The decision to release convicted spy Jonathan Pollard is a blatant move by the Obama administration to lessen the blow of the Iran nuclear deal to Israel, says
Newsmax TV political analyst Dick Morris, a former advisor to President Bill Clinton.
Pollard, an ex-U.S. Navy intelligence officer, was convicted of spying for Israel in 1987 and hit with a life sentence. For years, Israel has pressured the U.S. for his release.
This week, it was announced that Pollard will go free in November — a move Secretary of State John Kerry insisted is not related to the Iran deal, which Israel vehemently opposes. But Morris doesn't believe it.
"It's a good idea when you're a public official not to say something the average 8-year-old knows isn't true," Morris said Wednesday to John Bachman on Newsmax TV's "Newsmax Now."
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"And the average 8-year-old would know that this is related to Obama trying to pacify Israel and Jewish supporters over the Iran deal. He's taking real flack and it's making a real difference.
"The Israelis have been looking for Pollard's release for 20 years now and the intelligence community has made it a very high priority not to do it — so you have to believe that this is just political."
Morris took issue with the argument that Iran would just go ahead and develop a nuclear bomb without a deal — which calls for economic sanctions to be lifted in exchange for limits on Iran's nuclear capabilities.
"We know that if we don't do anything that the sanctions are crippling. We know that the sanctions are so strong that they forced Iran to negotiate and to agree to a freeze," Morris said.
"Do you realize we are giving Iran more money for one country than the Marshall Plan was for all of rebuilding Europe? We are literally giving them $150 billion over a period of 10 years. That's more than we give Israel or Egypt."
Morris is author of
"Power Grab: Obama's Dangerous Plan for a One-Party Nation," written with Eileen McGann and published by Humanix Books.
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