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Israeli commandos prepared Syria strike: paper
...However, diplomats close to the International Atomic Energy Agency have said they are unaware of such concerns. And some analysts also question the theory, noting in some cases, the failure to find secret weapons in Iraq after Washington had used their supposed existence to justify toppling Saddam Hussein.
The Sunday Times said that, in order to win U.S. President George W. Bush's support for the air raid in Syria's Deir az-Zor region in the early hours of September 6, Israeli commandos earlier had seized "nuclear-related" material. Tests later indicated it had originated in North Korea, the newspaper said...
Israel has imposed a media blackout on the events of the night of September 6, when Syria claimed its airspace in the northern province of Raqqa had been violated and that its defenses forced Israeli F-15 jets to flee, dropping "munitions" and fuel tanks in the desert near the Turkish border.
The US media insist, however, that the Israelis hit something major. The latest reports, attributed to "US government sources", say that Israel, with tacit assistance and support from the US, bombed a facility at which nuclear weapons were being developed with assistance from North Korea.
Joshua Landis, a professor at Oklahoma University who is an expert on Syrian affairs and runs Syriacomment.com, said: "Bolton represents the crowd that is very distressed that the US has declared defeat in North Korea by trusting the North Koreans. They would like to scuttle that agreement."
A diplomat associated with the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) was quoted saying that the organization didn't know anything about any nuclear facility in Syria.
The reports have not gone unchallenged. Joseph Cirincione, author of Bomb Scare: The History and Future of Nuclear Weapons and a senior fellow and director for nuclear policy at the Center for American Progress, said, "This story is nonsense."
'No alternative to ground operations'
..."We hear different versions of what happened every day," he told Ynet. "The report leads us to believe that the soldiers took samples of the material in a bottle and left. The nuclear material may have been enriched uranium or plutonium – it is very dangerous to transfer this material by hand....
Originally posted by KaneT
Showing the alleged nuclear materials to the IAEA would increase the credability of the claims. It seems surprising to me they were only shown to the US, before the raid it may have been for security reasons but now the raid has been completed there should be not problem with showing the evidence to the IAEA.
[edit on 23-9-2007 by KaneT]
Newsweek
How far will Israel go to keep Iran from getting the bomb? The question gained new urgency this month when Israeli warplanes carried out a mysterious raid deep in Syria and then threw up a nearly impenetrable wall of silence around the operation. Last week opposition leader Benjamin Netanyahu chipped away at that wall, saying Israel did in fact attack targets in Syrian territory. His top adviser, Mossad veteran Uzi Arad, told NEWSWEEK: "I do know what happened, and when it comes out it will stun everyone."
Same Newsweek article
A few months before he quit, according to two knowledgeable sources, Wurmser told a small group of people that Cheney had been mulling the idea of pushing for limited Israeli missile strikes against the Iranian nuclear site at Natanz—and perhaps other sites—in order to provoke Tehran into lashing out. The Iranian reaction would then give Washington a pretext to launch strikes against military and nuclear targets in Iran. (Wurmser's remarks were first reported last week by Washington foreign-policy blogger Steven Clemons and corroborated by NEWSWEEK.)
Originally posted by Rilence
The only time a nuclear device will detonate within the US is if your "government" allows it to happen...Just like 9/11...
Originally posted by Redge777
I do admire you are starting to look at history to find parallels keep working on it, the middle east is a really complicated mess. Especially the history of the factions in Lebannon and Syria and Isreals actions there.
The reason some in the media have been speculating, I think, is because Israeli censors are enforcing a strict clampdown and people who know something have suggested that this raid was a big deal, that something was targeted and that what was targeted was hit.
Israel usually is very boastful, very arrogant. Usually when they do something they boast about how spectacular their operation was, how successful they were. This time it’s only linkages here and there by people who claim this and that. ].
Originally posted by Freakaloin
it's silly to think if some little country in the middle east were to get a few nukes would use them on israel or america. if that happened the whole region would be turned to glass and everyone knows it.
Originally posted by esdad71
Maybe this week at the UN it will be brought up after Iran's rhetoric. That would be great. Show the evidence to the world.