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Israelis seized nuclear material in Syrian raid
Times Online ^ | 9/23/07 | Uzi Mahnaimi and Sarah Baxter

Posted on 09/22/2007 7:30:07 PM PDT by Libloather

Israelis seized nuclear material in Syrian raid
Uzi Mahnaimi and Sarah Baxter
September 23, 2007

Israeli commandos seized nuclear material of North Korean origin during a daring raid on a secret military site in Syria before Israel bombed it this month, according to informed sources in Washington and Jerusalem.

The attack was launched with American approval on September 6 after Washington was shown evidence the material was nuclear related, the well-placed sources say.

They confirmed that samples taken from Syria for testing had been identified as North Korean. This raised fears that Syria might have joined North Korea and Iran in seeking to acquire nuclear weapons.

Israeli special forces had been gathering intelligence for several months in Syria, according to Israeli sources. They located the nuclear material at a compound near Dayr az-Zwar in the north.

Evidence that North Korean personnel were at the site is said to have been shared with President George W Bush over the summer. A senior American source said the administration sought proof of nuclear-related activities before giving the attack its blessing.

Diplomats in North Korea and China believe a number of North Koreans were killed in the strike, based on reports reaching Asian governments about conversations between Chinese and North Korean officials.

Syrian officials flew to Pyongyang, the North Korean capital, last week, reinforcing the view that the two nations were coordinating their response.


TOPICS: Breaking News; Extended News; Foreign Affairs; Israel; News/Current Events; Politics/Elections
KEYWORDS: ahmadinejad; airstrikes; axisofevil; israel; nknukes; northkorea; nuclear; raid; sayeretmatkal; sept62007; spartansixdelta; syria
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To: RFEngineer

Your optimism is just phenomenal. ha.

It was worth it. No country is ever READY for democracy. Guess by tthat reasoning we should just wait till democracy springs forth full blown from Medusa’s head...and then let the people have freedom.

America came very very close to not being democratic or just not being.

and of course, the Germans could never be democratic and never the Japanese....its an old imperialistic argument that is very very tired.


81 posted on 09/22/2007 8:13:14 PM PDT by Recovering Ex-hippie (We need a troop surge in Philly and Newark!)
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To: bill1952

“they should have attempted to land and snatch a few bodies “

Who says the Isrealis or us didn’t. Neither of us would make that public, all the liberal “peace” groups would raise a huge stink.


82 posted on 09/22/2007 8:14:34 PM PDT by JSteff (Reality= realizing you are not nearly important enough for the government to tap your phone.)
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To: bill1952

“they should have attempted to land and snatch a few bodies “

Who says the Isrealis or us didn’t? Neither of us would make that public, all the liberal “peace” groups would raise a huge stink.


83 posted on 09/22/2007 8:14:57 PM PDT by JSteff (Reality= realizing you are not nearly important enough for the government to tap your phone.)
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To: Star Traveler

BOOK OF AMOS CHAPTER 1

3Thus saith the LORD; For three transgressions of Damascus, and for four, I will not turn away the punishment thereof; because they have threshed Gilead with threshing instruments of iron:

4But I will send a fire into the house of Hazael, which shall devour the palaces of Benhadad.

5I will break also the bar of Damascus, and cut off the inhabitant from the plain of Aven, and him that holdeth the sceptre from the house of Eden: and the people of Syria shall go into captivity unto Kir, saith the LORD.

3 TIMES SYRIA ATTACKED ISRAEL SINCE SHE BECAME A NATION
1948 WAR OF INDEP
1967 6 DAY WAR
1973 YOM KIPPER
4TH TIME DAMASCUS IS TOAST
PRAY FOR ISRAEL AND INNOCENT IN SYRIA


84 posted on 09/22/2007 8:16:13 PM PDT by bitlittle
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To: doc1019
We will sit on our collective butts and do nothing, as usual.

We might not, but Israel certainly is. They're going to be wiping out Damascus (Syria) in the near future. That will eliminate one threat, anyway...

Regards,
Star Traveler

85 posted on 09/22/2007 8:16:59 PM PDT by Star Traveler
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To: Libloather

I figured this would be the next thing reported.


86 posted on 09/22/2007 8:17:40 PM PDT by txroadkill ( http://iraqstar.org)
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To: Libloather

May be they should send the nuclear material to Jimmy Carter and Madeline Albrecht for verification.


87 posted on 09/22/2007 8:19:00 PM PDT by The Great RJ ("Mir we bleiwen wat mir sin" or "We want to remain what we are." ..Luxembourg motto)
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To: KantianBurke
And yet Bush claims that the DPRK have agreed to eliminate their nukes.

They did! They sold it to terrorist.

88 posted on 09/22/2007 8:19:58 PM PDT by txroadkill ( http://iraqstar.org)
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To: Mad_Tom_Rackham
You just don’t understand. The Clintons had this all under control with the brilliant diplomacy of Halfbright and Jimmah. If only we still had them in charge, everything would be copesettic.
89 posted on 09/22/2007 8:20:43 PM PDT by go-dubya-04
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To: DevSix

A Devsix big ole bump!


90 posted on 09/22/2007 8:21:52 PM PDT by BARLF (Who is Huma?)
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To: RFEngineer
...and pretend we are making a difference until we leave.

Ahem. We aren't leaving.

91 posted on 09/22/2007 8:21:58 PM PDT by Libloather (That's just what I need - some two-bit, washed up, loser politician giving me weather forecasts...)
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To: mware
Now that is interesting. They can determine where it came from.

I've read before that individual reactors have a fingerprint of sorts, trace elements that can uniquely identify the reactor that produced it. It has something to do with the variety of batches of stuff they run through a reactor which makes a unique trace elements signature.

I've tried to find out more about this but can't make a google search to find further info.
92 posted on 09/22/2007 8:22:04 PM PDT by George W. Bush (Apres moi, le deluge.)
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To: shield

Not what the US State Department says..

http://fpc.state.gov/documents/organization/71870.pdf

check out page 2 —NK may have produced two bombs.


93 posted on 09/22/2007 8:23:10 PM PDT by sgtyork ("The Press is impotent when it abandons itself to falsehood." Thomas Jefferson 1807)
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To: Rb ver. 2.0

"Nice job!" **CLINK**

94 posted on 09/22/2007 8:24:32 PM PDT by Libloather (That's just what I need - some two-bit, washed up, loser politician giving me weather forecasts...)
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To: Libloather
"Israeli commandos seized nuclear material...according to informed sources...The attack was launched..., the well-placed sources say...Israeli special forces had been gathering intelligence for several months in Syria, according to Israeli sources.

Just who are these informed sources?...Just wondering.

95 posted on 09/22/2007 8:26:44 PM PDT by LjubivojeRadosavljevic
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To: George W. Bush; ccmay
You might want to check with ccmay. This is a copy of a post he sent me.

Yes. We can tell quite accurately where fissile materials come from, by minor differences in isotopic distributions and contaminants. Those nations with nuclear capabilities know this well, and moreover they know that we will treat nuclear attacks by "rogue" elements as if they came from the nation in whose territory the material originated.

96 posted on 09/22/2007 8:26:52 PM PDT by mware (By all that you hold dear..on this good earth... I bid you stand! Men of the West!)
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To: GovernmentShrinker

“If we pay them, they’ll do what we don’t have the balls to do.”

Yeah and they can keep it all secret... one thing we can not do because some loud mouth in the CIA, State Department, FBI, NSA, or Senate/House will tell their buddy in the MSM.


97 posted on 09/22/2007 8:27:00 PM PDT by JSteff (Reality= realizing you are not nearly important enough for the government to tap your phone.)
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To: ccmay
as if they came from the nation in whose territory the material originated.
~~~~~~~~~~~

Oh, don’t get so cock sure of yourself there. A possibility exists that we could get hit by material that originated from an ally...or even that originated from ourselves.

Then what would we do?

98 posted on 09/22/2007 8:28:02 PM PDT by mamelukesabre
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To: bitlittle

Nuclear material can only be ‘fingerprinted’ if you have a reference sample to compare it with. As I understand it, we can collect reference samples from the atmosphere when a blast occurs; one presumes the Nork ‘fizzle’ was enough to disperse a collectable sample, or that we already got one from earlier inspections, but if not, this exercise may have been about obtaining one, to use as a deterrent.
The Iranians are busily spinning up nuclear bomb ingredients - do we have a reference sample of that? Or do we just ID theirs, once it goes boom, by process of elimination, which is reasonable if you have ALL the other fingerprints.
One question though - what if one blends the outputs of multiple reactors, say Nork AND Iranian (and maybe Pakistani); will we be able to sort through the mix and ID all the sources, or only be able to make an educated guess as to what the sources might be?


99 posted on 09/22/2007 8:31:50 PM PDT by Glenmore
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To: Man50D

I find this analogy confusing. You can throw a lot of rocks at President Bush, but analogizing him to Chamberlain is rather odd.

Perhaps he has softpedaled on the gangsters north of the 38th parallel, but after his appropriate aggression in the Middle East and being stabbed in the back by the Democrats in Congress, and France and Germany, his hand is weaker than it would have been had this been a united country.


100 posted on 09/22/2007 8:33:00 PM PDT by sgtyork (The secret of happiness is freedom, and the secret of freedom, courage. Thucydides)
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