Plans for a nuclear research program had been made within a year of the establishment of the Israeli state in 1948. Due to Israel’s precarious position in the Middle East, the bomb was considered a centerpiece of its security against hostile neighbors.

In 1949 Israeli scientists began exploration of the Negev Desert, finding low-grade uranium deposits near Beersheba. Meanwhile, promising students were sent abroad to study engineering and physics at Israeli government expense.

The Israel Atomic Energy Commission (IAEC) was secretly founded in 1952 and placed under the control of the Defense Ministry.

It was France, however, which provided assistance to Israel for the construction of the first nuclear research reactor at Dimona, in the Negev Desert. Nuclear cooperation between the two countries, initiated in the early 1950’s, became problematic when France began to pressure Israel to make the project public and to submit to international inspections of the site. After French disengagement in the early 1960's, Israel progressed on its own. (Some believe that French-Israeli cooperation extended to secret nuclear tests (4)

Lacking uranium reserves – Israel's own uranium sources consist solely of the small phosphate deposits in the Negev – a new collaboration with South Africa developed and continued through the 1970s and 1980s, whereby Israel supplied the technology and expertise for the ''Apartheid Bomb'', and South Africa provided the uranium for Israel’s Dimona reactor.

A nuclear explosion in the southern Indian Ocean in 1979 was suspected to be a joint South African-Israeli test.

Israel also obtained uranium oxide, known as yellow cake, from West Germany (5) and probably from Portugal.

The US was, from the very beginning, involved in the Israeli nuclear program, training Israeli scientists and providing technology including a small research reactor under the ‘’Atoms for Peace’’ program in 1955 (7).

The United States became aware of Dimona's existence after U-2 spy planes in 1958 captured the facility's construction. Israel initially said it was a textile plant; two years later US intelligence identified the site as a nuclear reactor, the C.I.A. voicing concerns that it was part of a weapons program.

On December 1960, Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion told the Israeli Parliament that a nuclear reactor was under construction for ''peaceful purposes'' only.

After refusing to allow regular international inspections, Israel eventually undertook a commitment with the US to use the facility for peaceful purposes and to admit an inspection team. These inspections began in 1962 and continued until 1969, but inspectors reported they found no evidence of a weapons program. In fact it is now known they saw only the above ground element of the Dimona complex, the underground plant was kept hidden during the inspections.

By early 1968, Carl Duckett, head of the C.I.A. directorate of science and technology, concluded Israel had nuclear weapons, which he announced in testimony he gave to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission in 1974. Duckett said his assessment was based largely on conversations he held with Edward Teller, the father of the hydrogen bomb, who visited Israel several times and supported its nuclear program.

In 1969, President Nixon struck a deal with Israeli Prime Minister Golda Meir: as long as Israel did not go public with its nuclear weapons program or test weapons openly, the US would stop its inspections and turn a blind eye to its program.

Israel’s sophisticated nuclear program was revealed for the first time in 1986 by Israeli nuclear scientist Mordechai Vanunu. The technician dismissed from Dimona secretly smuggled photographs and scientific data of the complex out of Israel, and his story was published in the London Sunday Times (9). His information led to the conclusion that Israel had produced enough plutonium for 100/200 nuclear devices since it went on line in 1964, 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.

Vanunu also exposed the system used to conceal the manufacture of weapons from US inspectors: a false wall had been built to hide elevators that descended six stories below ground to where plutonium was refined and bomb parts manufactured.

Shortly before the article was published, a female agent from Israel's intelligence service lured Vanunu from London to Rome. He was drugged, kidnapped and brought back to Israel where he was convicted of treason by a secret security court and sentenced to 18 years in prison, 11 of which he spent in isolated confinement. Vanunu is now set for release next month, 21 April 2004, having completed his entire 18 years sentence. There have been reports that Israeli Prime minister, Ariel Sharon, has opted to impose restrictions on Vanunu’s freedom of movement after his release (10).

To find more information about this important affair and support the campaign for Vanunu’s release, please visit the website: http://www.vanunu.freeserve.co.uk

Israel’s arsenal of mass destruction (12)

“The Israel 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” (13).

Nuclear

Estimates of the Israeli nuclear arsenal range from 100 to 200 nuclear warheads; some believe that the arsenal may also include thermonuclear weapons.

Israel’s nuclear program is centered at the Negev Nuclear Research Center, outside the town of Dimona (14). The Dimona site has a plutonium/tritium production reactor, an underground chemical separation plant and nuclear component fabrication facilities. The reactor has produced plutonium free from international controls since 1963.

Israel in not a party to the Non-Proliferation Treaty.

Chemical

There is no confirmed evidence of Israeli production or stockpiling of such weapons, despite allegations of its possession of a sophisticated chemical weapons program.
Some reports have suggested an offensive CW program is located at the Israel Institute for Biological Research in Nes Tziyona.

Production capability for mustard and nerve agents is suspected after the El Al crash in October 1992 in Amsterdam, led to the discovery of approximately 50 gallons of dimethyl methylphosphonate (a widely used stimulant for defensive research but also a possible precursor of sarin nerve agent) destined for Tel Aviv.

Israel has signed but not ratified the Chemical Weapons Convention.

Biological

While there is no indication of a production effort Israel is widely thought to possess the ability to produce biological weapons. Reportedly, extensive research in the field is conducted at the Biological Research Institute in Nes Tziyona.

Furthermore, the Israeli army is alleged to have poisoned Palestinian water wells with typhoid and dysentery bacteria during the 1948 war, but proof of such events is difficult to determine (15).

Israel is not a signatory to the Biological Weapons Convention.

Missiles

Israel’s arsenal comprises ballistic and cruise missiles, unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV) and the Arrow theater defense missile, one of the only functioning missile defense systems in the world.

Israel has developed two different kinds of nuclear-capable missile: The Jericho I, capable of delivering a 750-kilogram warhead a distance of 235-500 kilometers; and the Jericho II, with 1500 kilometer-range, long enough to reach the southern border of the Soviet Union. It is most likely that a Jericho III, with 4.800 kilometer-range, is also already developed.

In addition, Israel’s successful satellite launches using the Shavit space launch vehicle (SLV), suggest that Israel could quickly convert the Shavit into a long-range ballistic missile with an intercontinental capability of up to 7000 Km, depending on the weight of the warhead.

Israel is not a member of the Missile Technology Control Regime, though it has pledged to abide by the MTCR Guidelines.

Israel and the International Law on disarmament (16)

Along with Pakistan and India, Israel remains one of only three countries that have refused to sign the Non-Proliferation Treaty (17) (NPT), the global agreement aimed at stopping the spread of nuclear weapons through inspections and sanctions. The UN General Assembly and the International Atomic Energy Agency (18) (IAEA) General Conference have adopted 13 resolutions since 1987 appealing Israel to join the Treaty, but all have been ignored.

Israel has signed but not ratified the Chemical Weapons Convention (19) (CWC), which prohibits the development, production or acquiring of chemical weapons and requires those in possession to destroy existing stocks and production facilities. The CWC contains a strict mechanism for verifying compliance by states with the provisions of the convention.

Israel is not a party to the Biological Weapons Conventions (20) (BWC), which prohibits the development, production, stockpiling, acquisition and transfer of pathogens or toxins in types and quantities that have no justification for prophylactic, protective and other peaceful purposes. However, the absence of any formal monitoring mechanism to ensure compliance, and the possibility to use many biological agents for non-military uses, have limited the effectiveness of the BWC.

There is no universal treaty specifically governing the development, deployment or use of missiles. Nonetheless a Missile Technology Control Regime (21) (MTCR) was set up in 1987 to control the export of ballistic and cruise missile technologies capable of delivering nuclear warheads. It is a voluntary agreement only, and has no enforcement, administrative or verification structures (22). Israel, although not a member, has agreed to keep to MTCR guidelines.

The Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty (23) (CTBT), which bans all nuclear test explosions, for military or civil purposes, has not yet entered into force. Israel signed the treaty in 1996, but not ratified.

Endnotes

(1) Precise assessment of a state's capabilities is difficult because most weapons of mass destruction programs remain secret and cannot be verified independently.

(2) Federation of American Scientists http://www.fas.org/nuke/guide/israel/doctrine/index.html

(3) Avner Cohen “Israel and the bomb”, 1998, http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/israel/
Avner Cohen “Most favored nation”, 1995, http://www.thebulletin.org/issues/1995/jf95/jf95Cohen.html
Warner D. Farr “The Third Temple’s Holy of Holies: Israel’s nuclear weapons”, 1999, http://www.au.af.mil/au/awc/awcgate/cpc-pubs/farr.htm
Federation of American Scientists, 2000, http://www.fas.org/nuke/guide/israel/nuke/index.html

(4) Allegedly, underground tests were conducted in the Negev in 1963 and at Al-Naqab, Negev, in October 1966.

(5) Reportedly, I n 1964, Israel obtained 200 tons of yellow cake from West Germany.

(6) Marvin Miller and Lawrence Scheinman “Israel, India and Pakistan: engaging the non-NPT States in the Non-Proliferation Treaty”, December 2003 http://www.armscontrol.org/act/2003_12/MillerandScheinman.asp

(7) Under a now expired bilateral cooperation agreement, the US supplied a research reactor to Israel at the Nahal Soreq Nuclear Research Center. The reactor, which should be used solely for civil purposes, is under IAEA safeguards.

(8) The Daily Star, 16/07/2003.

(9) London Sunday Times, 12 October 1986.

(10) Haaretz, 27 February 2004, http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/398836.html

(11) Dougles Frantz ‘’Israel extends nuclear weapons capability’’, Los Angeles Times, 11 October 2003.

(12) Monterey Institute of International Studies http://cns.miis.edu/research/wmdme/israel.htm
Nuclear Threat Initiative (a US-based think-tank) http://www.nti.org/e_research/e1_israel_1.html#nuclear
Federation of American Scientists http://www.fas.org/nuke/guide/israel
Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) http://www.csis.org/mideast/stable/3h.html

(13) John Steinbach “Israeli weapons of mass destruction: a threat to peace”, 2002, http://www.wagingpeace.org/articles/2002/03/00_steinbach_israeli-wmd.htm

(14) To see a map of Israel’s nuclear sites click here

(15) http://www.nti.org/e_research/e1_israel_1.html; Avner Cohen ’’Israel and Chemical/Biological Weapons: History, deterrence and Arms Controls“, pp 31-32 http://cns.miis.edu/pubs/npr/vol08/83/83cohen.pdf ; Salman Abu-Sitta ’’Traces of poison’’ http://weekly.ahram.org.eg/2003/627/focus.htm

(16) United Nation’s website on Weapons of Mass Destruction http://disarmament2.un.org/wmd/

(17) The NPT, whose objective is to prevent the spread of nuclear weapons and weapons technology, to promote cooperation in the peaceful uses of nuclear energy and to further the goal of achieving general and complete disarmament, was opened for signature in 1968 and entered into force in 1970.

(18) The International Atomic Energy Agency is the world's center of cooperation in the nuclear field. It has the responsibility to verify compliance of member states with the NPT and to promote cooperation in the field of peaceful nuclear technology.

(19) The CWC opened for signature on 13 January 1993 and entered into force on 29 April 1997. Significant non-signing states include Egypt, Iraq, Libya, North Korea, Syria and Yugoslavia.

(20) The BWC, which incorporate the 1925 Geneva Protocol banning "bacteriological methods of warfare", was opened for signature on 10 April 1972 and entered into force on 26 March 1975. Egypt, Syria and the United Arab Emirates have signed but not ratified the Convention.

(21) MTCR membership now consists of most states capable of developing missiles with a range of over 300 Km. Notable exceptions include India, Iran, Iraq, Libya, North Korea and Pakistan.

(22) For more information, visit http://www.nti.org/f_wmd411/mtcr.html

(23) The CTBT was opened for signature on 24 September 1996. It will enter into force 180 days after 44 nuclear-capable States, identified in a list annexed to the treaty, have ratified it.

(24) John Steinbach “Israeli Weapons of Mass Destruction: a Threat to Peace”, March 2002.

How to Stop Nuclear Terror

By Spencer Abraham*

Securing this nuclear and radiological material is a top priority for the United States, Russia and many other nations. While much of it is concentrated in the former Soviet states, it is also found in other countries around the world. It constitutes a formidable threat if it falls into the wrong hands.

In the early aftermath of the Cold War, nuclear nonproliferation programs were appropriately focused on reducing and securing nuclear weapons and weapons material in the former Soviet Union. In 2001 President Bush broadened and accelerated these programs. Both he and Russian President Vladimir Putin have made nonproliferation a personal priority. The United States has developed much better working relationships with our counterparts in the Russian government, and we have been successful in bringing other countries into the effort.

President Bush's most recent budget request for the Department of Energy calls for $1.35 billion for the Defense Nuclear Nonproliferation Program -- nearly 75 percent more than the largest budget request of the previous administration -- and we have shortened the timetables and expanded the scope of many important nonproliferation programs.

The Department of Energy has accelerated efforts to secure 600 metric tons of weapons-usable material in Russia. By the end of this fiscal year, we will have secured more than 46 percent of this material, and in 2003 and 2004 we will have secured more of it than in any two-year period. We will finish this work by 2008, two years ahead of the schedule we inherited.

We have accelerated the recovery of about 10,000 high-risk radiological sources in the United States. We have helped the Russian navy secure its nuclear fuel and warhead sites much faster than originally planned, and have accelerated similar work at other military sites. We are installing nuclear detection equipment at international ports, airports and border crossings, and are working with the International Atomic Energy Agency on initiatives to locate and secure weapons-usable material around the world.

In the spring of last year, the Energy Department began a new program with Russia to upgrade security for its strategic rocket forces sites. By the end of this year, we will have secured two sites, and we are working to secure the remaining 15 by the end of 2008.

Other U.S. initiatives include the Global Partnership Against the Spread of Weapons and Materials of Mass Destruction, which President Bush called for and the G-8 leaders adopted. This 10-year program has brought new resources to bear and is engaging additional nations in nonproliferation efforts. The partnership already has secured almost $17 billion in pledges toward our target of at least $20 billion -- a figure we believe should be a floor, not a ceiling.

We are moving aggressively forward with these and many other programs, but we would be fooling ourselves, and endangering our citizens, to say we have done enough. This is why, in May in Vienna, the United States proposed the Global Threat Reduction Initiative to secure, remove or dispose of an even broader range of nuclear and radiological materials around the world.

Under this initiative, we will work in partnership with Russia to recover nuclear fuel of Russian origin from research reactors around the world and repatriate it to Russia for safe storage or disposition. We seek to do this not in three years, or five years, or eight but by late next year. We are also working to repatriate all Russian-origin spent high-enriched uranium fuel by 2009. At present about four metric tons of this spent fuel are at 20 reactors in 17 countries.

A second feature of this initiative is completing the repatriation of U.S.-origin high-enriched uranium spent fuel from research reactors -- about 40 metric tons in more than 40 locations around the world. This effort involves a number of diplomatic and legal challenges, but we believe most of the fuel can be repatriated in four to five years.

A third feature will be converting the cores of 105 civilian research reactors that use high-enriched uranium fuel to instead use low-enriched fuel. About one-third of the reactors are in the process of being converted or already have been converted, and we expect to finish another one-third in three to five years. The final one-third could be more difficult.

While we have developed low-enriched uranium fuel that works for some reactors, it does not work for others -- and developing a suitable fuel for these reactors will take time. Until a new fuel is available, some nations will be reluctant to give up the use of their research reactors. We have top scientists hard at work developing a substitute fuel, and they are making progress. In the meantime, critics who question our pace or commitment do not understand the technical realities or are choosing to ignore them.

The final pillar of the initiative is to identify nuclear materials and equipment not yet covered by existing programs and secure those materials and equipment as safely and quickly as possible.

With all these initiatives and other efforts across the government, President Bush is pursuing the most aggressive nonproliferation effort in history. Four years ago there was no comprehensive international effort to address radiological dispersal devices. Today there is. Four years ago there was no program to place radiation detection equipment at the world's major shipping ports. Today there is. Four years ago, there was no formal agreement to return Russian-origin spent high-enriched uranium reactor fuel to Russia. Today there is. Most important: Four years ago there was no G-8 global partnership with $20 billion in commitments for nonproliferation. But today, those programs are in place.

Securing nuclear and radiological materials is one of our highest priorities and greatest responsibilities in the battle against terror. The United States will continue to intensify its efforts to keep a legacy of the Cold War from becoming a tool of the enemies of freedom.

* The writer is U.S. secretary of energy.