2 U.S. Jewish Groups Criticize Severity of Pollard’s Sentence

Two major American Jewish groups have publicly criticized the life sentence given to convicted spy Jonathan Jay Pollard, signaling a shift in the community’s position toward the Jew who spied for Israel.

The American Section of the World Jewish Congress, representing 40 Jewish groups, issued a statement Monday asking that Pollard’s life sentence be commuted to time served.

And the Reform movement’s Central Conference of American Rabbis, the organization of Reform rabbis, said Tuesday it believes an “injustice” was done in Pollard’s sentencing.

The statement from the CCAR executive board said the group’s officers will consider filing a “friend of the court” brief next month, when Pollard’s lawyers file an appeal for a new trial.

Some Jewish community leaders said these statements exemplify a new outlook in the organized American Jewish community concerning Pollard, who once was studiously ignored by many communal leaders and organizations.

“I’m pleased (with the publicity) and think it’s reflective of a change in the mood in the community,” said Seymour Reich, former chairman of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations.

Reich, who three weeks ago visited Pollard in the maximum security prison in Marion, Ill., where he is being held in solitary confinement, added that since then, “everywhere I go, people come over to me and say that it’s about time the community responds to the harshness of the sentence.”

Pollard, a former naval intelligence officer in Washington, was arrested in 1985 for passing hundreds of secret documents to Israel. Two years later, he was sentenced to life imprisonment.

SHIFT AMONG ORGANIZED JEWRY

Pollard’s arrest aroused the ire and embarrassment of many in the U.S. Jewish community, who feared raising the issue of dual loyalty and who were angered that Israel would endanger the standing of the Jewish community by using an American Jew as a spy.

But those involved in organized Jewry say the community is starting to believe it can criticize Pollard’s sentence without excusing his crime.

“We would like commutation of the sentence, because we feel he has served enough,” said Evelyn Sommer, chairwoman of WJC’s American Section. “We believe his suffering is really out of proportion to the crime.”

Alan Dershowitz, Pollard’s lawyer, said the WJC statement “is an important first step and reflects the growing grass-roots sentiment in the Jewish community” that Pollard’s continuing imprisonment “is an affront to Israel, to American Jews and to justice.”

The Persian Gulf War, and the Iraqi Scud missile attacks on Israel, may have helped ease the tension between Pollard and U.S. Jewry, because of his contention that he gave Israel early warning of Iraq’s weapons capabilities.

During the Gulf crisis, his sister, Carol Pollard, said in an interview, “Right now is Jonathan’s time,” because people “realize that the information he gave Israel ensured that Israel was prepared” for such a threat.

In an interview Tuesday, she added that the WJC statement is “a historic step, given the size and stature of the group.” She applauded the Jewish community for taking a more public stand on her brother’s imprisonment.

The WJC resolution was also hailed by Israel’s Knesset Lobby on Behalf of Jonathan Pollard, which sent a letter to the WJC saying it had made a “very important decision.” It expressed hope that other American organizations would soon follow suit.

OTHERS GOT SHORTER SENTENCES

The group has been campaigning on behalf of Pollard. Last winter, it organized a petition, signed by 70 Knesset members, asking President Bush to treat Pollard with leniency.

“We believe that the crimes that Jonathan Pollard committed stemmed, in great part, from his intention to warn also of the unconventional Iraqi threat, which endangers the security of Israel and indeed the whole world,” said the Jan. 29 statement issued by the group.

Pollard’s supporters have long argued that he received an unduly harsh sentence, given that he was charged with passing classified documents to an ally.

They cite much shorter sentences given to others who have passed classified documents to non-enemy nations. Pollard’s sister referred to a 10-year sentence given to a weapons analyst for passing information to South Africa, and the less than four years given to a rocket scientist who tried to smuggle missile material to Egypt.

In a plea bargain agreement reached with the U.S. government, Pollard agreed to cooperate and plead guilty in exchange for a reduced sentence. But the Justice Department later claimed he broke his part of the agreement by speaking to journalist Wolf Blitzer, who wrote a book about the case.

Pollard’s supporters have suggested that anti-Semitism played a role in the long sentence, and they point to alleged statements by former Defense Secretary Caspar Weinberger showing great hostility toward Pollard.

Dershowitz said Weinberger was known to have a “problem” toward Jews and Israel.

After Pollard’s arrest, Weinberger referred to him as the most dangerous spy in U.S. history, saying he grossly compromised national security. A secret memo he wrote to the judge in Pollard’s case has never been released.

‘VISCERAL DISLIKE OF ISRAEL’

“It’s un-American to prosecute someone and sentence them on the basis of secrets and whispering, and people whispered into the judge’s ear,” said Dershowitz.

In a letter to Pollard’s father written last October by former Weinberger defense aide Lawrence Korb, Weinberger’s neutrality toward issues concerning Israel is raised.

“I am not aware of exactly what Weinberger told the court about the impact of the information Jonathan passed to Israel,” Korb wrote in the letter, a copy of which was obtained by the Jewish Telegraphic Agency

“I do know that Weinberger had an almost visceral dislike of Israel and the special place it occupies in our foreign policy,” said Korb, now director of the Center for Public Policy Education at the Brookings Institution in Washington.

“In my opinion, the severity of the sentence that Jonathan received was out of proportion to his alleged offense.”