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Russia Pardons US-Israeli National Jailed on Drug Charges

Charles Maynes

   MOSCOW - Russian authorities Thursday pardoned and released an
   American-Israeli citizen jailed on drug charges, in a gesture timed
   with a visit by embattled Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to
   Moscow intended to focus on a new U.S.-backed peace plan for the Middle
   East.

   Naama Issachar, 27, a native of New Jersey who had moved to Israel, was
   serving 7½ years in prison for drug possession after border guards
   found 9 grams of hash in her bag during a changeover at a Moscow
   airport on her way from India to Israel.

   While the case instantly became a cause celebre in Israel -- widely
   seen as an overly harsh sentence for a minor crime -- it was only
   recently that Russian President Vladimir Putin signaled her release was
   imminent.

   "Everything will be OK," Putin told Issachar's mother, Yaffa, during a
   sideline meeting in Israel last week to mark the 75th anniversary of
   the liberation of a key Nazi death camp in World War II.

   Yet the timing of Putin's decision to grant a pardon was riven with
   political implications.

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