Posted on 04/22/2008 12:07:37 PM PDT by anymouse
U.S. authorities arrested an American engineer on Tuesday on suspicion of giving secrets on nuclear weapons, fighter jets and air defense missiles to Israel during the 1980s, the Justice Department said.
Ben-Ami Kadish, 84, acknowledged his spying in FBI interviews and said he acted out of a belief that he was helping Israel, court papers said.
He was accused of reporting to an Israeli government handler who also dealt with Jonathan Jay Pollard, an American citizen serving a life term on a 1985 charge of spying for Israel.
Kadish's arrest is a sign the Pollard scandal, which remains an irritant in the close U.S. alliance with Israel, may have spread wider than was previously acknowledged. Kadish was arrested in New Jersey and was scheduled to be arraigned on Tuesday afternoon at U.S. District Court in New York City, authorities said.
"We will be informing the Israelis of this action," State Department spokesman Tom Casey said. "Twenty-plus years ago during the Pollard case we noted that this was not the kind of behavior we would expect from friends and allies and that would remain the case today."
Kadish's lawyer, Bruce Goldstein, did not immediately return a call for comment.
Israeli Foreign Ministry spokesman Arye Mekel, asked about the arrest, said: "We know nothing about it. We heard it from the media."
Pollard pleaded guilty in 1986. Israel granted him citizenship in 1996 and acknowledged in 1998 that the former U.S. Navy intelligence analyst was one of its spies. Israel has unsuccessfully sought Pollard's release.
Kadish is a Connecticut-born U.S. citizen who worked as a mechanical engineer at the U.S. Army's Armament Research, Development and Engineering Center at the Picatinny Arsenal in Dover, New Jersey.
His spying lasted roughly from 1979 to 1985, and his contact with the unnamed Israeli handler continued until March of this year, the federal complaint against him said.
The complaint said Kadish did not appear to receive any money in exchange for his suspected spying, just small gifts and restaurant meals.
Kadish, who had a security clearance, took 50 to 100 classified documents from the arsenal's library, working from a list provided by the handler identified in a federal complaint as "CC-1." The handler would then photograph the documents in Kadish's basement and Kadish would return them to the library, the complaint said.
It said one of the classified documents passed on by Kadish "contained information concerning nuclear weaponry." Israel is widely believed to have nuclear weapons but has never acknowledged it.
Another document obtained by Kadish related to "a major weapons system ... a modified version of an F-15 fighter jet that the United States had sold to another foreign country," the complaint said. It did not identify the country.
A third document contained information regarding the U.S. Patriot missile air defense system.
The complaint said Kadish maintained contact with CC-1, met him in Israel in 2004, and spoke with him by telephone on March 20 of this year, after his first FBI interview. It said the handler told him to lie to U.S. authorities: "Don't say anything ... What happened 25 years ago? You don't remember anything," the handler was quoted as saying.
The complaint said the handler worked for the Israeli government as consul for science affairs at the Israeli Consulate General in New York, from 1980 to November 1985.
During the late 1970s the handler worked for what was known at the time as Israeli Aircraft Industries, an Israeli government contractor, the complaint said. It said the handler left the United States when Pollard was arrested and has not returned.
The history appears to fit with that of Yosef Yagur, who has been publicly linked to the Pollard case. A woman who identified herself as Yagur's wife, when reached by telephone, said, "We're not speaking to journalists. Goodbye."
(Additional reporting by Arshad Mohammed, Christine Kearney in New York and Dan Williams in Jerusalem
Let’s see you last a day in a tough prison (Pollard has been in the worst) let alone 5 years before you talk tough.
I just have a hunch you’re Jewish and wouldn’t mind Israel having all our secrets.
Maybe I’m wrong about that, but the US should be in complete charge of what technology we share with allies. Because once it’s gone, it’s gone, and we can’t control our enemies stealing it from our allies.
What would you sentence someone to if they gave detailed plans to Iran on how to build a nuclear bomb? A couple years?
I feel the same for someone stealing secrets for Israel that I would if they stole secrets for Great Britain, South Korea, Taiwan etc. Maybe your problem is that you cannot realize Israel is an ally. Comparing stealing secrets for Iran and Israel shows that you lack understanding on this issue.
You are so full of crap. Really.
You think it’s okay to steal for friends who prove they are not friends by stealing from us.
It’s not.
You are no patriot. You are a danger to our republic.
If Dershowitz officially represented Pollard at trial, that’s news to me. I believe Pollard’s attorney at trial was named Hibey.
Later, on appeal, Ted Olsen (husband of the late conservative attorney and writer Barbara Olsen), who later became Solicitor General under W, represented Pollard. It turned out that Pollard’s conviction would have been overturned and he would have had a new trial had not Ruth Bader Ginsberg ruled against him on a procedural matter on a DC Circuit 3-judge panel back in the late 80s or early 90s.
Dershowitz’s role in the case was limited to commentator and pundit, to the best of my knowledge.
Please correct me if I’m mistaken.
Let’s try this one more time and maybe you can understand. Allies spy on each other. South Korea spies on us, Taiwan spies on us and Israel spied on us. Frankly I can understand why those nations do since to varying degrees their survival is in the balance and it is vital for them to know what we are doing that may affect their survival.
Now do I condone Americans who help them for reasons of money or ideology? The answer is no, I say they should be prosecuted as Pollard was. Do I think what they did is less serious than spying for an enemy? Yes, it is obvious and if you cannot grasp that concept, I probably cannot help you. Just as we don’t have a death penalty for assaulting someone, while we do consider it a serious crime it is not in the same class as murder. We have intermediate punishments for less serious crimes.
You may not like that fact but it is a fact. And we have accepted it as a society in the practice of sentencing those who have spied for allies much less seriously than those who spied for enemies. Pollard is a lone exception as has been demonstrated. Do you feel all the others should have been sentenced much more harshly? Perhaps you do. Curiously you only mention Pollard but never complain about all those others who served two years or less for spying for allies.
Dershowitz did get involved in his appeal. I don’t know exactly what his role was and whether he worked for Pollard at the same time as Olsen or prior to Ted Olsen getting involved. If memory serves me, Olsen was hired by the Israeli government to represent Pollard.
FYI, the Rosenbergs were electrocuted, not hanged, about a year before Pollard was born.
The US and Israel as allies share all kinds of secrets. However, it’s up to the governments to decide what they will and will not share. It’s not up to Pollard or Kadish.
I can’t understand why anyone convicted of espionage shouldn’t spend the rest of his/her life in prison.
We're not exactly at war with Russia. Have you checked the sentence given to Robert Hannsen?
You seem to have a basic misunderstanding of the penalties handed out to Americans who steal classified information and give it to someone else. It has nothing to do with who receives the information and more to do with the importance of the information itself. Pollard received a life sentence because of what information was compromised. According to a classified memorandum written for the trial judge by then-Secretary of Defense Caspar Weinberger, Pollard’s actions amounted to treason. “It is difficult for me…to conceive of a greater harm to national security,” Weinberger wrote.
We have had others who have spied on behalf of Israel, e.g., Larry Franklin, who were not sentenced to life. And there have been other spies like Aldrich Ames and John Walker who received life sentences. To suggest that Pollard was unfairly singled out in terms of punishment is nonsense. Why do you believe that to be the case?
The Rosenbergs worked for an ally nation. The Soviet Union was our ally in WW II. /end short history lesson
Do you have any facts to back up that assertion?
I do find it interesting that the Jerusalem City council passed a resolution naming a square for Pollard [an American citizen and spy] just before Bush's visit to Israel. Imagine what the reaction would be in Israel if Washington DC passed a resolution renaiming a square in DC after an Israeli imprisoned for spying on Israel. Pollard is a hero to many in Israel.
Photo Essay: Main Jerusalem Square Renamed 'Freedom for Pollard'
The Rosenbergs may have worked for an “ally” nation during WWII, but continued their espionage activity well into the Cold War period by which time the Soviets had unquestionably become an enemy and threat to the US. And the magnitude of that threat was greatly enhanced by the information passed to the Soviets by the Rosenbergs and others, which facilitated the Soviets’ building of their first atomic bomb.
I'd suggest you read the espionage statutes and the case law that has arisen from them. I would respectfully suggest that both who recieves the information and the importance of the information itself should be and have been important factors in a damage estimate in such cases.
As for Weinberger's memorandum in the Pollard case, perhaps the time will soon come when it will be declassified so we will be better able to evaluate it in terms of accuracy.
Meanwhile, I do have a suspicion that the late, black Carter-appointed judge did have an anti-Israel bias - considering his skin color (blacks are statistically far more likely to harbor antisemitic and anti-Israel attitudes than whites) and the biases of the man who appointed him to the federal bench.
Hansen’s spying goes back to the 1970s and the heart of the cold war. Again that is not an accurate analogy.
See the above, a Republican Senator disclosed the American procuring of a spy within Israel.
I think the Israelis are not being smart about a high profile honor for Pollard in conjunction with Bush’s visit.
Maybe the end of a short attention span. The Rosenbergs helped Stalin obtain a nuclear bomb after world war 2 was over and the cold war was on. That was threatening the life of every American. Clearly a totally different case.
I am sure those factors were taken into consideration by the jury and the judge when Pollard was tried and sentenced. Having just been on a jury involving a murder case, I have confidence in our judicial system.
As for Weinberger's memorandum in the Pollard case, perhaps the time will soon come when it will be declassified so we will be better able to evaluate it in terms of accuracy.
Are you questioning the statement or its factual accuracy?
Meanwhile, I do have a suspicion that the late, black Carter-appointed judge did have an anti-Israel bias - considering his skin color (blacks are statistically far more likely to harbor antisemitic and anti-Israel attitudes than whites) and the biases of the man who appointed him to the federal bench.
Baloney. Pollard was a U.S. Navy intelligence analyst who gave highly classified information to a foreign government. In many ways due to the sensitivity of his position, he is similar to Ames, Hanssen, Brian Reagan, etc. who also received life sentences. Pollard's wife only got 5 years. Defending Pollard is defending the indefensible. His sentencing was not the result of anti-semitism or anti-Israel bias. Pollard does not deserve the hero status he currently enjoys in Israel.
Unconfirmed and unsubstantiated.
You notice that the complaints against Durenberger were all of the sort that he should not have disclosed the info not that his info was bogus. You will never get official disclosure of such a fact but it demonstrates that more than likely the spying was going both ways.
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