Israel Returns Classified U.S. Documents

WASHINGTON — The State Department announced Friday that Israel has returned all classified documents it received in an “unauthorized manner” from a U.S. Navy employee and his wife who are accused of spying.

Moreover, Israel gave a team of State and Justice department investigators “full access” to Israeli officials involved in the case, State Department spokesman Charles Redman said at a briefing on the findings of the investigating team.

Without mentioning the name of the special Israeli intelligence unit, known as LEKEM, that allegedly obtained U.S. government documents in the spy case, Redman said Israel promised to disband the unit.

He also said Israel had pledged “appropriate steps” to prevent a repetition of the incident, which had caused the United States to restrict the normal flow of intelligence from Washington to Jerusalem.

‘Solved and Settled’

In Israel, Foreign Minister Yitzhak Shamir told Israel radio that he considered the case to be “solved and settled.”

“I think we will overcome this accident and our friendly ties with the United States will continue as ever,” Shamir said.

Jonathan J. Pollard, 31, a counterintelligence analyst with the Navy, has been held without bail on charges of selling confidential documents to Israel for $2,500 a month, earning at least $50,000 in total. His wife, Anne Henderson-Pollard, 25, is charged only with unauthorized possession of classified documents, but her attempts to win freedom on bail have been rejected because of the government’s contention that she may still hold information that could “pose a threat to the security of the United States” if disclosed.

Redman said that in light of Israel’s cooperation with the investigation of the Pollards, “our normal cooperation in all fields”--including intelligence-sharing--”will resume.”

He declined to answer questions about the possible punishment of the two Israeli diplomats believed to have been the Pollards’ contacts--Ilan Ravid, a science attache at the Israeli embassy in Washington, and Yosef Yagur, a science attache at the Israeli mission to the United Nations in New York. Despite a request by U.S. authorities that they remain in the United States for questioning, the two men were recalled to Israel the day after Jonathan Pollard was arrested outside the embassy here Nov. 21.

Strained Relations

Their return to Israel brought an unusually strong rebuke from the U.S. government and led to an unprecedented strain between the two countries. The tension eased when the Israeli government issued a formal apology and agreed to cooperate fully with a team of investigators headed by Abraham D. Sofaer, the State Department’s legal adviser.

The team went to Israel last week and all but Sofaer, who stayed behind to work on a joint statement, returned to the United States on Friday, Redman said. He said he was unable to comment on many aspects of the case because the Justice Department is still investigating and preparing the prosecution of the Pollards.

Asked if the Sofaer mission was empowered to look beyond the involvement of the Pollards when the investigators went to Israel, Redman replied: “They didn’t go with their eyes closed.”

The spokesman refused to say how many persons were interviewed by the Sofaer group, nor would he elaborate on what measures might be taken to prevent a repetition of the Pollard case. The department’s formal statement said the U.S. investigators and Israeli officials “have agreed to consider what concrete measures may be necessary, if any, in the future.”

No official assessment of the possible damage to U.S. security caused by the Pollard case has been made, but the information passed was believed to have dealt chiefly with radar and other electronic defense equipment of Israel’s Arab neighbors, U.S. airborne and seaborne monitoring equipment in the Mideast and details on Soviet weapons in the hands of Arab states.

Routine Sharing

While the United States routinely shares classified information with Israel, cooperating on strategic issues and in countering terrorism, material on Arab countries friendly to the United States is usually withheld from the Israelis.

In another spy case development Friday, a federal grand jury in Baltimore indicted Ronald W. Pelton, a former National Security Agency communications specialist, on six espionage-related counts for selling secrets to the Soviet Union. The National Security Agency is the nation’s most sensitive and secretive intelligence agency.

The indictment of Pelton, who the FBI said had been identified through information provided by the double KGB defector, Vitaly S. Yurchenko, before he returned to the Soviet Union, provided little information beyond what was disclosed through FBI affidavits after he was arrested Nov. 24.

Conspiracy Charged

Pelton was charged with conspiring with Anatoly Slavnov, a Soviet agent, and “other persons” to transmit to the Soviets U.S. national defense information from Jan. 14, 1980--six months after he left the NSA, where he had worked for nearly 14 years--to the time of his arrest.

The indictment alleged that Pelton first transmitted information to the Soviets at their embassy in Washington. Then he turned over more material in Vienna in 1980 and was paid $20,000, the indictment said, and he received another $15,000 at another Vienna meeting in 1983 after providing still more information.

Times staff writer Ronald J. Ostrow contributed to this story.