Israel acknowledged its responsibility for a 2007 attack on an unfinished nuclear reactor in Syria, lifting its silence at a time when it’s been warning that it’s prepared to take military action to keep Iran from threatening its security, Bloomberg reported.
“The message of the attack on the nuclear reactor in 2007 is that the State of Israel will not allow the establishment of capabilities that threatens Israel’s existence. This was our message in 2007, this remains our message today, and will continue to be our message in the near and distance future,” military chief of staff Lieutenant-General Gadi Eisenkot said in a statement.
It wasn’t immediately clear why Israel decided to disclose its involvement in the assault at Deir Ezzor, 280 miles (450 kilometers) north of Damascus. Foreign news outlets had attributed the attack to Israel shortly after it took place on the night between Sept. 5 and Sept. 6, 2007.
Syrian President Bashar al-Assad at the time said that the attack targeted an unused military building, but several months later the New York Times revealed that it was a partially built nuclear reactor. Syria denied developing a nuclear facility.
In its statement on Wednesday, the Israeli army said military intelligence had been monitoring the Syrian nuclear project for two years. It concluded the facility would become active toward the end of 2007, and dispatched fighter jets to carry out the raid. Army Radio said 18 tons of explosives were dropped on the site, which was being built by North Korea with Iranian funding.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has vocally opposed Iran’s nuclear activities for years, and unsuccessfully tried to quash Tehran’s nuclear deal with world powers in 2015. He is now supporting President Donald Trump’s demands to revise the deal or have the U.S. quit it, Bloomberg notes.
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