The following is a statement released by Justice For Pollard following reports that Jonathan Pollard is scheduled for release:
A spate of hastily-written, poorly-researched and deeply inaccurate news reports about the status of Jonathan Pollard which have been published lately do a disservice to Jonathan Pollard and to readers. Judicious readers should be cautious not to allow their understanding of the Pollard case to be tainted by unfounded speculation and utter nonsense.
A case in point: recently, a widely-circulated report by the Israeli online news source YNET was so riddled by gross distortions and outright errors as to be more fantasy than fact.
A dead give-away of how deeply flawed the article was, was YNET’s pompous assertion that Pollard received and is serving ” a 30 year sentence”. Nonsense!
As is well known, Pollard is serving a LIFE SENTENCE! If Pollard were serving a 30 year sentence, mandatory parole would have occurred 10 years ago!
This was just one of many serious errors in a deeply flawed YNET “news” report which unfortunately was imitated and reprinted by others.
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10 Responses
Mechilas Kevoidcha,
Is he going out or not?
They do not seem to be denying the main premise of the report that he will be released soon. They are just saying that there are some inaccuracies.
This article,beats around the bush,says nothing and has an untrue proof.Frstly,it just spews anger and does not disprove the claim that Jonathan Pollard is slated for release.Furthermore,the original article stated that 30 years,if there is reason to release,is considered as having served a life sentence.It did not say that Pollard was sentenced to 30 years.Just because someone speaks strongly does not mean they are right.
The first rumor this appeared was in the Lakewood “scoop.”
um… I don’t believe this to be from his lawyer, his lawyer gave an interview for Times of Israel with a very different tone. He said they had no knowledge of a parole possibility but nothing as angry as this.
And the supposed parole date was based on a department of justice website. Not poor research, maybe a glitch in a system somewhere.
Um, what?
The issue for many American Jews is that Pollard’s actions betrayed his country and violated his sacred oath by selling America’s secrets. You can rationalize his behavior and motivations but his actions placed a cloud over the loyalty of every American Jew working in the federal government with access to classified information. Untold numbers of Jews have lost jobs, been denied promotions etc. because this guy managed to reinject the loyalty issue that had been around since the cold war era and the Rosenbergs. He still has not apologized to American Jews and the American people so not sure if a pardon is likely or warranted.
it might still need work so they might not wanna push it quicker than it needs to go.
#6 Pollard did not sell any American secrets; all he did he passed on documents about common enemy state to an ally.
Whether or not some Jews lost their jobs does not warrant him suffering idefinitely in jail for crime that commonly gets just 4-years in prison even for enemy spys.
We must all continue to daven for the health and release of Yonoson Ben Malka.
#6, whatever he did, his punishment is disproportionate. spies that have done worse got less time.
Re comment 6: The Jewish loyalty question predates the Cold War. It goes back to Joseph ben Jacob’s sojourn in Egypt, which led to the Jewish slavery thing in Egypt.