B'nai Brith President: "Pollard Potential Dreyfus II"

March 6, 1998 - News Release

Jerusalem - Kol Yisroel Israel Radio today reported that following his March 5, 1998 prison visit with Jonathan Pollard, B'nai Brith International President Tommy Baer spoke to Kol Yisroel Washington Reporter Chaim Zissovitch. According to Kol Yisroel radio reports today, Mr. Baer declared that it is time for the US to release Pollard and return him to Israel. Mr. Baer indicated that Pollard's life sentence is unprecedented and that failure on the part of the US to release him now would turn this case into another Dreyfus Case.

The Alfred Dreyfus Case represents the historical epitome of the perversion of the law for anti-semitic purposes. Dreyfus spent 12 years incarcerated on Devil's Island until Emile Zola's famous treatise "J'accuse" ("I accuse") galvanized the support necessary to bring about Dreyfus' release. 1997 was the 100th anniversary of the Dreyfus case.

B'nai Brith's American Press Release on the Visit follows:

(WASHINGTON, D.C.) -- March 6, 1998 -- B'nai B'rith International President Tommy P. Baer met for the first time yesterday with Jonathan Jay Pollard who is serving a life sentence for spying on behalf of Israel. Baer said that B'nai B'rith "absolutely does not condone what Pollard did, but he has served longer than any individual convicted of the same crime. He has paid his debt to society."

"Mr. Pollard has made a clear statement of remorse for his misdeeds," said Baer who met with the former U.S. Naval intelligence analyst for more than 1 1/2 hours yesterday at the federal correction facility in Butner, North Carolina.

Baer pledged to rally support among American Jewish organizations on Pollard's behalf. "It is time," said Baer, "for the organized Jewish community in the United States to speak out on the basis of humanitarian concern and compassion for Mr. Pollard."

Pollard, who is serving a life sentence and has been incarcerated for 13 years, told Baer: "I am not a hero or a martyr and I object to any such characterizations."

B'nai B'rith has several times repeated its call for Pollard's sentence to be commuted to time already served, while consistently expressing its strong disapproval of his betrayal the trust placed in him. Most recently in 1996 B'nai B'rith delegates voted at its biennial convention to call upon President Clinton to commute the sentence on humanitarian grounds.

"I am not seeking exoneration and I do not claim my acts to have been justified," Pollard said.

It was Baer's observation that "Pollard's mental state is good, but that he suffers from several health problems."