Pollard Demands that Peres Testify
Hillel Fendel - Arutz Sheva News Service - May 30, 2006
A 3-judge Supreme Court panel will decide "at a later date" whether to respond favorably to Pollard's request to summon ex-PM Shimon Peres to testify about the case.
Jonathan Pollard, convicted in the U.S. for passing information to Israel, says Shimon Peres returned the papers that Pollard passed on - but only after receiving a promise from U.S. officials that the papers would not be used as evidence against him.
However, in the event, Pollard was convicted in a plea-bargain agreement and was sentenced to life in prison - with the above documents serving as the main body of evidence against him. Pollard is now serving his 21st year in prison.
Peres served at the time as Israel's Prime Minister. The suit claims that Peres and then-U.S. Secretary of State George Schultz struck the above deal. Darshan-Leitner asked that the Supreme Court summon Peres to testify and clarify the matter, as "he is the only one who can do so." She also asked that the papers be de-classified, in light of their declining, 21-year-old intelligence value.
Darshan-Leitner told Arutz-7's Shabtai Avraham that Israel fulfilled its part of the Peres-Schultz bargain and returned the documents, but the U.S. did not.
The State's representatives claimed that it is not clear there ever was such an agreement. This contrasts with the conclusions of the Eban Committee of the mid-1980's, which found that the U.S. did, in fact, commit itself not to use the papers against Pollard.
Jonathan Pollard's wife Esther said that the State should not spend its time fighting against its own agent, but should rather work to have him released.
The all-female panel of Supreme Court justices - Procaccia, Hayot and Naor - decided to postpone their decision as to whether to summon Peres. They are deliberating whether it is appropriate for the court to intervene in foreign policy issues. Darshan-Leitner said it is a civil rights issue and that the Court must therefore intervene.