Israeli Weapons of Mass Destruction:
a Threat to Peace
Nuclear Weapons
by John Steinbach, DC Iraq Coalition,
March 2002
Centre for Research on Globalisation
(CRG), March 3, 2002, globalresearch.ca
With between 200 and 500 thermonuclear
weapons and a sophisticated delivery system, Israel has quietly
supplanted Britain as the World's 5th Largest nuclear power, and
may currently rival France and China in the size and sophistication
of its nuclear arsenal. Although dwarfed by the nuclear arsenals
of the U.S. and Russia, each possessing over 10,000 nuclear weapons,
Israel nonetheless is a major nuclear power, and should be publically
recognized as such.. Since the Gulf War in 1991, while much attention
has been lavished on the threat posed by Iraqi weapons of mass
destruction, the major culprit in the region, Israel, has been
largely ignored. Possessing chemical and biological weapons, an
extremely sophisticated nuclear arsenal, and an aggressive strategy
for their actual use, Israel provides the major regional impetus
for the development of weapons of mass destruction and represents
an acute threat to peace and stability in the Middle East. The
Israeli nuclear program represents a serious impediment to nuclear
disarmament and nonproliferation and, with India and Pakistan,
is a potential nuclear flashpoint.(prospects of meaningful non-proliferation
are a delusion so long as the nuclear weapons states insist on
maintaining their arsenals,) Citizens concerned about sanctions
against Iraq, peace with justice in the Middle East, and nuclear
disarmament have an obligation to speak out forcefully against
the Israeli nuclear program.
Birth of the Israeli Bomb
The Israeli nuclear program began in the
late 1940s under the direction of Ernst David Bergmann, "the
father of the Israeli bomb," who in 1952 established the
Israeli Atomic Energy Commission. It was France, however, which
provided the bulk of early nuclear assistance to Israel culminating
in construction of Dimona, a heavy water moderated, natural uranium
reactor and plutonium reprocessing factory situated near Bersheeba
in the Negev Desert. Israel had been an active participant in
the French Nuclear weapons program from its inception, providing
critical technical expertise, and the Israeli nuclear program
can be seen as an extension of this earlier collaboration. Dimona
went on line in 1964 and plutonium reprocessing began shortly
thereafter. Despite various Israeli claims that Dimona was "a
manganese plant, or a textile factory," the extreme security
measures employed told a far different story. In 1967, Israel
shot down one of their own Mirage fighters that approached too
close to Dimona and in 1973 shot down a Lybian civilian airliner
which strayed off course, killing 104.(3) There is substantial
credible speculation that Israel may have exploded at least one,
and perhaps several, nuclear devices in the mid 1960s in the Negev
near the Israeli-Egyptian border, and that it participated actively
in French nuclear tests in Algeria.(4) By the time of the "Yom
Kippur War" in 1973, Israel possessed an arsenal of perhaps
several dozen deliverable atomic bombs and went on full nuclear
alert.(5)
Possessing advanced nuclear technology
and "world class" nuclear scientists, Israel was confronted
early with a major problem- how to obtain the necessary uranium.
Israel's own uranium source was the phosphate deposits in the
Negev, totally inadequate to meet the need of a rapidly expanding
program. The short term answer was to mount commando raids in
France and Britain to successfully hijack uranium shipments and,
in1968, to collaborate with West Germany in diverting 200 tons
of yellowcake (uranium oxide).(6) These clandestine acquisitions
of uranium for Dimona were subsequently covered up by the various
countries involved. There was also an allegation that a U.S. corporation
called Nuclear Materials and Equipment Corporation (NUMEC) diverted
hundreds of pounds of enriched uranium to Israel from the mid-50s
to the mid-60s.
Despite an FBI and CIA investigation,
and Congressional hearings, no one was ever prosecuted, although
most other investigators believed the diversion had occurred(7)(8).
In the late 1960s, Israel solved the uranium problem by developing
close ties with South Africa in a quid pro quo arrangement whereby
Israel supplied the technology and expertise for the "Apartheid
Bomb," while South Africa provided the uranium.
South Africa and the United States
In 1977, the Soviet Union warned the U.S.
that satellite photos indicated South Africa was planning a nuclear
test in the Kalahari Desert but the Apartheid regime backed down
under pressure. On September 22, 1979, a U.S. satellite detected
an atmospheric test of a small thermonuclear bomb in the Indian
Ocean off South Africa but, because of Israel's apparent involvement,
the report was quickly "whitewashed" by a carefully
selected scientific panel kept in the dark about important details.
Later it was learned through Israeli sources that there were actually
three carefully guarded tests of miniaturized Israeli nuclear
artillery shells. The Israeli/South African collaboration did
not end with the bomb testing, but continued until the fall of
Apartheid, especially with the developing and testing of medium
range missiles and advanced artillery. In addition to uranium
and test facilities, South Africa provided Israel with large amounts
of investment capital, while Israel provided a major trade outlet
to enable the Apartheid state avoid international economic sanctions.(9)
Although the French and South Africans
were primarily responsible for the Israeli nuclear program, the
U.S. shares and deserves a large part of the blame. Mark Gaffney
wrote (the Israeli nuclear program) "was possible only because
(emphasis in original) of calculated deception on the part of
Israel, and willing complicity on the part of the U.S.."(10)
From the very beginning, the U.S. was
heavily involved in the Israeli nuclear program, providing nuclear
related technology such as a small research reactor in 1955 under
the "Atoms for Peace Program." Israeli scientists were
largely trained at U.S. universities and were generally welcomed
at the nuclear weapons labs. In the early 1960s, the controls
for the Dimona reactor were obtained clandestinely from a company
called Tracer Lab, the main supplier of U.S. military reactor
control panels, purchased through a Belgian subsidiary, apparently
with the acquiescence of the National Security Agency (NSA) and
the CIA.(11) In 1971, the Nixon administration approved the sale
of hundreds of krytons(a type of high speed switch necessary to
the development of sophisticated nuclear bombs) to Israel.(12)
And, in 1979, Carter provided ultra high resolution photos from
a KH-11 spy satellite, used 2 years later to bomb the Iraqi Osirak
Reactor.(13) Throughout the Nixon and Carter administrations,
and accelerating dramatically under Reagan, U.S. advanced technology
transfers to Israel have continued unabated to the present.
The Vanunu Revelations
Following the 1973 war, Israel intensified
its nuclear program while continuing its policy of deliberate
"nuclear opaqueness." Until the mid-1980s, most intelligence
estimates of the Israeli nuclear arsenal were on the order of
two dozen but the explosive revelations of Mordechai Vanunu, a
nuclear technician working in the Dimona plutonium reprocessing
plant, changed everything overnight. A leftist supporter of Palestine,
Vanunu believed that it was his duty to humanity to expose Israel's
nuclear program to the world. He smuggled dozens of photos and
valuable scientific data out of Israel and in 1986 his story was
published in the London Sunday Times. Rigorous scientific scrutiny
of the Vanunu revelations led to the disclosure that Israel possessed
as many as 200 highly sophisticated, miniaturized thermonuclear
bombs. His information indicated that the Dimona reactor's capacity
had been expanded several fold and that Israel was producing enough
plutonium to make ten to twelve bombs per year. A senior U.S.
intelligence analyst said of the Vanunu data,"The scope of
this is much more extensive than we thought. This is an enormous
operation."(14)
Just prior to publication of his information
Vanunu was lured to Rome by a Mossad "Mata Hari," was
beaten, drugged and kidnapped to Israel and, following a campaign
of disinformation and vilification in the Israeli press, convicted
of "treason" by a secret security court and sentenced
to 18 years in prison. He served over 11 years in solitary confinement
in a 6 by 9 foot cell. After a year of modified release into the
general population(he was not permitted contact with Arabs), Vanunu
recently has been returned to solitary and faces more than 3 years
further imprisonment. Predictably, The Vanunu revelations were
largely ignored by the world press, especially in the United States,
and Israel continues to enjoy a relatively free ride regarding
its nuclear status. (15)
Israel's Arsenal of Mass Destruction
Today, estimates of the Israeli nuclear
arsenal range from a minimum of 200 to a maximum of about 500.
Whatever the number, there is little doubt that Israeli nukes
are among the world's most sophisticated, largely designed for
"war fighting" in the Middle East. A staple of the Israeli
nuclear arsenal are "neutron bombs," miniaturized thermonuclear
bombs designed to maximize deadly gamma radiation while minimizing
blast effects and long term radiation- in essence designed to
kill people while leaving property intact.(16) Weapons include
ballistic missiles and bombers capable of reaching Moscow, cruise
missiles, land mines(In the 1980s Israel planted nuclear land
mines along the Golan Heights(17)), and artillery shells with
a range of 45 miles(18). In June, 2000 an Israeli submarine launched
a cruise missile which hit a target 950 miles away, making Israel
only the third nation after the U.S. and Russia with that capability.
Israel will deploy 3 of these virtually impregnable submarines,
each carrying 4 cruise missiles.(19)
The bombs themselves range in size from
"city busters" larger than the Hiroshima Bomb to tactical
mini nukes. The Israeli arsenal of weapons of mass destruction
clearly dwarfs the actual or potential arsenals of all other Middle
Eastern states combined, and is vastly greater than any conceivable
need for "deterrence."
Israel also possesses a comprehensive
arsenal of chemical and biological weapons. According to the Sunday
Times, Israel has produced both chemical and biological weapons
with a sophisticated delivery system, quoting a senior Israeli
intelligence official, "There is hardly a single known or
unknown form of chemical or biological weapon . . .which is not
manufactured at the Nes Tziyona Biological Institute.")(20)
The same report described F-16 fighter jets specially designed
for chemical and biological payloads, with crews trained to load
the weapons on a moments notice. In 1998, the Sunday Times reported
that Israel, using research obtained from South Africa, was developing
an "ethno bomb; "In developing their "ethno-bomb",
Israeli scientists are trying to exploit medical advances by identifying
distinctive a gene carried by some Arabs, then create a genetically
modified bacterium or virus... The scientists are trying to engineer
deadly micro-organisms that attack only those bearing the distinctive
genes." Dedi Zucker, a leftist Member of Knesset, the Israeli
parliament, denounced the research saying, "Morally, based
on our history, and our tradition and our experience, such a weapon
is monstrous and should be denied."(21)
Israeli Nuclear Strategy
In popular imagination, the Israeli bomb
is a "weapon of last resort," to be used only at the
last minute to avoid annihilation, and many well intentioned but
misled supporters of Israel still believe that to be the case.
Whatever truth this formulation may have had in the minds of the
early Israeli nuclear strategists, today the Israeli nuclear arsenal
is inextricably linked to and integrated with overall Israeli
military and political strategy. As Seymour Hersh says in classic
understatement ; "The Samson Option is no longer the only
nuclear option available to Israel."(22) Israel has made
countless veiled nuclear threats against the Arab nations and
against the Soviet Union(and by extension Russia since the end
of the Cold War) One chilling example comes from Ariel Sharon,
the current Israeli Prime Minister "Arabs may have the oil,
but we have the matches."(23) (In 1983 Sharon proposed to
India that it join with Israel to attack Pakistani nuclear facilities;
in the late 70s he proposed sending Israeli paratroopers to Tehran
to prop up the Shah; and in 1982 he called for expanding Israel's
security influence to stretch from "Mauritania to Afghanistan.")
In another example, Israeli nuclear expert Oded Brosh said in
1992, "...we need not be ashamed that the nuclear option
is a major instrumentality of our defense as a deterrent against
those who attack us."(24) According to Israel Shahak, "The
wish for peace, so often assumed as the Israeli aim, is not in
my view a principle of Israeli policy, while the wish to extend
Israeli domination and influence is." and "Israel is
preparing for a war, nuclear if need be, for the sake of averting
domestic change not to its liking, if it occurs in some or any
Middle Eastern states.... Israel clearly prepares itself to seek
overtly a hegemony over the entire Middle East..., without hesitating
to use for the purpose all means available, including nuclear
ones."(25)
Israel uses its nuclear arsenal not just
in the context of deterrence" or of direct war fighting,
but in other more subtle but no less important ways. For example,
the possession of weapons of mass destruction can be a powerful
lever to maintain the status quo, or to influence events to Israel's
perceived advantage, such as to protect the so called moderate
Arab states from internal insurrection, or to intervene in inter-Arab
warfare.(26) In Israeli strategic jargon this concept is called
"nonconventional compellence" and is exemplified by
a quote from Shimon Peres; "acquiring a superior weapons
system(read nuclear) would mean the possibility of using it for
compellent purposes- that is forcing the other side to accept
Israeli political demands, which presumably include a demand that
the traditional status quo be accepted and a peace treaty signed."(27)
From a slightly different perspective, Robert Tuckerr asked in
a Commentary magazine article in defense of Israeli nukes, "What
would prevent Israel... from pursuing a hawkish policy employing
a nuclear deterrent to freeze the status quo?"(28) Possessing
an overwhelming nuclear superiority allows Israel to act with
impunity even in the face world wide opposition. A case in point
might be the invasion of Lebanon and destruction of Beirut in
1982, led by Ariel Sharon, which resulted in 20,000 deaths, most
civilian. Despite the annihilation of a neighboring Arab state,
not to mention the utter destruction of the Syrian Air Force,
Israel was able to carry out the war for months at least partially
due to its nuclear threat.
Another major use of the Israeli bomb
is to compel the U.S. to act in Israel's favor, even when it runs
counter to its own strategic interests. As early as 1956 Francis
Perrin, head of the French A-bomb project wrote "We thought
the Israeli Bomb was aimed at the Americans, not to launch it
at the Americans, but to say, 'If you don't want to help us in
a critical situation we will require you to help us; otherwise
we will use our nuclear bombs.'"(29) During the 1973 war,
Israel used nuclear blackmail to force Kissinger and Nixon to
airlift massive amounts of military hardware to Israel. The Israeli
Ambassador, Simha Dinitz, is quoted as saying, at the time, "If
a massive airlift to Israel does not start immediately, then I
will know that the U.S. is reneging on its promises and...we will
have to draw very serious conclusions..."(30) Just one example
of this strategy was spelled out in 1987 by Amos Rubin, economic
adviser to Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir, who said "If left
to its own Israel will have no choice but to fall back on a riskier
defense which will endanger itself and the world at large... To
enable Israel to abstain from dependence on nuclear arms calls
for $2 to 3 billion per year in U.S. aid."(31) Since then
Israel's nuclear arsenal has expanded exponentially, both quantitatively
and qualitatively, while the U.S. money spigots remain wide open.
Regional and International Implications
Largely unknown to the world, the Middle
East nearly exploded in all out war on February 22, 2001. According
to the London Sunday Times and DEBKAfile, Israel went on high
missile alert after receiving news from the U.S. of movement by
6 Iraqi armored divisions stationed along the Syrian border, and
of launch preparations of surface to surface missiles. DEBKAfile,
an Israeli based "counter-terrorism" information service,
claims that the Iraqi missiles were deliberately taken to the
highest alert level in order to test the U.S. and Israeli response.
Despite an immediate attack by 42 U.S. and British war planes,
the Iraqis suffered little apparent damage.(32) The Israelis have
warned Iraq that they are prepared to use neutron bombs in a preemptive
attack against Iraqi missiles.
The Israeli nuclear arsenal has profound
implications for the future of peace in the Middle East, and indeed,
for the entire planet. It is clear from Israel Shahak that Israel
has no interest in peace except that which is dictated on its
own terms, and has absolutely no intention of negotiating in good
faith to curtail its nuclear program or discuss seriously a nuclear-free
Middle East,"Israel's insistence on the independent use of
its nuclear weapons can be seen as the foundation on which Israeli
grand strategy rests."(34) According to Seymour Hersh, "the
size and sophistication of Israel's nuclear arsenal allows men
such as Ariel Sharon to dream of redrawing the map of the Middle
East aided by the implicit threat of nuclear force."(35)
General Amnon Shahak-Lipkin, former Israeli Chief of Staff is
quoted "It is never possible to talk to Iraq about no matter
what; It is never possible to talk to Iran about no matter what.
Certainly about nuclearization. With Syria we cannot really talk
either."(36) Ze'ev Shiff, an Israeli military expert writing
in Haaretz said, "Whoever believes that Israel will ever
sign the UN Convention prohibiting the proliferation of nuclear
weapons... is day dreaming,"(37) and Munya Mardoch, Director
of the Israeli Institute for the Development of Weaponry, said
in 1994, "The moral and political meaning of nuclear weapons
is that states which renounce their use are acquiescing to the
status of Vassal states. All those states which feel satisfied
with possessing conventional weapons alone are fated to become
vassal states."(38)
As Israeli society becomes more and more
polarized, the influence of the radical right becomes stronger.
According to Shahak, "The prospect of Gush Emunim, or some
secular right-wing Israeli fanatics, or some some of the delerious
Israeli Army generals, seizing control of Israeli nuclear weapons...cannot
be precluded. ...while israeli jewish society undergoes a steady
polarization, the Israeli security system increasingly relies
on the recruitment of cohorts from the ranks of the extreme right."(39)
The Arab states, long aware of Israel's nuclear program, bitterly
resent its coercive intent, and perceive its existence as the
paramount threat to peace in the region, requiring their own weapons
of mass destruction. During a future Middle Eastern war (a distinct
possibility given the ascension of Ariel Sharon, an unindicted
war criminal with a bloody record stretching from the massacre
of Palestinian civilians at Quibya in 1953, to the massacre of
Palestinian civilians at Sabra and Shatila in 1982 and beyond)
the possible Israeli use of nuclear weapons should not be discounted.
According to Shahak, "In Israeli terminology, the launching
of missiles on to Israeli territory is regarded as 'nonconventional'
regardless of whether they are equipped with explosives or poison
gas."(40) (Which requires a "nonconventional" response,
a perhaps unique exception being the Iraqi SCUD attacks during
the Gulf War.)
Meanwhile, the existence of an arsenal
of mass destruction in such an unstable region in turn has serious
implications for future arms control and disarmament negotiations,
and even the threat of nuclear war. Seymour Hersh warns, "Should
war break out in the Middle East again,... or should any Arab
nation fire missiles against Israel, as the Iraqis did, a nuclear
escalation, once unthinkable except as a last resort, would now
be a strong probability."(41) and Ezar Weissman, Israel's
current President said "The nuclear issue is gaining momentum(and
the) next war will not be conventional."(42) Russia and before
it the Soviet Union has long been a major(if not the major) target
of Israeli nukes. It is widely reported that the principal purpose
of Jonathan Pollard's spying for Israel was to furnish satellite
images of Soviet targets and other super sensitive data relating
to U.S. nuclear targeting strategy. (43) (Since launching its
own satellite in 1988, Israel no longer needs U.S. spy secrets.)
Israeli nukes aimed at the Russian heartland seriously complicate
disarmament and arms control negotiations and, at the very least,
the unilateral possession of nuclear weapons by Israel is enormously
destabilizing, and dramatically lowers the threshold for their
actual use, if not for all out nuclear war. In the words of Mark
Gaffney, "... if the familar pattern(Israel refining its
weapons of mass destruction with U.S. complicity) is not reversed
soon- for whatever reason- the deepening Middle East conflict
could trigger a world conflagration." (44)
Many Middle East Peace activists have
been reluctant to discuss, let alone challenge, the Israeli monopoly
on nuclear weapons in the region, often leading to incomplete
and uninformed analyses and flawed action strategies. Placing
the issue of Israeli weapons of mass destruction directly and
honestly on the table and action agenda would have several salutary
effects. First, it would expose a primary destabilizing dynamic
driving the Middle East arms race and compelling the region's
states to each seek their own "deterrent." Second, it
would expose the grotesque double standard which sees the U.S.
and Europe on the one hand condemning Iraq, Iran and Syria for
developing weapons of mass destruction, while simultaneously protecting
and enabling the principal culprit. Third, exposing Israel's nuclear
strategy would focus international public attention, resulting
in increased pressure to dismantle its weapons of mass destruction
and negotiate a just peace in good faith. Finally, a nuclear free
Israel would make a Nuclear Free Middle East and a comprehensive
regional peace agreement much more likely. Unless and until the
world community confronts Israel over its covert nuclear program
it is unlikely that there will be any meaningful resolution of
the Israeli/Arab conflict, a fact that Israel may be counting
on as the Sharon era dawns.
Israel watch
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