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Israel's Options vs. Iran's Bomb

[UPI] Joshua Brilliant - Analysts maintain Iran needs a year or more to produce 25 kilos of enriched uranium for a first nuclear bomb. That bomb might be ready by the end of the decade. IDF Maj.-Gen. (res.) Yaakov Amidror says Israel has two options. "None are good, each one is difficult and each one is dangerous." One is to stop the Iranians by force. It would be a much more difficult task than Israel's attack on the Iraqi nuclear reactor in 1981. The Iranian facilities are farther away. Israel would need "very, very accurate intelligence" to hit the "network of installations" spread over a wide area. Some installations are located in underground tunnels. Furthermore, attacking Iran is tantamount to signing an open check because the minute Teheran will have a bomb, it will retaliate, he warned. The alternative is to accept the fact Iran will be a nuclear power and focus on defense. Israel would need an "active defense system" including missiles that could intercept Iranian attacks. It already has the Arrow ballistic missile interceptor and would have to invest in preparations for more advanced Iranian missiles. "There is no human possibility of building a system that is 100 percent safe," Amidror stressed. Israel is very small, most of its population is near Tel Aviv, so every nuclear attack could cause terrible damage. Israel would therefore need a deterrent that the Iranians would know that if they attack, Israel will retaliate so forcefully that "there won't be any Iranians left to count their dead," Amidror said. However, some experts doubt Israel can deter the ideology that Ahmadinejad and other Iranians espouse. Ahmadinejad believes that the imam who disappeared 1,000 years ago is about to return. Bloodshed will speed his coming and then the Muslims will rule the world.
2006-12-29 01:00:00
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