The Next 9/11-Made in Israel?

The massive arms smuggling network set up by David Ben-Gurion in the United States in the 1940s had acquired a nuclear branch within a decade, according to Smith. The 1955 purchase of the Apollo Steel Company plant in Pennsylvania was financed by David Lowenthal, a close friend of Israel’s first prime minister and a former member of the Haganah, the precursor to the Israeli army.

The following year, Dr. Zalman Shapiro, head of a local Zionist Organization of America chapter, incorporated the Nuclear Materials and Equipment Corporation (NUMEC) at Apollo. Before long, NUMEC was receiving large quantities of highly enriched uranium and plutonium from Westinghouse and the U.S. Navy for nuclear reprocessing.

By the 1960s, the Atomic Energy Commission (AEC) became suspicious of security lapses at NUMEC, and even considered suspending its “classified weapons work.” A 1965 AEC audit discovered that 220 pounds of highly enriched uranium were unaccounted for.

The following year, the FBI launched its own investigation, codenamed Project Divert, to monitor NUMEC’s management and its frequent Israeli visitors. Nevertheless, the diversion of nuclear material to Israel continued unabated. After a September 10, 1968 visit by four Israelis, including Mossad agent Rafi Eitan, a further 587 pounds of highly enriched uranium went missing.'

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US Rages at NPT Over Israel Decision

After the international community agreed to put pressure on Israel to sign the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), the US president reacts by condemning the move.

In a statement issued on Friday, US President Barack Obama said the agreement reached at the 2010 NPT review conference singled out Israel with regard to a nuclear weapons-free Middle East.

"We strongly oppose efforts to single out Israel and will oppose actions that jeopardize Israel's national security," President Obama said.'

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Israel Must Sign NPT, 189 Countries Say

The final statement of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty Review Conference has called for the establishment of a nuclear weapons-free zone in the Middle East.

The 28-page document, which was agreed upon on Friday by all 189 NPT signatories after a month-long round of talks at UN Headquarters in New York, called for a conference to be held in 2012 "to be attended by all states of the Middle East, leading to the establishment" of a nuclear weapons-free zone in the Middle East.

Western diplomats said the United States finally agreed to a deal at the UN that would pressure Israel to join the NPT, Al Jazeera.net reported.'

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Israel's Nuclear Weapons Capabilities: Secret Report Reveals Weapons-grade Uranium Diversions from the U.S. to Israel

The 2010 Review Conference of the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons is underway at UN Headquarters in New York. A working paper calls for a nuclear-free Middle East. It would require member states of the NPT to “disclose in their national reports on the implementation of the resolution on the Middle East all information available to them on the nature and scope of Israeli nuclear facilities and activities, including information pertaining to previous nuclear transfers to Israel.” On May 6, 2010, the Government Accountability Office (formerly known as the General Accounting Office) released the previously secret 1978 report “Nuclear Diversion in the U.S.? 13 Years of Contradiction and Confusion” [.pdf]. It fills in important historic gaps about weapons-grade uranium diversions from the U.S. to Israel.

U.S. presidents have long acquiesced to “strategic ambiguity” – a policy of neither confirming nor denying that Israel even possesses nuclear weapons. This pretext has allowed the U.S. to deliver the lion’s share of its foreign assistance budget to Israel, despite clear legal prohibitions imposed by the Glenn and Symington amendments to the Foreign Assistance Act. UN member countries have long suspected that the United States either turns a blind eye or actively supports the transfer of know-how, weapons-grade uranium, and dual-use technology to Israel. The 62-page General Accounting Office investigation and correspondence confirms the United States refuses to mount credible investigations that would enable warranted prosecutions of the perpetrators.

“Nuclear Diversion in the U.S.? 13 Years of Contradiction and Confusion” investigates the period between 1957 and 1967 when the Nuclear Materials and Equipment Corporation (NUMEC) received over 22 tons of uranium-235 – the key material used to fabricate nuclear weapons. NUMEC’s founder and president Zalman M. Shapiro was head of a local Zionist Organization of America (ZOA) chapter and a sales agent for the Defense Ministry of Israel in the U.S. In the early 1960s the Atomic Energy Commission (AEC) began documenting suspicious lapses in security at NUMEC’s plant at Apollo, Pa. In 1965 an AEC audit found NUMEC could no longer account for over 200 pounds of highly enriched uranium. Subsequent estimates spiraled to almost 600 pounds.

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Israel must sign NPT, IAEA Chief Says

The head of the UN nuclear watchdog has called for international input to pressure Israel into joining the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT).

International Atomic Energy Agency Director General Yukiya Amano has asked the watchdog's 151 member states to share views on how to implement a resolution demanding that Israel "accede to the" NPT and open its nuclear facilities to inspections.'

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'Israel Must Sign the NPT'

Egypt has declared that turning the Middle East into a nuclear weapons-free zone is the key to solving the dispute over Iran's nuclear program and said Israel must sign the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT).

"Success in dealing with Iran will depend to a large extent on how successfully we deal with the establishment of a nuclear-free zone" in the Middle East, Egypt's Ambassador to the UN, Maged Abdel Aziz, told a luncheon briefing with reporters in New York on Tuesday.

"We refuse the existence of any nuclear weapons in (the Middle East) whether it is in Iran or whether it is in Israel," AFP quoted Abdel Aziz as saying.'

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Israel Has Nukes, But Iran is Pressured: Erdogan

Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan says Iran's nuclear rights should be respected and it is only a rumor that Iran is trying to produce nuclear weapons.

Speaking before meeting British Prime Minister Gordon Brown in London on Tuesday, Erdogan also questioned why countries like Israel did not face calls from the international community to disarm, while Iran did.'

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Gaddafi Highlights Nuclear 'Double Standards'

Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi today said that the Palestinians should be allowed to have nuclear weapons if the world does not act to disarm Israel of its arsenal.

Colonel Gaddafi accused the international community of "double standards" because Israel is allowed to maintain a barely-hidden nuclear capability while Iran comes under massive pressure not to develop its own.'

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Obama Agrees to Cover up Israel's Nukes

Israel has reportedly received an assurance by US President Barack Obama that it would not be pressured into accounting for its alleged nuclear arsenal or signing the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT).

In a meeting with, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu obtained President Obama's guarantee that the White House would continue a 4-decade-old secret deal to allow Israel keep a nuclear arsenal without opening it to international inspections, The Washington Times reported on Friday quoting officials familiar with the matter.

"The president gave Israel an NPT treaty get out of jail free card," said a Senate staffer speaking on the condition of anonymity. "What this means is that the president gave commitments that politically he had no choice but to give regarding Israel's nuclear program."

"However, it calls into question virtually every part of the president's nonproliferation agenda."

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UN Body Urges Israel to Allow Nuclear Inspection

This is good news, no it is great news. Now, let's hope it is followed up on. Though I will point out, Israel is saying they will not cooperate in any way with this resolution.
Hmmm... sounds like time for some strong sanctions.

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New Nuclear Report on Iran Angers Israel

Israel's Foreign Ministry says the UN nuclear watchdog cannot be trusted to monitor the Iranian program and the international community should act independently to stop Iran.

"These findings demonstrate that the international community, no more than Israel, cannot place its trust in the IAEA monitoring in Iran," the ministry said in a statement Sunday after the UN agency released its latest report on Iran.

The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) said Friday that the country was proceeding with its nuclear activities as the agency continues to verify the "non-diversion" of the controversial program.

Iran says its program is aimed at the civilian applications of the technology. Israel, however, has accused the country of developing a nuclear weapon over the past few years.

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