Special to WorldTribune.com

JERUSALEM — Israel’s parliament has reported U.S. espionage
operations in the Jewish state.

Several parliamentarians said the United States was spying on Israel’s
government and military despite friendship agreements. They called on the
government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to release information on
the foiling of U.S. spy plots in Israel.

“They are spying on a friendly country,” opposition parliamentarian
Arieh Eldad said.

During a July 31 session of the Knesset State Control Committee, Eldad, a physician and retired brigadier general, cited a series of leaks from the U.S. intelligence community on purported Israeli spying. One report said Israel’s Mossad broke into the apartments of CIA agents in Tel Aviv.

“It’s time to say out out loud what the CIA was doing in that apartment and what is happening on the roof of the U.S. embassy in Tel Aviv,” Eldad said.

Parliamentarians said the spate of leaks on purported Israeli espionage was meant to discredit the Jewish state and prevent the release of Jonathan Pollard.

Pollard, a former U.S. Navy analyst, has spent 27 years out of a life
sentence for relaying classified information to Israel. Over the last year,
scores of former U.S. officials and members of Congress have called for
Pollard’s release.

“If Obama realizes that he needs American Jewish votes or money, there
is hope to bring about Pollard’s release by November,” Eldad said. “But if
not, Israel must remove the mask [on U.S. spying in Israel].”

Eldad said Israel must be ready to expose U.S. efforts to spy on the
Jewish state. He said American espionage continued for decades after Israel
pledged not to operate in the United States.

“Israel no longer has anything to lose,” Eldad said. “We must demand his
release and add wholeheartedly that friendly countries do occasionally spy
on each other, as the Americans do [in Israel] today.”

Uri Ariel, chairman of the Knesset committee, said the United States has
repeatedly broken its promise toward Pollard and Israel. Ariel cited the
refusal by then-President Bill Clinton to free Pollard as part of a 1998
Israeli-Palestinian agreement and the violation of Pollard’s plea bargain
for a 10-year sentence in 1986.

The government refused to send a representative to the Knesset hearing,
which examined state efforts to free Pollard. Ariel said he was told by
Netanyahu’s office that it had nothing to tell the committee.

“We tried for a long time to coordinate the meeting with them but they
are clearly avoiding coming,” Ariel said. “It is wrong to say that the state
did everything in its power to release Jonathan Pollard. At the end of the
day, the man who acted for Israel is still incarcerated.”

At the hearing, a representative of the campaign to free Pollard said
support for his commutation has increased in the United States. The
representative, Efraim Lahav, said Americans, including government
officials, have not challenged the argument that Pollard has been in jail
for far longer than anybody else convicted of a similar offense.

“We know from our meetings with Americans that they have never
challenged us with facts that disprove our case,” Lahav, who represented the
Committee to Bring Jonathan Pollard Home, said.

  ‘they are spying on a friendly country’, Arieh Eldad, Benjamin Netanyahu, Israeli official calls out CIA: ‘They are spying on a friendly country’, Jonathan Pollard, Knesset State Control Committee, Mossad