(Tablet) Shimon Peres - In the 1950s, the Arab world had made commitments to Israel's annihilation a litmus test for leadership; indeed, every Middle Eastern politician or general who hoped to ascend had to prove he was more intent on destroying us than his rival was. I believed that sowing doubt in their ability to actually do so was our highest security imperative. On Oct. 24, 1956, when the French and Israeli leadership were meeting to finalize the plans for Operation Suez, I approached French foreign minister Christian Pineau and defense minister Maurice Bourges-Maunoury with an explicit request: to sell Israel a nuclear reactor for peaceful purposes. To my utter surprise, they agreed. The purpose of Israel's nuclear program was not to fight a war, but to prevent one. It was not the reactor that mattered but the echo it generated. This was a different kind of security altogether. This was the security of knowing the state would never be destroyed - a first step toward peace that started with peace of mind. This is an excerpt from No Room for Small Dreams, Shimon Peres' posthumous autobiography.
2017-09-15 00:00:00Full ArticleBACK Visit the Daily Alert Archive