It is understandable that the Trump administration might want to support the U.S. nuclear industry, which is shrinking at home. However, the congressional report raised concerns that the group seeking to make the sale may have have sought to carry it out without going through the process required under U.S. law. Doing so could give Saudi Arabia U.S. nuclear technology without appropriate guarantees that it would not be used for nuclear weapons in the future.
A competitive global market
Exporting nuclear technology is lucrative, and many U.S. policymakers have long believed that it promotes U.S. foreign policy interests. However, the international market is shrinking, and competition between suppliers is stiff.
Private U.S. nuclear companies have trouble competing against state-supported international suppliers in Russia and China. These companies offer complete construction and operation packages with attractive financing options. Russia, for example, is willing to accept spent fuel from the reactor it supplies, relieving host countries of the need to manage nuclear waste. And China can offer lower construction costs.
Saudi Arabia declared in 2011 that it planned to spend over US$80 billion to construct 16 reactors, and U.S. companies want to provide them. Many U.S. officials see the decadeslong relationships involved in a nuclear sale as an opportunity to influence Riyadh’s nuclear future and preserve U.S. influence in the Saudi kingdom.
Why does Saudi Arabia want nuclear power?
With the world’s second-largest known petroleum reserves, abundant untapped supplies of natural gas and high potential for solar energy, why is Saudi Arabia shopping for nuclear power? Some of its motives are benign, but others are worrisome. ………..
US nuclear trade regulations
Under the U.S. Atomic Energy Act, before American companies can compete to export nuclear reactors to Saudi Arabia, Washington and Riyadh must conclude a nuclear cooperation agreement, and the U.S. government must submit it to Congress. Unless Congress adopts a joint resolution within 90 days disapproving the agreement, it is approved. The United States currently has 23 nuclear cooperation agreements in force, including Middle Eastern countries such as Egypt (approved in 1981), Turkey (2008) and the United Arab Emirates (2009).
The Atomic Energy Act requires countries seeking to purchase U.S. nuclear technology to make legally binding commitments that they will not use those materials and equipment for nuclear weapons, and to place them under International Atomic Energy Agency safeguards. It also mandates that the United States must approve any uranium enrichment or plutonium separation activities involving U.S. technologies and materials, in order to prevent countries from diverting them to weapons use.
American nuclear suppliers claim that these strict conditions and time-consuming legal requirements put them at a competitive disadvantage. But those conditions exist to prevent countries from misusing U.S. technology for nuclear weapons. I find it alarming that according to the House report, White House officials may have attempted to bypass or sidestep these conditions – potentially enriching themselves in the process.
According to the congressional report, within days of President Trump’s inauguration, senior U.S. officials were promoting an initiative to transfer nuclear technology to Saudi Arabia, without either concluding a nuclear cooperation agreement and submitting it to Congress or involving key government agencies, such as the Department of Energy or the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. One key advocate for this so-called “Marshall Plan” for nuclear reactors in the Middle East was then-national security adviser Michael Flynn, who reportedly served as an adviser to a subsidiary of IP3, the firm that devised this plan, while he was advising Trump’s presidential campaign.
The promoters of the plan also reportedly proposed to sidestep U.S. sanctions against Russia by partnering with Russian companies – which impose less stringent restrictions on nuclear exports – to sell reactors to Saudi Arabia.
The Sea of Galilee: A Sea of Miracles Disappearing
Where Jesus once preached, the holy waters are draining away,Climate change and conflict have left the river Jordan a stagnant stream and the Sea of Galilee critically low, Guardian, Oliver Holmes Sun 24 Feb 2019
If Jesus were alive today, he might reconsider a baptism in the river Jordan; there’s a good chance he’d pick up an eye infection. Faecal bacteria in the pungent, murky waters have risen in recent years to up to six times the recommended levels.
Once a raging torrent, the lower Jordan has been starved of water to become a stagnant stream, filled with sewage and dirty run-off from farms. Around 95% of its historical flow has been diverted by agriculture during the past half-century. And the river’s primary source, the Sea of Galilee – where Christians believe the son of God walked on water – has for years been dammed to prevent its demise.
Biblical bodies of water in the Holy Land, eternalised in Christian, Jewish and Muslim ancient texts as godly, are now facing very human threats: climate change, mismanagement and conflict.
Following five consecutive years of drought, the Sea of Galilee has sunk to a 100-year low. A number of small islands have emerged at the water’s surface, and several holiday homes that were built on the shoreline now stand at least 100 metres from the boggy edge.
Overuse has also taken its toll. Last summer, the level of the lake dropped close to a black line, a level at which it could lose its status as a freshwater body. “The black line is our best guess of that point,” says Gidon Bromberg, the Israeli director of EcoPeace, an organisation of Israeli, Palestinian and Jordanian environmentalists. “It was tens of centimetres above the black line,” he says, adding that such a shallow depth has not been seen in records taken over the past century.
As the lake’s level falls, it cannot wash away salt fast enough, and its salinity rises. If the Sea of Galilee’s waters were left to hover around the black line, its flora and fauna would start to perish. A glimpse of the lake’s grim future might be seen 350km downriver at the lowest place on the planet: the Dead Sea, a body almost devoid of fish and plant life. “Once the lake becomes saline, that could be irreversible,” says Bromberg, speaking at the muddy edge of the water, reeds poking up behind him………
As long as the Sea of Galilee is under threat, the river Jordan will be too. And their eventual deaths could have explosive ramifications as water in this region has been a key source of conflict. The river Jordan is shared by Israel, the occupied Palestinian territories, Jordan and Syria, all of which use its depleting reserves………
EcoPeace hopes that good water management will spur on peace to the region. Bromberg is now advocating for a deal in which Israel, which is on the Mediterranean, supplies desalinated water to Jordan. In exchange, Jordan, which is low on water but full of open desert with 320 sunny days a year, will supply solar power.
Guardian 23rd Feb 2019 The idea that the US might sell state-of-the-art nuclear technology to
Saudi Arabia, potentially enabling Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman’s reckless regime to build nuclear weapons, sounds so far-fetched as to be almost grotesque.
After all the near-hysterical American and Israeli warnings about the risk of Iran, the Saudis’ arch-rival, acquiring the
bomb, surely even Donald Trump would balk at such breathtaking – and dangerous – hypocrisy? Apparently not.
According to a congressional inquiry, senior White House officials, retired generals and Trump’s close relatives and business cronies have been secretly pursuing a multibillion-dollar scheme to cut a nuclear deal with Riyadh.
The talks are said to be continuing, despite increased public scrutiny and legal advice that a technology transfer lacking strict conditions could contravene US law, breach international counter-proliferation safeguards, and fuel a
nuclear arms race.
Financial Future Of Iranian Nuclear Power Plant In Question, February 24, 2019, Radio Farda
While the parliament weighs President Hassan Rouhani’s budget for the new Iranian year (beginning March 21), senior officials at the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran (AEOI) have complained of the “minimal” budget allocated to the Bushehr nuclear power plant.The head, deputy head, and spokesman for AEOI have all criticized the government, saying the budget allocated to the plant in southern Iran is so low that it endangers the future of the nuclear reactor.
The Energy Ministry “pays peanuts” for electricity produced at Bushehr, AEOI and former Foreign Minister Ali Akbar Salehi said on February 23. “For each kilowatt per hour of electricity produced at Bushehr, ME pays half a cent but exports electricity for nine cents,” he said.
Speaking at an industrial seminar, Salehi said, “The electricity produced at Bushehr reactor is bought for $40 million, while the annual budget needed for running the plant is $120 million. There’s a deficit of $80 million for which we don’t know how to compensate.”
Iran is currently suffering from an acute economic crisis and has been unable to issue a budget for the upcoming Iranian fiscal year. U.S. economic sanctions have halved Iran’s oil exports, which provide the hard currency needed for government operations.
AEOI spokesman Behrooz Kamalvandi says that given the budget allocated to Bushehr, the fate of Iran’s only nuclear power plant now hangs in the balance.
Bushehr’s construction started during the reign of Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi in 1975 by Kraftwerk Union, a Siemens company, along with several other German firms.
Following the downfall of the monarchy, work on the nuclear reactor ground to a halt.
A veteran Iranian diplomat and former foreign minister, Abbas Khalatbari, was executed by firing squad in April 1979 for charges that included signing a contract with Germany for the power plant’s construction.
However, in 1988, Russia signed a contract with Iran to complete the project……..
Based on a parliamentary motion endorsed by the parliament 14 years ago, the Iranian government is obliged to construct 13 more plants with output similar to Bushehr’s.
A report by the Democratic staff of the House Oversight and Reform Committee this week provided new details of how former national security adviser Michael Flynn and other National Security Council officials attempted to rush through a plan for U.S. companies to sell nuclear power plants to Saudi Arabia in the early weeks of the Trump administration. Ignoring warnings by career officials that they could violate laws on technology transfers, as well as conflict-of-interest rules, they pushed a scheme drawn up by a firm represented by several well-connected retired generals.
According to the committee report, Mr. Flynn had identified himself as an adviser to the company, and the plan called for President Trump to appoint his close friend Tom Barrack to oversee a deal with the Saudis even though his private business has raised considerable funds from Saudi investors.
Though the NSC initiative appears to have been squelched by H.R. McMaster, who replaced Mr. Flynn, negotiations with the Saudis have quietly continued under Energy Secretary Rick Perry. As recently as last week, Mr. Trump held a meeting with nuclear company executives in the Oval Office to discuss power-plant sales to Saudi Arabia. The session was organized by the firm that previously collaborated with Mr. Flynn, and the shadows of possible conflicts of interest persist. One of the nuclear companies, Westinghouse Electric, is owned by a firm that also bought a stake in a troubled Manhattan skyscraper owned by Jared Kushner’s family company. Mr. Kushner, a key interlocutor with Mohammed bin Salman, is due to visit the kingdom again next week.
There is an argument to be made for U.S. firms selling nuclear plants to Saudi Arabia: If the kingdom is determined to acquire them, then it would be better it do so from U.S. companies than from their Russian or Chinese competitors. But that logic holds only if the administration negotiates a deal with Riyadh imposing strict controls on the technology. In the case of Saudi Arabia, the only responsible accord would be one that prohibited the regime from any enrichment of uranium or reprocessing of spent fuel — techniques that can be used to build nuclear weapons.
Unsurprisingly, the arrogant crown prince is refusing to accept those terms — probably because he wishes to preserve a nuclear-arms option. Though federal law requires the United States to negotiate a protocol on the conditions for supplying nuclear technology and submit that to Congress, it does not mandate those conditions. So Congress must insist that any nuclear deal with Saudi Arabia embrace this gold standard. To do otherwise would only compound the danger posed by Mohammed bin Salman.
The US is rushing to transfer sensitive nuclear power technology to Saudi Arabia, according to a new congressional report.
A Democratic-led House panel has launched an inquiry over concerns about the White House plan to build nuclear reactors across the kingdom.
Whistleblowers told the panel it could destabilise the Middle East by boosting nuclear weapons proliferation.
Firms linked to the president have reportedly pushed for these transfers.
The House of Representatives’ Oversight Committee report notes that an inquiry into the matter is “particularly critical because the Administration’s efforts to transfer sensitive US nuclear technology to Saudi Arabia appear to be ongoing”.
President Donald Trump met nuclear power developers at the White House on 12 February to discuss building plants in Middle Eastern nations, including Saudi Arabia.
And Mr Trump’s son-in-law, White House adviser Jared Kushner, will be touring the Middle East this month to discuss the economics of the Trump administration’s peace plan.
Lawmakers have been critical of the plan as it would violate US laws guarding against the transfer of nuclear technology that could be used to support a weapons programme.
They also believe giving Saudi Arabia access to nuclear technology would spark a dangerous arms race in the volatile region.
Saudi Arabia has said it wants nuclear power in order to diversify its energy sources and help address growing energy needs.
But concerns around rival Iran developing nuclear technology are also at play, according to US media.
Previous negotiations for US nuclear technology ended after Saudi Arabia refused to agree to safeguards against using the tech for weaponry, but the Trump administration may not see these safeguards as mandatory, ProPublica reported.
What does the report say?
The House report is based on whistleblower accounts and documents showing communications between Trump administration officials and nuclear power companies.
It states that “within the US, strong private commercial interests have been pressing aggressively for the transfer of highly sensitive nuclear technology to Saudi Arabia”.
These commercial entities could “reap billions of dollars through contracts associated with constructing and operating nuclear facilities in Saudi Arabia”.
Mr Trump is reportedly “directly engaged in the effort”.
The White House has yet to comment on the report.
The report includes a timeline of events and names other administration officials who have been involved with the matter, including Energy Secretary Rick Perry, Mr Kushner, Mr Trump’s inaugural committee chairman Tom Barrack and former National Security Adviser Michael Flynn.
Flynn was found guilty of lying to the FBI about Russian contacts as a part of special counsel Robert Mueller’s inquiry into alleged Russian meddling in the 2016 presidential election.
The commercial entities mentioned in the report are:
IP3 International, a private company led by ex-military officers and security officials that organised a group of US companies to build “dozens of nuclear power plants” in Saudi Arabia
ACU Strategic Partners, a nuclear power consultancy led by British-American Alex Copson
Colony NorthStar, Mr Barrack’s real estate investment firm
Flynn Intel Group, a consultancy and lobby set up by Michael Flynn
The report states that Flynn had decided to develop IP3’s nuclear initiative, the Middle East Marshall Plan, during his transition, and while he was still serving as an adviser for the company.In January 2017, National Security Council staff began to raise concerns that these plans were inappropriate and possibly illegal, and that Flynn had a potentially criminal conflict of interest.Following Flynn’s dismissal, however, IP3 continued to push for the Middle East Plans to be presented to Mr Trump.
According to the report, one senior official said the proposal was “a scheme for these generals to make some money”.
And whistleblowers described the White House working environment as “marked by chaos, dysfunction and backbiting”.
What next?
The report says an investigation will determine whether the administration has been acting “in the national security interests of the United States or, rather, [to] serve those who stand to gain financially” from this policy change.
These apparent conflicts of interest among White House advisers may breach federal law, and the report notes that there is bi-partisan concern regarding Saudi Arabia’s access to nuclear technology.The oversight committee is seeking interviews with the companies, “key personnel” who promoted the plan to the White House, as well as the Departments of Commerce, Energy, Defence, State, Treasury, the White House and the CIA.
Climate change will fuel more wars and displacement in the Middle East, experts warn
‘Terrorist organisations like ISIS also capitalise on climate change to get new members’ https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/middle-east-climate-change-war-food-water-refugees-jihadis-un-a8786911.html, 20 Feb 19, Borzou Daragahi The Hague@borzo ,Themost volatile region in the world is about to be plunged into further chaos because ongoing climate change, with food scarcity and water shortages adding to the flood of displaced people, sparking wars, and providing opportunities for extremist groups, warned scholars and international officials at a conference on Tuesday.
A UN development official predicted that 7 to 10 million people in the Middle East and North Africa will be forced to leave their ancestral or temporary homes over the next decade because a lack of water, food or owing to wars possibly sparked by conflicts over resources. Others speaking at a panel at the annual Planetary Security Initiative in the Dutch capital cited small and large conflicts in the region over the years, including food riots in 2008 in Jordan, and identified other future hotspots in the Levant and north Africa.
“Food and fuel in security can very quickly quickly lead to unrest,” Jamal Saghir, a professor at McGill University.
“It’s likely that such shocks will happen again. Such crises might trigger violent crisis and increase public support for extremist groups offering viable alternatives,” he told attendees at the conference. “Terrorist organisations like ISIS also capitalise on climate change to get new members. They find impoverished farmers to take advantage of – they are offered food, salaries, and other advantages.”
First launched in 2015, the Planetary Security Initiative is a conference sponsored by the Dutch government and several international organisations to address climate change and associated crises. It seeks to broaden the definition of security beyond weapons and borders to include daily sustenance.
Scholars and policymakers have already attributed to climatic shifts that a decades-long drought that has afflicted the Middle East. During the opening talk, the Iraqi ambassador showed a chart that traced average rainfall in Baghdad collapsing and temperatures rising consistently over the last decade.
The changing conditions contributed to unrest in Syria and Iraq and other Arab nations plunged into chaos in the 2011 Arab Spring uprisings, and the subsequent rise of ISIS. But the troubles are far from over, with warmer temperatures leading to less water, for example along the Tigris and Euphrates rivers that nourish Iraq.
“In Iraq, what is projected is the reduction of rainfall or snow in the headwaters,” said Nadim Farjallah, a professor specialising in climate change issues at the American University of Beirut. “The Middle East has all the problems now and all it needs is a spark. We already have all the tinder there.”
Adding to the complications, the Middle East region imports 65 percent of its grain, with the numbers increasing, making governments and populations even more vulnerable to market shifts or climactic changes in other regions. “The region is completely dependent on the sustainable management of agriculture in other parts of the world for its food security,” said Johan Schaar, a scholar at the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute.
The United Nations and other development agencies are nibbling at the edges of the looming crisis. They’ve established a fund to find water solutions for Egypt, where the bulk of its nearly 100 million population live along the Nile River. Kishan Khoday, a UNDP official focused on Middle East issues, described initiative bring solar energy to Somalia and manage underground water resources.
Participants spoke of the urgent need of making governments and publics more aware of the need to manage water and other natural resources. “We need to weave climate change more systematically into our analysis of what’s happening in the region,” said Elizabeth Sellwood, an official of the UN’s environment arm.
In Jordan and Gaza, international officials have launched efforts to find sources of agricultural water that are sustainable.
But in the end, many were sceptical that either policymakers or populations had a sense of the looming threat, and the waves of crises still ahead.
“We’re looking at a situation of rising scarcity due to climate change and people on the move being the new normal,” said Tessa Terpstra, the Netherlands’ envoy for water matters in the Middle East.
A handful of governments — including those of Jordan, Tunisia and Morocco — have begun to address the issue of climate change. The preamble to Tunisia’s landmark 2014 constitution stresses “the preservation of a healthy environment that guarantees the sustainability of our natural resources.”
But for the most part, governments are blithely ignoring the issue, especially those wealthy Arabian Peninsula states dependent on the export of oil and gas. “Between the talk and the walk there’s a major discourse that needs to be addressed,” said Mr Saghir. “I don’t think the political will is there.”
Zarif decries ‘US hypocrisy’ over planned nuclear sale to Saudis Neither human rights or a burgeoning nuclear programme are a real concern for the US, Iran’s foreign minister says. Aljazeera, 21 Feb 19, Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif accused the US of hypocrisy for allegedly attempting to sell nuclear technology to Saudi Arabia while Washington tries to wreck Iran’s nuclear programme.
Zarif’s comment on Twitter on Wednesday came after reports the administration of President Donald Trump is trying to bypass US Congress to advance the sale of nuclear power plants to Saudi Arabia.
“Day by day it becomes clearer to the world what was always clear to us: neither human rights nor a nuclear program have been the real concern of the US,” Zarif wrote.
“First a dismembered journalist; now illicit sale of nuclear technology to Saudi Arabia fully expose #USHypocrisy,” Zarif added, referring to the killing of Saudi writer Jamal Khashoggi at the hands of Saudi agents, and the new report by a US congressional committee on the planned technology sale. …….
Mohammad Ali Shabani, Iran Pulse Editor at Al-Monitor, said he doubted the US would sell uranium-enrichment technology to Saudi Arabia and, therefore, Riyadh would not have the capability to develop a nuclear weapon.
“However, the sidestepping of America’s own laws to facilitate sales of nuclear power plants puts the Trump administration’s broader credibility under question,” Shabani told Al Jazeera.
‘Terrorist attack’
Tensions between Washington and Tehran – bitter foes since Iran’s 1979 revolution – have intensified since Trump withdrew the US from the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), better known as the Iran nuclear deal, under which it scaled back its uranium enrichment programme and promised not to pursue nuclear weapons.
In exchange for the deal signed in 2015 in Vienna with six world powers – the US, UK, France, Germany, Russia, China and the European Union – international sanctions were lifted allowing Iran to sell its oil and gas worldwide.
Trump reimposed sanctions with the aim of slashing Iranian oil sales and choking its economy in order to curb its ballistic missile programme and activities in the Middle East, especially in the conflicts in Syria and Yemen.
Iranian President Hassan Rouhani said on Wednesday Iran-US relations are at a new low and sanctions imposed by the Trump administration targeting Tehran’s oil and banking sectors amounted to “a terrorist attack”.
“The struggle between Iran and America is currently at a maximum. America has employed all its power against us,” Rouhani was quoted as saying in a cabinet meeting by the state broadcaster IRIB.
“The US pressures on firms and banks to halt business with Iran is 100 percent a terrorist act,” he said.
The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) has repeatedly confirmed Tehran has been meeting its nuclear commitments fully.
US will not open door to Saudi Arabia building nuclear weapons, deputy energy secretary says CNBC David Reid| @cnbcdavy 17 Feb 2019
The Trump administration wants to sell its nuclear energy technology to cash-rich Saudi Arabia.
To prevent nuclear arms development, the U.S. wants to place tight controls on how the technology can be used.
Saudi Arabia has put the U.S. on a shortlist with China, Russia and others to bid for nuclear power projects in the country.
“………….The Saudis have so far refused to rule out their right to enrich uranium for nuclear weapons, pointing to neighboring Iran’s ability to do so under the 2015 nuclear agreement that world powers struck with Tehran.
In an interview in March on CBS’s “60 Minutes” Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman said the country wasn’t interested in developing weapons but would develop nuclear capability should Iran ever develop a working nuclear bomb.
On Sunday, Saudi Arabian Prince Turki Al-Faisal responded directly to Brouillette’s words, saying the country had more options than just U.S. technology.
“Well the nuclear energy market is open. It is not just the United States that is providing nuclear technology,” he told CNBC’s Hadley Gamble in Munich.
UN Nuclear Watchdog Warns Against Meddling Over Iran, Bloomberg By Jonathan Tirone, February 2, 2019,
IAEA calls pressure on Iran monitoring ‘extremely harmful’
Comments follow criticism at Tel Aviv event sponsored by U.S.
………Late Wednesday, at a private reception for diplomats, IAEA Director General Yukiya Amano lashed out at efforts to hamstring an organization that’s been at the forefront of nuclear security for decades, according to two foreign officials who were there. Without naming Israel and the U.S., the career Japanese diplomat made it clear those countries were the source of his ire, they said.
“The agency’s independence must not be undermined,” Amano said, according to the IAEA’s website. “If attempts are made to micro-manage or put pressure on the agency in nuclear verification, that is counterproductive and extremely harmful.”
An IAEA official said on Saturday that the U.S. wasn’t Amano’s intended target. He declined to specify which countries prompted the rebuke.
Three years into an agreement that was meant to be a hallmark of the Obama administration, in which Iran agreed to curb its nuclear activities in return for sanctions relief, IAEA inspectors say Tehran is in full compliance.
That hasn’t stopped the Trump administration from backing out of the agreement, piling on new penalties and trying to use the agency to turn the screws with help from Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
Iran Abides Nuclear Limits
Enriched uranium has remained below thresholds agreed under deal
President Donald Trump’s hardline stance on Iran has heightened tensions with the other signatories to the agreement: China, France, Germany, Russia and the U.K. It’s also sowed divisions between the White House and America’s spy agencies, with Trump castigating his own intelligence officials this week for being “passive and naive when it comes to the dangers of Iran.”
Netanyahu went to the U.S. Congress to lobby against the agreement before it was signed and has continued to criticize the deal since, arguing that it won’t prevent Iran from attaining nuclear weapons……..
fake newscast in Israel came as Iran’s deputy foreign minister was in Vienna for talks with the IAEA, which is trying to keep the accord from unraveling.
Iran’s leadership has said the country’s ready to re-start its enrichment program using more advanced technology if the agreement fails. The country is considering making the kind of nuclear fuel used in naval propulsion, implying it could enrich uranium closer to the levels needed for weapons.
Meanwhile, the European Union is moving to help countries evade the sanctions that the Trump administration imposed to stop countries from trading with Iran.
On Thursday, the 28-member bloc finalized a new financial mechanism for bypassing the U.S. restrictions. The special purpose vehicle, called the Instrument in Support of Trade Exchanges, will be headquartered in Paris and staffed with German leadership.
The vehicle will have a positive “impact on trade and economic relations with Iran, but most importantly on the lives of Iranian people,” a draft of the joint communique seen by Bloomberg says.
World War 3 fears SURGE as experts warn Saudi Arabia could be seeking ‘NUCLEAR weapons’
FEARS Saudi Arabia could be seeking to build nuclear weapons have surged following reports the Kingdom has launched a domestic ballistic missile programme. Express UK By JAMES BICKERTON, Jan 25, 2019 According to a report published in The Washington Post, Saudi Arabia appears to have constructed a ballistic missile factory, which could threaten to trigger a new Middle Eastern arms race. Saudi Arabia already owns foreign-brought ballistic missiles but has yet to construct its own. A number of experts have warned this could signal a Saudi desire to become nuclear armed.
Satellite images taken in November appear to show a ballistic missile factory near the town of Al-Watah, according to the report.
The site is situated next to an existing Saudi Arabian missile base.
A team led by nuclear expert Jeffrey Lewis, from the Middlebury Institute of International Studies, uncovered the pictures.
Saudi Arabia Receives Offers from 5 Countries to Build 2 Nuclear Reactors 23 January, 2019 Riyadh – Asharq Al-Awsat
Five countries have submitted their requests for the establishment of two nuclear reactors in Saudi Arabia on the Arabian Gulf coast.
The bid was made after the peaceful Saudi nuclear project met the requirements of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).
The oil-rich Kingdom launched a tender to define specifications of sites that will host the two reactors, said Chairman of King Abdullah City for Atomic and Renewable Energy (KACARE) Khalid al-Sultan.
National Interest, by Zachary Keck 20 Jan 19, There is no reason to think that Israel doesn’t have the technical capability to make its new F-35s nuclear capable
By the end of this year, Israel is expected to become the second country after the United States to declare Initial Operational Capability for its F-35s. Already, Tel Aviv has taken possession of five of the multirole fighters,and following an agreement late last month to buy an additional seventeen planes, will ultimately purchase fifty planes. All fifty F-35s are scheduled to be delivered by the end of 2024.
(This first appeared in 2017.)
Israeli officials typically describe the F-35s purpose as ensuring the country’s continued air superiority in the region. In particular, they focus on how the plane’s stealth capabilities will allow them to evade Iran’s increasingly capable, Russian-built air defense systems. One mission that is not being discussed is that Israel will likely use its F-35s as a nuclear delivery system.
Although the government refuses to officially acknowledge it, Israel is known to have a nuclear arsenal with as many as 100 warheads. The Jewish State is also believed to possess a nuclear triad, consisting of ground-based Jericho missiles, Dolphin-class submarines equipped with sea-launched cruise missiles and some combination of nuclear-capable aircraft.
It’s likely that the F-35 will be the newest addition to the air leg of Israel’s triad……….At the same time, Israel also assured the United States that it would not “introduce” nuclear weapons in the Middle East, which Israel interpreted to mean it could build a nuclear arsenal as long as it didn’t publicly acknowledge its existence. ……https://nationalinterest.org/blog/buzz/super-weapon-israel-could-arm-stealth-f-35s-nuclear-weapons-42097
Israel’s Secret Nuclear Reactor https://www.jerusalemonline.com/israels-secret-nuclear-reactor/By JOL Staff -January 20, 2019, Israel began work on the Dimona nuclear reactor in 1958 without informing members of the government or the country’s parliament, Israeli historian and Haaretz contributor Adam Raz revealed, citing a trove of primary documents he reportedly received from a secret source at an academic event. The papers, which include notes, memorandums, drafts and summaries by senior Israeli officials of the time, including Israel Galili, an adviser to prime ministers Levi Eshkol and Golda Meir, Eshkol himself, cabinet member Yigal Allon and IDF commander Moshe Dayan, defence chief-turned prime minister Shimon Peres, and senior diplomat Abba Eban, helped Raz piece together important details about the clandestine project.
Moral Qualms and Cost Concerns
The papers revealed that Galili had several concerns about the nuclear endeavour, known as “the enterprise,” including its potential to undermine Israel’s “moral status,” or cause then-Egyptian President Gamal Abdel Nasser to attack Israel to try to take out a “justified target.” Finally, he feared that the program could incite Cairo to start work on its own nuclear program.
The documents also indicated that the cost of the Dimona reactor, estimated at about $53 million by Peres in April 1962, was revised upwards by Alon to “three times” the $60 million discussed by the cabinet in 1964. An undated note, presumably written sometime between 1963 and 1966, indicated that the real cost may have been as much as $340 million (about $2.75 billion in present day dollars, accounting for inflation).
“If it were known in advance that it would cost $340 million – would we have voted for Dimona?” the note, written by Eban to Galili, reads.
Meir Proposes Switching From Defense to Offense
The documents showed that after Eshkol succeeded David Ben-Gurion as prime minister in 1963, the new PM’s foreign minister, Golda Meir, proposed admitting the existence of the program in a bid to get support from America’s Jews.
“Our situation will be stronger when the struggle becomes public,” she insisted, adding the need to “switch to offence instead of defence.”
Interestingly, the papers reportedly show that Israeli leaders had to resist pressures to place the project under international supervision, not only from Charles de Gaulle of France, but even from the Kennedy, Johnson and Nixon administrations, who urged Israel to sign on to the non-Proliferation Treaty, which was being developed at the time. In one memo, Peres reportedly told Galili that “in order to overcome the supervision [that the US wanted], cooperation by both sides is needed.”
Nuclear Status Undefined
One particularly important note, again by Galili, seems to indicate that even several years into the reactor’s construction, Tel Aviv did not commit to building actual nuclear bombs. “There is no decision by the government of Israel to manufacture atomic weapons,” the note says.
In another bombshell document cited by Raz, Yigal Allon refers to a phraseology agreed between himself and Nixon Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, whereby a nuclear state is defined as “a state that has exploded a bomb or a device.” This definition allowed the US not to classify Israel as a nuclear state subject to the NPT.
“I am constantly using a phrase agreed with Kissinger — that Israel is not a nuclear state,” Allon wrote in one of the papers.
Nuclear Option in 1973
Finally, without providing any direct quotations from the documents, Raz noted that the subject of the possible use of nuclear weapons during the 1973 Yom Kippur War, in which Israel came dangerously close to defeat at the hands of Egypt and Syria, was also discussed in the papers. In brief, Raz confirmed that Defence Minister Dayan had arrived at defence headquarters in Tel Aviv on the afternoon of 8 October 1973 to recommend preparations to activate the nuclear option.
On October 9, Meir told Israeli Atomic Energy Commission Chief Shalhevet Freier that preparations would not be made without her explicit authorisation. Israel Lior, Meir’s military secretary, similarly indicated to Dayan and Freier that the nuclear option was a no-go.
Citing censorship, Raz indicated that the information he provided addresses “only a small portion of the subject that came up in the notes,” and urged Israeli authorities to allow for a more open discussion of the country’s nuclear program.
A treasure trove of memos written by top Israeli politicians in the 1960s and onward reveals disputes over the nuclear ‘project,’ its huge cost and the decision to adopt a policy of ambiguity. Haaretz Adam Raz18 Jan 19,
A few years ago, shortly after I published my book “The Struggle for the Bomb” (Hebrew), about Israel’s nuclear history, I was invited to give a talk before an academic audience. Someone at the venue handed me a thick envelope and requested explicitly that I not open it until I got home. Examining its contents later that day, I discovered some 100 different documents, including slips of paper, memoranda, drafts and summations of the most intimate meetings and events relating to Israel’s nuclear history.
The vast majority of the documents were original. Many of them were written by Israel Galili, a minister without portfolio and close adviser to two prime ministers, Levi Eshkol and Golda Meir. Others were penned by Yigal Allon, Shimon Peres, Moshe Dayan and Abba Eban, and by Eshkol himself. Many of the items refer to highly confidential meetings that took place in 1962-1963, where the future of the nuclear project, and its impact on Israel’s neighbors, especially Egypt, were discussed. No official minutes were taken at these meetings, and the participants were forbidden to sum them up in writing.
The questions Galili posed to his colleagues at these meetings continue to occupy many historians around the world. Some of those questions – concerning the date on which the Dimona reactorwould become operational; whether its activation could be concealed from foreign inspectors; how much money had already been invested in the project and how much more would be needed – can be answered now, thanks to this trove of information.
The start of work on the nuclear reactor, at the end of 1958, was kept secret from the Knesset and the government. The obvious need to keep the undertaking secret, and the fact that part of its budget came from foreign sources, made it possible to bypass temporarily any disagreements over the necessity for a nuclear program and the discussion of its potential significance. But when the reactor’s existence became public knowledge, in December 1960 – after the fact of its construction was leaked to the international media by foreign government sources – Israel’s political echelons began to discuss its future seriously.
The implications of the issues surrounding the nuclear project were critical. To begin with, its continued development demanded vast monetary resources, certainly for a country still taking its first steps. Second, any further development of the facility would have ramifications vis-a-vis Israel’s integration into the Cold War web of international diplomatic relations. And third, pursuit of the project was liable to induce neighboring countries, notably Egypt, to develop independent nuclear programs of their own.
Arnan (“Sini”) Azaryahu, the right-hand man of Galili and military leader Yigal Allon, said years later that one of the major decisions made in these meetings was in retrospect the most important in the history of Zionism. He was referring to the group’s decision not to accept the approach of Peres and Dayan – who urged that the absolute majority of the defense budget be diverted to the Dimona reactor and that its potential be made a public fact – but to adopt, instead, a policy of nuclear “ambiguity.”………….
For reasons of censorship, only a small portion of the subjects that came up in the notes can be addressed here, among them the cost of building the reactor. ………
the crucial aspect of the project that was kept secret from the Israeli public in those years was not the visits in Dimona (which were frequently reported in the foreign press) or U.S. pressure on Israel. It was the fact that the future of the facility and its purpose were subjects of fierce dispute in the political realm in Israel. ………..
Whereas a lively discussion on the significance of nuclear development has been held throughout the world for years, in Israel there is only silence. This is not a minor issue, as the nuclear project raises weighty questions: Who makes the decisions? Who is supervising the project? What is its effect on the foreign relations of the nuclear state? What is its cost? What effect does it have on security conceptions? And so on.
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