Word: raids
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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Perhaps most hazardous of all, the Israeli action managed to blend two of the world's most explosive issues: the question of nuclear proliferation in the Third World and the perpetual cauldron of Middle East politics. After a day of silence following the raid, Iraq declared that its reaction would be "bigger and better nuclear reactors." Begin made clear that Israel was ready to repeat its attack any time. Considering what might lie ahead, Sigvard Eklund, director-general of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), which inspects the nuclear facilities of signatories to the nuclear nonproliferation treaty, declared...
...Security Affairs. The meetings were in part spurred by an intelligence report that the Iraqis might be able to start manufacturing two or three small nuclear weapons within a year. Despite that, not all of the committee's Cabinet-level members were in favor of a pre-emptive raid. Among those opposed were Deputy Prime Minister Yigael Yadin, Interior Minister Yosef Burg and Education Minister Zevulun Hammer, who felt that the attack would damage relations with the U.S. But Begin prevailed with the support of such Israeli hawks as Agriculture Minister Ariel Sharon and Foreign Minister Yitzhak Shamir. In October...
...after the war bogged down, the French returned. Another attack date was set for February, but it was canceled after Yadin reiterated his strong objections. A third date, in March, was scrubbed for undisclosed reasons. In May, the ministerial committee authorized Begin to choose his own date for the raid, but strong objections about timing were raised by Opposition Leader Shimon Peres, who had been briefed on the scheme, and the strike was once more postponed...
After so many false starts, the cloak of secrecy sheltering the operation was beginning to fray. On May 22, word of the raid was leaked to Moshe Shahal, a Knesset opposition party leader. His source: former Defense Minister Ezer Weizman, who viewed the proposed strike as "adventurist." At roughly the same time, Begin's office received two additional intelligence reports that the Iraqis were prepared to activate the reactor (make it "hot" in technical jargon) as early as the first week in July. On June 5, Begin gave orders to launch the attack two days later. His day of decision...
Israel, too, was eerily silent about the raid. Begin had instructed his new press secretary, Uri Porath, to prepare an official announcement at short