Is Israel Planning a Nuclear Strike on Iran?/ Der Spiegel

[TexasLawyer]

January 08, 2007


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THE WORLD FROM BERLIN
Is Israel Planning a Nuclear Strike on Iran?

The British Sunday Times has reported that Israel is preparing for a nuclear strike on Iran's atomic weapons facilities. Planted or not, the story should serve as a wake-up call for the West.

When it comes to its alleged nuclear weapons and what it intends to do with them, Israel likes to keep the world guessing. Hence it came as no surprise that Israel has denied a report that it is preparing for a nuclear strike on Iran's purported nuclear facilities -- a report which may serve Israel well as a means of psychological warfare, even if it makes the rest of the world's hair stand on end.

<snip>

Germany's papers Monday expressed alarm at the report and called on the West to stand firm on Iran so that Israel would not feel pressured into taking matters into its own hands.

The business daily Handelsblatt writes:

"It's not easy to believe Israel's denials (that it is planning an attack), because top Israeli politicians and military officers regularly threaten Iran with violence. Deputy defense minister Ephraim Sneh said in November he did not want to rule out a military option against Iran as "a last resort." In October Prime Minister Ehud Olmert sent a similar warning to Tehran. (...)

<snip>

http://www.spiegel.de/international/0,1518,458373,00.html

[cosmicone]

1. why pressure Iran?

Iran is not breaching any treaty obligations.

Why not pressure Israel instead?

[ellisonz]

3. Iran is breaching treaty obligations. They signed the NPT, Israel did not.

Because Iran does not have nuclear weapons yet and it would just start another arms race...

Personally I think its all posturing (I want peace), but Israel has much more of a defense need for them than the Iranians, who want them more for the sake of having them at this point than anyother reason (Saddam is gone, and the US/Israel is not going to attack Iran under any circumstance it merely serves to keep the regime on top of the young people politically IMHO):crazy:

[cosmicone]

5. The treaty specifically allows

Iran to enrich fuel. Iran is not breaching anything.

[ellisonz]

6. I didn't say fuel enrichment, they are violating the inspections requirement.

Article III: Each non-NWS party undertakes to conclude an agreement with the IAEA for the application of its safeguards to all nuclear material in all of the state's peaceful nuclear activities and to prevent diversion of such material to nuclear weapons or other nuclear explosive devices.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_Non-Proliferation_Treaty

The UN has imposed sanctions for exactly that reason, they cannot verify that Iran does not have a weapons programs because Iran is not cooperating with IAEA inspectors and has violeted safeguard seals on the enrichment process: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/6205295.stm

DICKEY: Do you have any indication that there is some other completely separate Iranian nuclear-weapons program?

ELBARADEI: No, we don´t. But I won´t exclude that possibility.

DICKEY: But there´s another problem. Even if the declared nuclear research is all that Iran has going, there´s nothing in the Non-Proliferation Treaty itself to prevent them from enriching uranium - which they say is their right. They could get to the point of producing their own nuclear fuel, or bomb material, then tell you, "We´re pulling out of the treaty."

ELBARADEI: Sure. And if they have the nuclear material and they have a parallel weaponization program along the way, they are really not very far - a few months - from a weapon. We need to revisit the treaty, because that margin of security is unacceptable. But specifically on Iran, the board is saying, "You have a right under the treaty to enrich uranium, but because of the lack of confidence in your program and because the IAEA has not yet given you a clean bill of health, you should not exercise that right. In a way, you have to go through a probation period, to build confidence again, before you can exercise your full rights."

http://www.iaea.org/NewsCenter/Transcripts/2006/newsweek12012006.html

[cosmicone]

7. There is no probation period in the treaty...

El Baradei pulled it out of his ass. It is clear that Iran has a right to enrich uranium for fuel under the treaty and the west is trying to bully Iran by putting pressure on the IAEA.

Iran has never refused inspections ... they just won't allow inspections that are contrary to the letter and spirit of the treaty when the west is moving the goalposts.

[Double T]

2. If this is in fact true, Israel would be making a mistake of cataclysmic proportions

[Lurking Dem]

4. This is yet another story

about the bogus story in the Times.

A gazillion papers talking about the original story, with no sources and no independent investigating, is not going to make it "more true".