Opposition Chairman, MK Yitzhak Herzog (Labor), called on the US Wednesday to free Jonathan Pollard without any linkage to deals for freeing terrorists.
At the Conference for Small and Medium-Sized Businesses, Herzog said that “Pollard does not belong to the Left or the Right. I would like to see him with us before the Seder night.”
Former senior Mossad man and government minister Rafi Eitan, who was Pollard's handler, said Wednesday that Israel “must not give up this time” and must take action for his immediate release.
"I never thought he would sit in jail for so long,” Eitan told Channel 10. “I thought he would sit for ten years.”
"Israel must set a clear condition: no Pollard, no deal,” he added, “and this is a condition that any deal must include, just like the conditions that the Palestinians lay down.”
If Pollard is released, revealed Eitan, he would like to meet with him. “I am just a small detail in this system because it has turned into a national issue – but what I intend to tell him, I will keep to myself.”
Eitan said that he is not in touch with the Pollard family. He explained that this is intentional, because he feels that he only hinders Pollard's release. “Everything that I do only interferes,” he explained. “Thr Americans see me as a person who performed a criminal offense as well.”