Mordechai Vanunu, the Israeli nuclear-whistle blower, will be released from Ashkelon Prison in Israel on Wednesday, April 21, after serving an 18 year prison term. For background information on this remarkable advocate for peace and disarmament, please see www.vanunu.com.

Kathy Kelly, from her prison cell in Pekin, Illinois, joins many in the world community in celebrating Mordechai’s release. Kathy writes:

“Thinking of Sam Day and his determination, after becoming blind, to help Mordechai Vanunu freely see the light of day, I think an hour must have passed while I read and re-read this passage:

Thus with the year
Seasons return, but not to me returns
Day, or the sweet approach of even or morn,
Or sight of vernal bloom, or summer’s rose,
Or flocks, or herds, or human face divine,
But clouds instead and ever during dark
Surrounds me, from the cheerful ways of men
Cut off, and, for the book of knowledge fair,
Presented with a universal blank
Of Nature’s work, to me expunged and raised.
And wisdom, at one Entrance, quite shut out.
John Milton, Paradise Lost–Book III

Sam might have thought Milton was a mightily mistaken fellow — misogynist, bigotry-prone, depicts untamed wilderness as the haunt for devils — yet Sam would, I think, have nodded thoughtfully at the above passage. Milton tucks it into the beginning of Book III.

This I know! Sam dove into the campaign to free Mordechai Vanunu and Sam would revel in the group assembling to welcome Mordechai out of prison. If there is an email means to wish Ken, Cynthia, Scott Schaeffer Duffy, Audrey Stewart, Grace Ritter and other friends heading to Ashkelon my very best, please do! Thanks! –Kathy”

Also, Amnesty International published a press release yesterday which urged the Israeli authorities not to impose any restrictions or conditions on the former nuclear technician upon his release. Read more.