The former spy had dreamed of settling in Israel for years. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Saturday (November 21) welcomed the end of the travel ban on Jonathan Pollard, an American Jew imprisoned in the United States in 1985 for spying for the benefit of the Hebrew state. “The Prime Minister welcomes the lifting of restrictions on Jonathan Pollard” and expects his arrival in Israel “soon”, according to a message on WhatsApp from his cabinet.
Jonathan Pollard, a former US Navy analyst, served a 30-year sentence for disclosing secret US documents. He was released on parole in 2015, but remained banned from leaving the United States, among other restrictions, despite Israeli pressure.
On Friday, the US Department of Justice said it had lifted the conditions imposed on his release. According to the Israeli statement, Benjamin Netanyahu “pledged to obtain the release [de Jonathan Pollard] for several years ”and worked“ tirelessly ”to bring him back to Israel.
The former spy has no passport
The former Jewish spy shared thousands of crucial US documents with the Hebrew state intelligence service, straining relations between the two close allies.
Jonathan Pollard, 66, has regularly expressed his wish to move to Israel, where he obtained nationality in 1995 and where he is seen as a national hero by part of the population.
According to Israeli public radio, Jonathan Pollard may not be able to travel immediately, however, as he does not have a passport. In addition, he would wait to leave that his wife Esther, suffering, according to his lawyers, from an “aggressive form of cancer”, finished her current chemotherapy.
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