Iran has threatened Israel to attack the nuclear reactor in Dimona if the US tries to overthrow the government in the Islamic Republic, ISNA reported, citing a military source. We talked about what is known about this nuclear research center located in the Negev desert with nuclear energy expert, head of the Atominfo Center, Alexander Uvarov.
© Oleg Fochkin
“It is worth noting that this information, linked to a military source, was given not by the official Iranian news agency IRNA but by the Iranian students' news agency ISNA,” said Alexander Uvarov. “Maybe this is just some form of warning, propaganda.” (The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps has not made any statements about plans to attack the facility in Dimona).
— What is known about this object in Dimona?
– This is a closed military facility, it is difficult to say anything about it. According to the ISNA agency, Iran has threatened Israel with an attack on the nuclear reactor there. This facility is located 15 km southeast of the city of Dimona. There is no open information about it. Israel has nuclear weapons but they do not publicly acknowledge their presence. The question is where did they do it?..
As this expert tells it, at one point, in 1986, there was a defector from there, Mordechai Vanunu, an Israeli nuclear technician who became famous around the world as a whistleblower of Israel's nuclear program.
According to open sources, Mordechai Vanunu was born in Morocco in 1954 in a devout Jewish family. In 1963, when he was about 9 years old, his family immigrated to Israel. After serving in the army, he went to university but left his studies and got a job in 1976 as a technician at the Nuclear Research Center in the Negev Desert, near the city of Dimona.
After working there for nearly 10 years, Mordechai Vanunu gained access to secret areas. The technician said he was very concerned about the scale of the program, which goes against Israel's official policy of “nuclear ambiguity” (neither confirming nor denying the presence of weapons).
When he learned he was about to be fired in 1985, Mordechai Vanunu brought a camera into the center and took 57 photos of secret rooms, including areas that, he said, were used to produce weapons-grade plutonium.
After leaving Israel, Vanunu traveled to Asia and Australia, where he converted to Christianity. Through journalists, he contacted the British newspaper The Sunday Times. In October 1986, the newspaper published a sensational article with his photographs and detailed analysis, which showed that Israel possessed a significant nuclear arsenal.
– Israeli technicians sent information that there was a military reactor at the facility and showed photos of plutonium. But even before publication, the hunt for him had begun. As a result, he was captured in Italy using a “honey trap” and sent back to Israel.
A Mossad agent (a woman named Cindy/Cheryl Bentov), posing as an American tourist, became acquainted with Vanunu and lured him to Italy. There, on September 30, 1986, he was kidnapped and smuggled to Israel on a cargo ship.
The trial has ended. Mordechai Vanunu was charged with treason and espionage. He was sentenced to 18 years in prison, of which more than 11 years were spent in solitary confinement.
While being taken to court, he wrote details of the kidnapping on his palm and pressed his hand against the window of the paddy wagon where journalists filmed him. This is how the world learned the truth about the arrest.
Vanunu was released in 2004. He was banned from leaving Israel, contacting foreign journalists or using the Internet and mobile communications. However, he repeatedly violated these prohibitions when giving interviews, and he was again briefly imprisoned. As of 2024 there is no information about Mordechai Vanunu. His whereabouts and health condition are currently unknown.
— When an article appeared in a British newspaper in 1986, it was suggested that this might be an Israeli operation, that Mordechai Vanunu had deliberately been allowed to “go away” so that it would be known that Israel had something to say in response to the threats.
As the expert said, the coordinates of the object are known.
— In Israel at that time, they firmly believed that this was a light industrial factory. The US U-2 spy plane filmed the object from the air and said: “It doesn't look like you're sewing shirts there.” Then, gradually, it became clear that there was a reactor there.
– Is this a buried object?
– I highly doubt that it was somehow solidified at that time. That was in the middle of the last century, then they didn't really bother with this. Until recently, everyone followed the Geneva Convention, which prohibited attacks on nuclear facilities. The Iranians usually have a reactor in their capital Tehran. This is an old research reactor built in the US.
— Is the facility in Dimona currently operational?
“Nobody knows what's going on there, it's a closed facility.” Israel has not signed the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT).
Israel officially adheres to a “nuclear uncertainty” policy; The country neither confirms nor denies the presence of nuclear weapons. According to the Israeli leadership, such a strategy has the effect of deterring the enemy, but at the same time does not cause an arms race in the region and allows to avoid international pressure.
As former Israeli Prime Minister Golda Meir said: “We do not have nuclear weapons. But if necessary, we will use them.”
— Israel has a small peaceful reactor called Sarek (Sorek Nuclear Research Center), which is open to international inspections and has real benefits in medicine and science. It is under IAEA control, unlike the military complex in Dimona.
As this expert says, it is unknown what could happen if, according to an Iranian military source, they attack the facility in Dimona in response to an attempt to change power in the Islamic Republic.
“No one knows where Israel stores its formidable weapons and in what form they are stored, except perhaps the intelligence agencies of some countries. If Iran attacks the Dimona facility, the desert may or may not be contaminated with radioactive substances.
