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| Israeli spy's release again comes up at Camp David summit
CAMP DAVID, Maryland (CNN) -- White House spokesman Joe Lockhart said Monday that Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak is pushing for the United States to free convicted spy Jonathan Pollard as part of the Mideast peace negotiations. Pollard, a former U.S. naval intelligence official, pleaded guilty and was jailed in 1987 for spying for Israel. He is serving a life sentence.
"I'm not aware that it's come up in the context of the discussions," Lockhart said Monday, "but ... I don't know of any time the president has met with Barak in any format or extended session where, at some point, it's not raised." This is not the first time the Pollard case has come up during peace negotiations. A demand that the United States allow him to return to Israel delayed the official announcement of an interim peace agreement during the Wye River negotiations in October 1998. At the time, sources told CNN that U.S. President Bill Clinton had agreed to Pollard's release in principle, but he later rejected then-Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's request. Administration officials later said the president had promised only to review the case, as he has done several times, though several Israeli officials were convinced Clinton had assured Netanyahu that Pollard would be freed. U.S. Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, the U.S. Justice Department, the Department of Defense, the CIA and the FBI all opposed Pollard's release in 1998 and 1999, and CIA Director George Tenet reportedly threatened to resign if Pollard was released. Supporters of clemency for Pollard argued that other Americans convicted of espionage have received lesser sentences, and claimed that some suspected of spying for the former Soviet Union and other adversaries were not prosecuted in order to not expose U.S. intelligence information. RELATED STORIES: Clinton returns to Camp David hoping to mediate Mideast differences RELATED SITES: "New Jersey Jewish News" OpEd by Jonathan Pollard | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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