.
“Does anyone seriously believe that Ackerman, Frank, and the rest of the Israel Lobby would be arguing to free the spy if he were not Jewish?”
Does anybody think that outspoken supporters of a non-Jewish traitor would not immediately be targeted as traitors/probable spies?
I think and hope that Pollard is not released. A number of US Presidents have been approached by Pollard supporters, and Pollard is a popular cause in Israel, but Pollard remains in prison. There is enough opposition among members of the US intelligence community that the simplest and easiest thing for a US President is to do nothing.
Incidentally, some contributors to Mondoweiss seem (to me) to exaggerate the power of the Israel Lobby. The Pollard case is an important problem for the exaggerators: Israel wants Pollard released, but the US says no.
There are other cases of conflict between the US and Israel: consider, for example, the Lavi fighter, an advanced fighter plane developed by Israel with US help. Both Israel and the US put in a lot of money to build a prototype. And the Israeli scientific/technical/military complex were proud that Israel had built its own figher plans. But because the Lavi was a direct competitor with US airplanes, the Lavi never went into production. Because the US vetoed the Lavi.
Want another exception? The 1956 Suez crisis pitted Israel, Britain and France against the US and the USSR. The US forced Israel to withdraw from the Sinai.
Yes, there is an Israel Lobby. Yes, it has a lot of clout. But some people overestimate that clout.
The US/Israeli alliance has persisted because the two countries have a common interest in opposing Arab nationalism. The leaders of the US and Israel think that on the whole, and in the long run, the interests of the two countries overlap. But there are exceptions, and I just cited three exceptions: the Pollard case, the Lavi fighter, and the 1956 Suez crisis.
Yes, I agree, Nevada Ned, but the examples you site are a long time ago already; how about an example more recent? There is none.
George W. Bush was lobbied to pardon Pollard as GWB left the White House, but he didn’t. See the Washington Post story from January 14, 2008, Bush Trip Revives Israeli Push for Pardon of Spy.
LOTS of US politicians have vowed (during their election campaign) to move the US Embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, but they promptly forget all about it after the election…that is, until the next election looms. Then the whole charade starts over again.
As far as I have been able to discern, there are only two items on which the United States disobeys Israel. One is Pollard. The full extent of his activities, with precision, is itself highly classified. Whatever politicians say about releasing him during their campaigns, if and when they are elected, they receive a visit from some highly placed people in US intelligence who provide information (beyond what has been mentioned publicly by anyone) which persuades them to drop the subject. The most recent former spook to tell me this is Giraldi.
The second item on which the US disobeys Israel is on the status of Jerusalem. For reasons that elude me – and I have not been able to get a convincing answer as to what they are – the US actually takes the 1947 Partition Resolution seriously when it comes to the international status of Jerusalem. Politicians will declare that the US Embassy must be moved to Jerusalem, but once they are in power, they receive a visit from the State Department which convinces them to drop the subject. The US Consulate in Jerusalem has a unique status in that it reports directly to the State Department and not to the Embassy in Tel Aviv. I have not been able to get a clear answer from Ambassadors and other highly placed people as to why our government has religion on this matter and ignores all other facts and matters of international law in Palestine.
Anyone have any ideas?
Homingpigeon, maybe because American Christians would rise up in rage? Jerusalem is, after all the home of the three Abrahamic religions. Here’s where Obama was at on Jerusalem after two years in office:
““For me, the Jew that I am, Jerusalem is above politics,” (Eli) Weisel wrote. “It is mentioned more than six hundred times in Scripture — and not a single time in the Koran. Its presence in Jewish history is overwhelming. There is no more moving prayer in Jewish history than the one expressing our yearning to return to Jerusalem. To many theologians, it IS Jewish history, to many poets, a source of inspiration. It belongs to the Jewish people and is much more than a city; it is what binds one Jew to another in a way that remains hard to explain. When a Jew visits Jerusalem for the first time, it is not the first time; it is a homecoming.”
“Most of the problems [between America and Israel] remain, but the intensity on both sides and the recriminations are gone,” Weisel added. “During our lunch, it was clear that the President does at least know that Jerusalem is the center of Jewish history, and he knows you can’t ignore 3,000 to 4,000 years of history. I believe the only way to attain peace is to put Jerusalem at the end of the negotiations, not at the beginning.”
By this summer, with the fall midterm elections looming ever larger in the calculations of the White House, the Obama administration seemed to soften some of its more controversial Mideast policy initiatives. For instance, on Jerusalem, the White House conceded that the question of the city’s status should now come at the end of negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians, as Elie Weisel desired, rather than at the beginning, as the president originally wanted.”
link to edwardklein.com
Homingpigeon, I wrote you a response but in last few days most of mine do not appear after I hit the reply button, and they are not there. A few have appeared later when I returned to the thread.
@Citizen
Jews have always believed that first the messiah will come and afterwards all the Jews will return to the Holy Land. They will go there under the messiah’s leadership. See Isaiah Chapter 11 which begins with a description of the messiah, and then says (v. 12), “And He (i.e. G-d) will lift up a banner to the nations, and He will gather in the scattered of Israel, and the diaspora of Yehudah He will gather from the four corners of the earth.” See also Rambam Melachim 11:1, “The king messiah will eventually arise and restore the kingship of the house of David to its former status, build the Temple and gather in the exiles of Israel.”
See also the Talmud (Kesubos 111a) which states that nowadays the Jewish people is forbidden under oath to take over the Holy Land. Clearly then, taking over Eretz Yisroel is something we cannot do on our own, before the messiah comes. We must wait for the messiah to tell us in the name of G-d that the exile is over and the oath is no longer in force.
How will we know who the messiah is? He will bring all Jews to repent and fulfill the laws of the Torah (Rambam, Melachim 11:4). This is such a hard task that no false messiah will be able to accomplish it and fool the world. Whoever does this clearly has G-d’s help and is designated by G-d to be the messiah.
The Satmar Rav notes (Vayoel Moshe Chapters 48 and 80) that by making the repentance of the entire Jewish people the criterion for the messiah, the Rambam is not leaving open the door for impostors. On the contrary, to make everything dependent on miracles and wonders would be dangerous, because sometimes a false prophet is given the ability to fool people with miracles (Devarim 13:3). But to make all Jews do teshuva is such a monumental task that, in the normal way of the world, no one can do it. If someone does succeed, it is a clear sign that G-d has sent him.
Whatever the criteria are for the messiah, it is clear that we have to wait for him, and thus it is certainly wrong to conquer the Holy Land under a movement such as Zionism that does not even claim that any particular person is the messiah.
(Zionist they ssure know how to tell the Big Lie)
Jew4palestine
link to jewsagainstzionism.com
In following Mondoweiss, I don’t see much overestimation of the lobby’s “clout.” Many of the arguments seem to follow along the lines of:
1) The Israel lobby has too much influence.
2) That influence harms the majority of Americans.
3) The lobby gained and maintains that influence through illicit means.
The Lavi was cancelled partially due to illegal activity—Israel wanted to repackage and resell proprietary US technology to other countries, including US adversaries. Even the US Congress would not have been able to keep up US contractor involvement much longer if all of their best stuff was leaking to competitors. The issue, by the way, has not gone away. Israel is complaining that too many systems (paid for by US taxpayers) are “black box” and don’t allow Israeli access to the underlying technology. They are now chafing at not being allowed access to the source code for the F-22.
The 1956 Suez Crisis seems a little dated as a test of present-day influence. The lobby was somewhat hobbled by the Eisenhower administration’s insistence that it could not use tax-deductible charitable contributions to lobby Congress. It’s been a long time since anyone seriously looked at all those hundreds of millions of dollars flowing out of the US as “charity.” Although we’ve tried: link to original.antiwar.com
The lobby has undue influence, but sometimes overextends itself, confident that there won’t be any real consequences…
-grant
PS It’s too early to tell on Pollard. Let’s see what happens by next February.
Thanks Grant, what you do is invaluable and under appreciated, one day, hopefully, Americans will be thankful for all you have done.
Ditto here, I greatly admire Grant and all his courageous work in behalf all Americans and humanity.
i’ll second what atime forpeace said grant. i have never told you before but i am in complete awe of what you do. it is a miracle you are still alive. thank you from the bottom of my heart.
Ditto that…Grant. You do great work…some day it will break thru the political barricade.
ditto..ditto. Thanks Grant
Dear Grant:
(1) On overestimating the power of the Israel Lobby: many people (not just at Mondoweiss) think that the US would not be invading and occupying Iraq if it were not for the power of the Israel Lobby. In other words, the Lobby convinced a reluctant GW Bush administration to attack Iraq.
My opinion is that the US wanted to attack Iraq, so whatever the Lobby wanted was beside the point. The situation was that in 2003 the political support from US allies was collapsing for the US blockade of Iraq. So Bush/Cheney had to do something. The choices were: get in or get out.
It turns out that Cheney himself wrote a book about his role as Defense Secretary in the George H. W. Bush administration during Gulf War I. In his book, Cheney explains how capturing Baghdad would have left the US bogged down in an endless occupation of a hostile country. (Which is just what happened.) But since the choices were: get in or get out, the temptation to get in was overwhelming.
(2) I agree that the 1956 Suez Crisis was definitely in another era. Lots of things changed after the 1967 Six-Day War. US aid to Israel quadrupled in the wake of the war. And Nasserism never recovered. The US rewarded Israel for destroying Nasserism. The Lobby grew in power after 1967.
My point was that the 1956 Suez Crisis cannot be explained if we assume that US and Israeli interests are identical, or always overlapping. In that crisis Israeli interests (in seizing the Sinai) conflicted with US interests, and Israel had to withdraw.
“On overestimating the power of the Israel Lobby: many people (not just at Mondoweiss) think that the US would not be invading and occupying Iraq if it were not for the power of the Israel Lobby.”
The I lobby were one of the very powerful components who pushed hard for the invasion of Iraq. Confluence of interest. Oil, neo, theo cons. Former Secretary of the Treasury Paul O’neil under Bush 43 said in Susskinds “The Price of Loyalty” that Wolfowitz was pushing hard for the invasion in the first Bush 43 cabinet meetings in early 2001. That same group started pushing for military action against Iran based on unsubstantiated claims soon after the invasion of Iraq. Gerecht, Ledeen, Bolton, Rice, Gaffney, Wolfowitz, Cheney etc were everywhere on the MSM repeating false claims about Iran
Heard on NPR the other day that Ahmad Chalabi is waiting in line for Al Maliki to fall from grace.
Too much influence on U.S. foreign policy.
With Annie on thanking you for what you do.
Col Patrick Lang over at sicsempertyranis has said this…
“I was on the damage assesment board that looked at what Pollard had done for Israel and to the US.
Most of the purloined material had nothing to do with the ME and everything to do with the Warsaw Pact. The Israelis wanted the material for “trade goods.”
Pollard was 150% Israel’s guy then and now. The Israelis once again betrayed our trust. Any “American” who wants Pollard pardoned should emigrate to Israel with him if he is released. pl”
Barney Frank’s political career seems to be over. So why is he doing this?
He has always been an Israeli firster.
I am 100% in favor of releasing Pollard under visible political pressure.
In my opinion he should have been hanged for treason – but he wasn’t. Now we are paying to keep him alive.
The damage he did cannot be undone. He will never be in a position to do any more damage to us. However, we can use his release to make visible to the somnambulant majority of Americans how much power a foreign nation has over us through their sayanim in politics. In a weird way, his release can help us more than keeping him locked up where no one can see him or highlight the damage he did to us.
Frankly, I am surprised by why Israel wants Pollard released since there is no honor among thieves, unless they want to convince other would-be spies that Israel is like the marines and never leaves a man behind. In continuously bringing up the Pollard issue they are making more Americans aware that Israel is not a friend and that most of our politicians have been compromised. So, perhaps, I should contradict myself and argue that keeping him in prison and keeping the controversy alive is well worth paying for his food and lodgings.
Free Pollard and enrage our Intelligence people to revolt! No wait, keep him locked up and the debate alive and cause the common citizenry to revolt! Either is good for us.
Maybe I am not 100% for releasing him after all!
“Free Pollard and enrage our Intelligence people to revolt!”
Or demand that those documents having to do with the damage done to the U.S. by Pollards treasonous activities that are now locked in a vault be released.
Interesting that the usual zio-apologists have left this story alone. Cowards.
Yep – they fear a debate on this topic would make more Americans aware.
the list of individuals who have an continue to push for Pollards release should all be investigated ” “THE TRUE EXTENT OF THE SPY’S DAMAGE REMAINS LOCKED IN GOVERNMENT VAULTS” There would be demands to release the reports about the real damage done by Pollards spying.
link to voices.washingtonpost.com
“In a piece written for a forthcoming journal of the Association of Former Intelligence Officers, founded years ago to support the CIA, Bowman notes that there have been “few rebuttals of this escalation of calls for Pollard’s release…mainly because so few were cognizant of the scope of Pollard’s disclosures, or the misuses of those disclosures, and the damage they did to our own operations and sources.”
The true extent of the spy’s damage remains locked in government vaults, Bowman writes, “because when a plea agreement was reached, it was no longer necessary to litigate issues that could have exposed the scope of Pollard’s treachery — and the exposure of classified systems.”
But the retired Navy captain singles out three of Pollard’s leaks, the first being “the daily report from the Navy’s Sixth Fleet Ocean Surveillance Information Facility (FOSIF) in Rota, Spain, a top-secret document filed every morning reporting all that had occurred in the Middle East during the previous twenty-four hours, as recorded by the NSA’s most sophisticated monitoring devices.”
“Probably the most serious disclosure (of those of which we are aware) was the TOP SECRET NSA RAISIN manual, which lists the physical parameters of every known signal [or electronic communication], notes how we collect signals around the world, and lists all the known communications links then used by the Soviet Union,” Bowman writes.
“It is certainly the thing that stood out in the mind of the sentencing judge; particularly when Pollard alleged at sentencing that there really was no harm done. The judge interrupted and brought him up short, pointing specifically to disclosure of the RAISIN manual”
You have to wonder what is in those documents locked away in D.C. vaults about the damage done to U.S. National Security by Pollard’s activities. Wonder if Frank and team will push for this? The intelligence community should…as well as the public.
link to jta.org
“Congressional staffers described Nyer as “relentless,” and he eventually struck gold: Rep. Barney Frank (D-Mass.), who chairs the U.S. House of Representatives Banking Committee, agreed to sign on. That prompted a total of 39 signatures — all from Democrats — to the letter sent to Obama.
Getting Frank was a coup, one congressional insider said, not only because he has a leadership position, but because his pronounced liberalism in other arenas adds credibility to an effort that has been identified in recent years with the Israeli and pro-Israel right.
Frank took up the cause because he long has believed that Pollard’s life sentence was disproportionate to the crime, his spokesman said.
“It is something he feels strongly about,” Harry Gural told JTA.
Launching the initiative at a Capitol Hill news conference Nov. 18, Frank listed two factors that made the matter timely: Pollard’s 25 years in prison as of Sundayand the parlous state of the Israeli-Palestinian peace process.
“The justification of this is the humanitarian one and the notion that the American justice system should be a fair one,” Frank said. “We believe that clemency after 25 years for the offenses of Jonathan Pollard would do that.
“My own hope is that if the president would do this, it would contribute to the political climate within the democracy of Israel and would enhance the peace process.”
Frank:
“”The justification of this is the humanitarian one and the notion that the American justice system should be a fair one,” Frank said. “We believe that clemency after 25 years for the offenses of Jonathan Pollard would do that.
“My own hope is that if the president would do this, it would contribute to the political climate within the democracy of Israel and would enhance the peace process.”
What peace process?
Folks should be contacting their Reps and Obama demanding that if there is really any serious consideration of releasing Pollard those documents having to do with Pollards traitorous activities that were never submitted in the trial will be released. So that that our Reps, the Justice system, the public really knows exactly what damage his activities did to U.S. national security
At Wikipedia
“Clinton states that Madeleine Albright, Sandy Berger, and George Tenet were all “adamantly opposed” to letting Pollard out of prison.[64]
“Former FBI and navy lawyer M.E. “Spike” Bowman, top legal adviser to navy intelligence at the time, and with intimate knowledge, of the Pollard case, has issued a detailed critique of the case for clemency, asserting “Because the case never went to trial, it is difficult for outside observers to understand the potential impact and complexity of the Pollard betrayal. There is no doubt that Pollard was devoted to Israel. However, the extent of the theft and the damage was far broader and more complex than evidenced by the single charge and sentence.”[86] Bowman wrote that Pollard “was neither a U.S. nor an Israeli patriot. He was a self-serving, gluttonous character seeking financial reward and personal gratification.”[86]
In September 2011, Vice President Joe Biden was reported by the New York Times to have told a group of rabbis that, “President Obama was considering clemency, but I told him, ‘Over my dead body are we going to let him out before his time. If it were up to me, he would stay in jail for life.’”[87] A few days later, Biden denied having used those words although he acknowledged that the sentiment attributed to him was, in fact, his position on the issue.[88]
Republican presidential candidate Newt Gingrich has expressed support for releasing Pollard.[”
James Woolsey, Kissenger, Lawrence Korb support releasing him. Interesting to see who is supporting the release, who is not.
The Pollard release website:
link to jonathanpollard.org
There have been many Rep letters sent in support of Pollards release over the years. Keep in mind President Bush 43 rejected this bad idea.
RELEASE THOSE DOCUMENTS HAVING TO DO WITH THE DAMAGE DONE TO U.S. NATIONAL SECURITY BY POLLARDS TRAITOROUS ACTIVITIES LOCKED IN D.C. VAULTS. That is what should be released
Look at this list of those pressuring for a release of a traitor to the U.S.
link to jonathanpollard.org
Senator Arlen Spector
Senator Dennis DeConcini: 1996 – 2009 – Aug 2010 – Dec. 2010
Senator Frank Lautenberg
Senator Carol Mosley-Braun
Congressman Gary Ackerman
Congressman Eliot Engel
Congressman Chaka Fattah
Congressman Barney Frank and Colleagues
Congressman Jon D. Fox
Congressman Lee Hamilton
Congressman Peter King
Congresswoman Margolies-Mezvinsky
Congressman Jerrold Nadler: 1993, 2000
Congressman John Olver
Congressman Frank Pallone
Congressman Bill Pascrell: Dec. 1999 – June 2001
Congressman Jim Saxton
Congresswoman Janice Schakowsky
Congressman Charles Schumer: 1993 – 1994 – 1999
Congressman Walter Tucker III
Congressman Henry Waxman
Congressman Anthony Weiner: 1999 – 2000 – 2001 – 2004 – 2008 – 2011
Congressman Ted Weiss
Congressman Allen West
Congressman Robert Wexler
NY State Senator Seymour Lachman: March 2000 – Sept. 2000
NY State Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver
NJ Assembly Majority Leader Paul DiGaetano
NY Assemblyman Sam Colman: 1993 – 1996 – 2000
NY Assemblyman Thomas DiNapoli
NY Assemblyman Dov Hikind
NJ Assemblyman John Kelly
NY Assemblyman Jeffrey Klein
NJ Assemblyman Gary Schaer
NY Assemblywoman Helene Weinstein
NYC Public Advocate Mark Green
NYC Councilman Noach Dear: 1999 – 2000 – 2001
NYC Comptroller Alan Hevesi: 1999 – 2001
Bronx Borough President Fernando Ferrer
David Liba’i: Israeli Justice Minister
Amram Mitzna: Mayor of Haifa
Avraham Ravitz: Leader, United Torah Parties
Yossi Sarid: Israeli Cabinet Minister
Arik Sharon: Israeli Opposition Leader
We need a grassroots campaign to ensure that these people never get re-elected even to the lofty post of county dog catcher agin!
Thanks for the list, Kathleen – I am mailing it to everyone I know.
Send your own comments to the White House about whether releasing Pollard is a good idea. Releasing a traitor for what peace process? What is the message?
link to whitehouse.gov
Too bad the same group of individuals pushing for the traitor Jonathon Pollards release do not push President Obama to pressure Israel to get back to the internationally recognized borders and stop building illegal settlements. Too bad this same group is not spending their time pressuring Israel to abide by UN resolutions and internationally accepted borders and to sign the NPT. Wonder when Barney Frank will write a letter like that?
Exchange Pollard for Vanunu.
Writing in Commentary magazine (6/11/2012), writer James S. Tobin is pessimistic about getting Pollard released.
“But even if after more than 26 years of his imprisonment, the case for clemency based on what Peres called ‘humanitarian’ grounds is getting stronger, it is no more likely to meet with success than previous appeals.”
NO MORE LIKELY TO MEET WITH SUCCESS THAN PREVIOUS APPEALS.
Hope he’s right!!
Here’s the link.