An Israeli minister on Sunday visited the Cairo cell of an Israeli sentenced to 15 years in prison for spying for the Jewish state, the Tel Aviv-based Haaretz newspaper said.
Danny Naveh, a minister without portfolio, met Azzam Azzam, an Israeli Druze who was found guilty by a court here and sentenced in June 1997 to 15 years in jail.
Israel denies that Naveh is a spy, but Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak has rejected Jerusalem's appeals for his release.
Azzam gave Naveh a letter for Prime Minister Ariel Sharon in which the businessman asked Sharon to secure his freedom so he could return home to his family, said the paper.
"I can't endure it any longer and I don't see any hope," Azzam told Naveh, who was meeting the Druze businessman for the second time in five months.
"Give me a little hope. I am suffering and paying a political price, but all I wanted to do was earn a living for my family. Even Yigal Amir, who killed a prime minister [Yitzhak Rabin], lives like a human being in prison."
The minister during the first visit complained the prisoner was held in isolation and forced to sleep on the floor at Liman prison, in the southern suburbs of Cairo – Albawaba.com
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