By Wolf Blitzer
\nEx BLITZER`S BLOG
\nCopyright by the Author
\nJune 13, 2012
\nIsraeli President Shimon Peres says he will ask Obama to give clemency to the former U.S. naval intelligence analyst who pleaded guilty to providing Israel with classified documents in 1987.
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Peres is in Washington to receive the Presidential Medal of Freedom from Obama. Editor`s note: Wolf Blitzer interviewed Pollard in a federal prison while he was awaiting his sentence. Blitzer wrote a book on the case, \u201cTerritory of Lies,\u201d\u009d published by Harper & Row in 1989. The New York Times Book Review cited it as one of the most notable books of that year.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" “The pressure is mounting on President Barack Obama to free Jonathan Jay Pollard, the American convicted of spying for Israel.”<<\/p>","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[93],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/israeldefender.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1699"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/israeldefender.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/israeldefender.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/israeldefender.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/israeldefender.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1699"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/israeldefender.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1699\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/israeldefender.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1699"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/israeldefender.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1699"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/israeldefender.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1699"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\nTwo congressmen, Reps. Christopher Smith, R-New Jersey, and Eliot Engel, D-New York, are circulating a letter on Capitol Hill asking the president to commute Pollards sentence to time served. <BR><BR>\n\u201cWhat Mr. Pollard did was wrong,\u201d\u009d the two lawmakers wrote. \u201cHe broke the law and deserved to be punished for his crime.\u201d\u009d <BR><BR>\nBut they say 25 years is a long enough sentence. <BR><BR>\nBut there<\/code>s also enormous pressure from inside the U.S. law enforcement and intelligence community to keep Pollard in jail.
\nWhen asked Wednesday what the administrations stance on the issue is, White House Press Secretary Jay Carney said, \u201cOur position has not changed and will not change today. I would simply remind you that Mr. Pollard was convicted of extremely serious crimes.\u201d\u009d <BR><BR>\nThis is not the first time this issue has come up. <BR><BR>\nUnder similar pressure from Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Former President Bill Clinton was close to freeing Pollard near the end of his second term. Clinton was trying to negotiate an interim Israeli-Palestinian peace agreement. But then-CIA Director George Tenet said he would resign if Pollard were freed. <BR><BR>\nAs part of his plea agreement in 1987, Pollard pleaded guilty. Because there was no trial, the Reagan administration did not need to release any sensitive or classified information as evidence. <BR><BR>\nIn exchange, Joseph E. diGenova, U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia, worked out an arrangement with Pollard<\/code>s defense attorneys that he would receive a substantial sentence but not the maximum sentence – life.
\nYet in an extraordinary move, Judge Aubrey Robinson rejected the plea agreement and sentenced Pollard to life, citing the enormous damage to U.S. national security that then-Defense Secretary Caspar Weinberger outlined in a classified memo to the court.
\nSo the pressure is now once again on Obama. Let`s see what he does.
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