US could be offering Israeli spy Pollard release as ‘sweetener’ for Iran deal

America has been silent on whether Pollard will be freed on his parole date, with believed to be November 21, or whether he will remain behind bars.

The anonymous source quoted in the Algemeiner report stressed that the purported plan to release him was unrelated to the fact that the US has just closed on a deal with Iran that infuriates Israel. But some Israeli experts think that it could actually be a sweetener to help Israel swallow the deal.

Jonathan Rynhold, a Bar Ilan University academic and expert in Israel-US relations, said that Pollard’s freedom is “the kind of thing they [the Americans] throw in” when wanting to calm or reward Israel.

He said: “If the negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians had not broken down, one of the things Israel would have to would have been Pollard’s release — it’s definitely seen as a card, so it’s possible it has come up in this context.”