JERUSALEM (JTA) — Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu ordered an investigation into reports of American spying on Israeli leaders.
In his first comments following revelations that American intelligence intercepted e-mails from senior Israeli officials, Netanyahu said such actions were unacceptable.
“In the close ties between Israel and the United States, there are things that must not be done and that are not acceptable to us,” Netanyahu said Monday at the beginning of a Likud Party faction meeting at the Knesset.
Netanyahu announced at the meeting that he had ordered an investigation into the issue.
Netanyahu also told the party meeting that he had met with Esther Pollard and had updated her on his efforts to free her husband, the jailed spy Jonathan Pollard. Pollard is in the 29th year of a life sentence in a U.S. prison for spying for Israel while working as a civilian Navy intelligence analyst.
Netanyahu is expected to call for Pollard’s release as part of the current U.S.–brokered Israeli-Palestinian peace negotiations.
