Jonathan Pollard gets engaged to mother of seven

Former spy Jonathan Pollard announces his engagement, nine months after his wife Esther Pollard lost her battle with cancer.

By World Israel News Staff

Former spy Jonathan Pollard got engaged in Jerusalem last week, and is set to remarry after the upcoming holiday season.

The 68-year-old American immigrant now living in Jerusalem’s Kiryat Moshe neighborhood announced Wednesday evening that he has recently gotten engaged with Rivka Avrahamis-Donin, a widow and mother of seven children from Jerusalem.

The couple had originally planned to announce their engagement Wednesday morning, but delayed the formal announcement until after the funeral of IDF Major Bar Falah, who was shot and killed by Arab terrorists in northern Samaria late Tuesday night.

The wedding is slated to take place in roughly two months, after the High Holidays, the announcement read.

“’How can I repay the Lord for all of his bountiful deals towards me?’ With praise and thanks to G-d, we are excited to announce our engagement. We are full of gratitude to you, our friends and family members and our dear children for your love and hugs and first and foremost to Esther, may she rest in peace, who in her infinite love even recognized us and allowed this miracle to happen. Her memory will always be with us.”

This will be Pollard’s third marriage.

Pollard divorced his wife, Anne, in the 1980s, after she was released from prison after serving three years in connection with his spying on behalf of Israel.

This January, Pollard’s second wife, Esther, died from cancer. The couple had married in 1993, while Pollard was serving a life sentence for espionage.

Jonathan Pollard was released from prison in 2015 but was subject to parole conditions, including an electronic tracking bracelet and a blanket ban on leaving New York.

Shortly after those conditions were removed in 2020, the pair immigrated to Israel, settling in Jerusalem.