Pollard learns father is dying, issues new appeal

Advocates for Israeli agent approach Obama to lobby for "compassionate leave" to enable him to visit his 95-year-old father on his deathbed.

By GIL STERN STERN HOFFMAN
Jonathan Pollard 311 (R) (photo credit: Courtesy of Justice for Jonathan Pollard)
Jonathan Pollard 311 (R)
(photo credit: Courtesy of Justice for Jonathan Pollard)
Advocates for the release of Israeli agent Jonathan Pollard redoubled their efforts this weekend to persuade US President Barack Obama to enable him to visit his visit his father on his deathbed .
Pollard received a call from his brother Harvey that their father Morris, 95, was hospitalized at Memorial Hospital and Health System in South Bend, Indiana, suffering from the impact of a severe bladder infection. Since then, Pollard advocates have been in touch with Israeli and American government officials and Jewish organizations in America to persuade them to grant Pollard "compassionate leave" to see his father for the last time.
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"Jonathan called me crying that they do not know if his father will even make itthrough the day," Pollard's wife Esther said. "This was totally unexpected and a great shock. His dad was in fairly good health. He is old but he is in very good shape."
Harvey Pollard arranged with the prison to allow his brother to have an emergency phone call with their father, but Morris was too weak to speak. Jonathan Pollard told his father, with whom he had had a troubled relationship,  that he has always loved him and always will.
"He thanked him for all he taught him and for the wonderful years they had
together," Esther Pollard said. "He blessed his father to go in peace and surrounded by the good deeds he has done all his life. His voice broke when he told his dad how sorry he is that their hopes and dreams of being together in freedom didn't come true."