Also, considering that the U.S. spies on allies consistently, I think that it's hypocritical to completely play the victim card.
Every country (that has the means) spies on every other country it has interests in. If spies are caught bad things tend to happen to them. I'm not sure what fundamentally separates Pollard from, say, Aldrich Ames or Robert Hanssen on that front.
There's a lot of value to arresting spies, not least of which is exactly that element you mentioned above. Should the need ever come to do a prisoner exchange with Israel if they catch one of our spies, we could hand Pollard over.
It's just bad policy to give away potential bargaining chips like that. We have something Israel wants (Pollard), and should the circumstances align that Israel has something we want we could trade Pollard for it. Giving him up for free is just foolish.
EDIT: Should it turn out that we're releasing Pollard in return for Netanyahu lifting overt efforts to block the Iran deal, I might revise my opinion. That would be a good bargain.
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