Morris Pollard, the father of Jonathan Pollard, has died at age 95. HIs family has sent an urgent plea to President Obama, asking him to show mercy and allow Jonathan Pollard compassionate leave to attend his father's funeral. Jonathan Pollard was convicted for passing classified information to a foreign country and has been incarcerated for 26 years
Pollard's father had been hospitalized for the last several months. During this period, activists on Pollard's behalf and various well-known Israelis, attempted to no avail to obtain permission for Jonathan to visit his father on a 24 hour leave.
The refusal prompted MK Aryeh Eldad to send a message of condolence to Jonathan, saying: "The people of Israel will not forget President Obama's cruelty in ignoring all the requests to free you. A president who lacks the basic human feeling that would allow a son's visit to his dying father should not wonder that the Jewish people will make every effort to prevent his re-election."
A petition signed by a 75 israeli MK's, asking Obama to allow Pollard to visit his dying father was to have been handed to Vice President Joe Biden shortly. It came too late.
MK Nachman Shai (Kadima), initiator of the petition, said that its signers represented a broad spectrum of parties and opinions, who united for this humanitarian purpose. "I hope that we will succeed in opening President Obama's heart," he had said.
Recent efforts on the part of various persons to convince President Shimon Peres, considered by Deptury Foreign Minister Danny Ayalon the natural choice to turn to Obama on this issue, had been unsuccessful.
Ayalon had told an Army Radio interviewer that "the President, who is the country's senior statesman and deals with political issues, is the most suitable person for this type of petition and a request from him to Obama would be treated seriously." Peres decided not to get involved..
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