WASHINGTON (JTA) — A top adviser to Benjamin Netanyahu acknowledged that he is the former Mossad agent named in a Pentagon leaks case.
Uzi Arad, said to be the Israeli prime minister-designate’s choice for national security adviser, has been denied a U.S. visa since 2007 reportedly because he is the former Mossad chief cited as meeting twice with Larry Franklin, a former Pentagon Iran analyst who pleaded guilty in 2006 to leaking Pentagon secrets.
"We had coffee and we talked about the agenda of the day — nothing classified, nothing secret, nothing related to espionage," Arad said Wednesday in an interview with The Associated Press. "If I was not a Mossad employee in the past, they would not have noticed me. My sin was that I was in the past in the Mossad. It’s not a big deal, and I believe that this issue will be resolved."
Franklin’s meetings with Arad occurred separately from his alleged relationship with two former American Israel Public Affairs Committee staffers now facing trial for handling sensitive information.
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