Israeli Assails U.S. Handling of Pollard Case

Washington’s public criticism of Israel for its handling of the Pollard spy affair is a “mistake” that only makes it “much more difficult” for Jerusalem to cooperate with American investigators, a senior government official said here Saturday.

The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, stressed that he was commenting privately. But his remarks are believed to reflect top-level government thinking.

The reaction came a day after State Department spokesman Charles Redman said Washington was “dismayed that the government of Israel was not as forthcoming as we would have hoped and expected” in the case.

Seized Outside Embassy

Jonathan J. Pollard, a U.S. Navy intelligence analyst, was arrested outside the Israeli Embassy in Washington 10 days ago and accused of selling defense secrets to Israel.

The Israeli official branded as “ridiculous” and “part of a smear campaign against us” an American television report that Prime Minister Shimon Peres or a member of his entourage may have met Pollard during the prime minister’s visit to Washington several weeks ago.

The official’s comments continue an evolution in Israeli reaction to the Pollard affair in which Jerusalem is increasingly portrayed as a victim.

The official specifically denied a statement by Deputy Prime Minister David Levy on Friday that Israel had already apologized to the United States over the affair.

‘May Be’ Unsatisfactory

He also said that while a preliminary report about the Israeli role in the affair--submitted to U.S. Ambassador Thomas R. Pickering last Wednesday--”may be” unsatisfactory, “this is not a reason to come out publicly against us.”

He said that Peres, Foreign Minister Yitzhak Shamir and Defense Minister Yitzhak Rabin are personally directing an Israeli investigation into the affair and are committed “to fully cooperate with the United States without making costly mistakes here in Israel.”

The official refused to elaborate on what kind of potential “mistakes” concern the three, but he described their situation as “delicate.”

Hirsh Goodman, veteran defense correspondent for the Jerusalem Post, noted in a weekend column that one of the three “must have had ministerial responsibility for the branch of the intelligence community responsible for hiring and controlling Pollard.”

If Peres was responsible, Goodman wrote, his position “could be in jeopardy.” If Peres knew about Pollard, he would be guilty of “extreme bad judgment,” the Israeli journalist said, while if he did not, “he would be guilty of gross incompetence.”

‘Irreparable Consequences’

On the other hand, Goodman said, for either Rabin or Shamir to accept responsibility for Pollard could have “irreparable political consequences for the fragile national unity government,” which unites the centrist Labor Alignment of Peres and Rabin with the rightist Likud Bloc headed by Shamir.

The government official interviewed Saturday said that “people like Shamir or Rabin or Peres are not the kind of people you can push around.”

“If a mistake was made, and they are sorry and want to find ways to overcome that, you don’t help them by pushing them publicly,” he said. Statements like Redman’s only “inflame public opinion in the United States” and make cooperation more difficult “because it looks like cooperation under pressure or duress,” the official added.

The official complained particularly about Washington’s insistence on questioning two Israeli diplomats quickly recalled from the United States after Pollard’s arrest. The two are said to have been links between the Navy intelligence analyst and a little-known intelligence operation in Israel headed by a former counterterrorism adviser in the prime minister’s office.

‘Things You Cannot Do’

Washington “asks publicly things that no government asks from another government . . . for example, to interrogate Israeli diplomats,” the official said. “Things that you can do privately between governments, without anybody knowing, you cannot do publicly like that.”

Such “unheard of” demands raise the question here of Washington’s motives, the official said. “Does this reflect a division within the United States Administration? Or is it a deliberate policy intended to embarrass our government?”

The State Department has said that even before the two Israeli diplomats left Washington, Israel was asked to make available for questioning any individuals with information about the Pollard case. A department spokesman said that the Israelis, despite their promise to cooperate, had not provided “full and prompt cooperation” by the weekend.

‘Shock and Consternation’

Israel has made only one official public comment on the Pollard case. That was last Sunday, when the Foreign Ministry said that “Israel’s political leadership received with shock and consternation” the reports that Pollard was spying for Israel.

‘The Necessary Conclusions’

While it did not admit any Israeli involvement, the ministry statement said that authorities were investigating the affair and promised that if they found any “deviation” from a longstanding policy against such intelligence-gathering in the United States, “the necessary conclusions will be drawn.”

Unofficially, however, reaction by government sources here has gone through distinct phases. At first, they expressed ignorance or shock. Then there were promises of a prompt investigation and full public disclosure of any wrongdoing. But during the last several days, the emphasis of government sources has been to lay blame on Washington.

Officials have increasingly raised accusations of previous U.S. spying in Israel, for example.

At one point they contended that Pollard only passed on information about Arab armies, which, they suggested, meant that there was technically no violation of the agreement not to spy on the United States.

More recently, it has been suggested that the Navy analyst was asked to supply other data only in hopes of discovering a “leak” through which American intelligence was thought to have penetrated the Israeli military.