A noted professor and energy security expert who was arrested earlier this month on charges of trafficking arms to Communist China and Libya has appealed to Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, to “rescue him” from President Biden.

Gal Luft was arrested at Larnaca International Airport in Cyprus, where he was about to board a regular commercial flight back to Israel. As the Sun reported last week, Mr. Luft, co-director of the Washington-based Institute for the Analysis of Global Security, claims that his arrest was retaliation for his cooperation with an investigation into alleged corruption related to the president’s son, Hunter Biden. 

The pan-Arab newspaper Asharq Al-Awsat reported that on Friday the district courthouse at Larnaca began a review of American authorities’ “request to extradite Luft to be brought to trial in the U.S. over breaching the law of selling oil and weapons.”

In a tweet from February 19, Mr. Luft stated, “The US, claiming I’m an arms dealer. It would be funny if it weren’t tragic.” He also wrote that the Department of Justice was trying to “bury” him to protect the president, Hunter Biden, and the president’s brother, Jim Biden. 

Hunter Biden is under investigation by the House Oversight Committee. The troubled younger Biden has a history of murky international business dealings involving Ukraine and Communist China. He also has a nascent career as an artist, though his art dealer is now under investigation, too. 

According to the Jerusalem Post, Mr. Luft’s attorney, Mordechai Tzivin, said the professor “was targeted by Washington for information handed to law enforcement authorities in 2019 as part of Hunter Biden’s criminal investigation.” 

The Israeli website Ynet was the first to report that Mr. Luft was arrested “under an Interpol Red Notice issued at the request of the United States.”

Mr. Tzivin told Ynet, “When there is a political motive, Interpol does not extradite, or when there is a danger to someone’s life. I don’t want to say that he is in mortal danger, but he is indeed in great danger.”

According to Asharq Al-Awsat, after Mr. Luft was arrested he sent letters to Mr. Netanyahu as well as to Israel’s foreign minister, Eli Cohen, defense minister, Yoav Galant, and justice minister, Yariv Levin. He reportedly asked all of them to intervene to rescue him. 

The newspaper also reported that on Friday the Cypriot court released Mr. Luft but kept him under house arrest — exactly where was not immediately clear — and confiscated his passport. 

Presumably, that would mean he surrendered his Israeli passport. While Mr. Luft is an Israeli citizen, he may be a dual national citizen of the United States. If that is the case, then his attorney’s fears for his client’s extradition to stand trial in what is increasingly taking on the appearance of a politically motivated case are more than theoretical.

Whether Mr. Luft’s entreaties to Mr. Netanyahu have been received at Jerusalem is not clear, but it is understood that the Israeli embassy at Nicosia, the Cypriot capital, is on the case. The embassy’s deputy head of mission, Rotem Segev, told the Sun that “the Ministry of Foreign Affairs is familiar with the case and is dealing with its consular aspects.”

There has been no public comment as yet from the White House. Inquiries sent by email to the Israeli foreign ministry spokesman, Lior Haiat, and his deputy, Yosef Zilberman, regarding the prospects of Mr. Luft’s safe return to Israel were not immediately answered.