Bush Forgives Man Convicted for 1948 Aid to Israel

[Scurrilous]

Rare Posthumous Pardon for B-17 Sale

<snip>

"In 1948, Charlie Winters took an unusual step for a Boston-born Protestant businessman: He waded into the bloody struggle for a Jewish state in the Middle East, selling decommissioned B-17 bombers to the Haganah resistance group and even helping to fly one of the planes overseas.

The assistance earned him a federal conviction for violation of the Neutrality Act and made him a hero for many Israelis who have long decried his case as a grave injustice.

Winters, who died in 1984 at age 71 and is buried in a Christian cemetery in Jerusalem, was granted a rare posthumous pardon yesterday by President Bush, nearly half a century after he was convicted and served 18 months in prison.

"I'm elated," said Winters's son, Jimmy, of Miami. "This is an example of a man who did something for his friends that he thought was the right thing to do, and it had nothing to do with race or religion or money."

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[theoldman]

1. Sorry Jimmy but it had everything to do with race, religion

and money. Charlie was a Christian who wanted to help the Jews and was able to make money. It was probably the money part that got him into trouble.

[rateyes]

3. Do great minds think alike or what? See my post below. nt

[rateyes]

2. Sorry, but it had everything to do with race, religion, and money. nt

[Donnachaidh]

4. So * pardons a war profiteer

Is this a warm up for the REAL list of pardons he's going to slip under the door when he leaves? :sarcasm:

[azurnoir]

5. Wow and to think the guys only been dead for 24 years

I am sure he appreciates it.

[LeftishBrit]

6. He'll appreciate it almost as much...

as the 306 British WW1 soldiers who were sentenced to death for 'cowardice', and subsequently pardoned.

Unfortunately, the pardon didn't happen till 2006, about 90 years after they'd been shot.

Then there were three people executed in the 1950s for murders that it then turned out they almost certainly didn't commit: Derek Bentley, Mahood Mattan and James Hanratty. (These cases helped to bring about the abolition of the death penalty in Britain.) They were pardoned: one in 1962 and the others in 1988. It didn't bring them back to life, but it may have brought some healing to their families.

[LeftishBrit]

7. Sadly, on checking, Hanratty has not yet been pardoned. The campaign is still continuing,

[Lithos]

10. Derek Bentley, Mahood Mattan and James Hanratty

If their deaths helped abolish the death penalty, then there was some spark of good made from the sins of the state.

[IndianaGreen]

8. The British were happily hanging Holocaust survivors for the crime of wanting their own state

Compare Charlie Winters to the likes of a Prescott Bush who did business with the nazis.

[Vegasaurus]

9. Prescott was a nasty man

but he had plenty of company of anti-semitic haters.

[Scurrilous]

11. Was Pardoning a Dead Guy Bush's Consolation Prize for Israel?

<snip>

"President George W. Bush has pardoned Charles Winters for the anachronistic sin of selling arms to Israel. Winters died in 1984. Why did Bush bother?

Winters, an Irish protestant who flew a B-17 bomber across the Atlantic for Israel and helped sell the fledgling nation two other planes, served 18 months in jail for violating the 1939 Neutrality Act and a then-active arms embargo on Israel. He became only the second person ever to be granted a posthumous pardon after quite a bit of lobbying from the likes of Steven Spielberg and other friends of Israel.

But a tipster, who claims to have info from the Israeli prime minister's office, says all that pleading wasn't the reason Winters name was cleared: Bush didn't want to pardon Jonathan Pollard, a former intelligence officer in the U.S. Navy who's serving a life sentence for spying for Israel. "Israel wanted Jonathan Pollard released from prison. So Bush threw them a bone and pardoned a Zionist hero," says the tipster. Israel acknowledged that he was a spy in 1998, and has since been actively lobbying for his release. At this rate, he may get pardoned in 2046."

http://gawker.com/5117887/was-pardoning-a-dead-guy-bushs-consolation-prize-for-israel