Ben-Ami Kadish, Spy for Israel, Dies at 85
Ben-Ami Kadish, a former civilian employee of the U.S. Army who was arrested at the age of 85 for spying for Israel, has died.
No date of death or cause of death was made public, according to the New Jersey Jewish News, citing a funeral home death notice.
Kadish, a former U.S. Army mechanical engineer, was arrested in December 2008 for passing classified documents between 1980 and 1985 to an Israeli agent, reportedly the same handler as Jonathan Pollard.
He pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy and was sentenced in mid-2009, at the age of 85, to pay a $50,000 fine.
“I’m sorry I made a mistake,” Kadish said before sentencing. “It was a misjudgment. I thought I was helping the State of Israel without harming the United States.”
Kadish was born in Connecticut and moved to what was then Palestine. He returned to the United States after World War II. He was employed by the army for 27 years after serving in the U.S. Air Force and had security clearance.
A message from our Publisher & CEO Rachel Fishman Feddersen
I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s award-winning, nonprofit journalism during this critical time.
We’ve set a goal to raise $260,000 by December 31. That’s an ambitious goal, but one that will give us the resources we need to invest in the high quality news, opinion, analysis and cultural coverage that isn’t available anywhere else.
If you feel inspired to make an impact, now is the time to give something back. Join us as a member at your most generous level.
— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO