Syria admits: Target hit by IAF jets was a nuclear facility

Jerusalem Post ^ | October 17, 2007

[camerakid400]

In its first official admission by a state official, Syria confirmed that an air raid carried out by Israeli fighter jets deep in Syrian territory on September 6 was, indeed, an attack on a Syrian nuclear facility, Israel Radio reported Wednesday morning.

A Syrian envoy disclosed the nature if the target during a meeting of a UN committee where Israeli envoys were also present.

A senior source in the Foreign Ministry confirmed the statement made in New York by the Syrian official.

Since first announcing on September 6 that an incursion into Syrian airspace by IAF jets took place, Syria veered between attempts to muster international condemnation of Israel on the one hand and efforts by Damascus to blur the nature and purpose of the facility attacked on the other hand.

Several weeks after the strike, Syrian President Bashar Assad said in a BBC interview that the target hit by the Israeli Air Force was a building in an abandoned military base.

But several days before Assad interview, a Syrian "agricultural research center" in the area of the strike independently invited foreign journalists to visit the site, as proof that Israeli missiles missed their target.

Israel continues to keep mum on the affair, and the only information cleared by the military censor for publication was the fact that a strike took place; any other morsel of information published in Israel continues to be accompanied by the phrase "according to foreign media outlets."

Israeli analysts estimated that the government's decision not to disclose information about the strike was intended to avoid embarrassing Assad's regime, in the hope that silence on Israel's side could prevent the tension between the two countries from escalating into all-out war.

[shield]

It’s obvious we’re talking to the opposition in Iran. And we’ve been funding them...of course, that’s what he would like. However, when you hear the Ambassador and General Petraeus talk of a proxy war with Iran...our troops are being killed by them...I can understand the need to hit them and hit ‘em hard. And if we do that...we’ll need to do it with someone like France NOT the Israelis’. Israel is in the ME...and doesn’t need to be in a fight that will overtime create probs for them, IMPO. So if somethin’ needs to be taken out...we’ll do it with the Brits or France.

[shield]

Can’t tell you...no it’s not.

[txhurl]

I completely agree. My only question is .. why did Israeli jets need to be turned around? Were they going to go it alone?

Answered my own question - Israel has always had to go it alone.

Between this and the Minot situation, there's strange messages being sent, if what you say is true.

[bray]

Nice pic of Neville Nancy! Too bad they didn’t do it while she was sucking up to that Butcher.

Pray for W and Our Troops
Shalom

[CougarGA7]

Dont forget that when the Israeli’s hit the Iraqi reactor in 1981 they informed the US Administration after the fact. So they very likely were going it alone. If I were president I wouldn’t have turned them around myself.

[shield]

It’s true...remember we were moving into a position to go after all the nuke facilities, that’s changed...at least that’s what’s being put out there...are we still getting info of weapon shipments into Iraq and ‘Stan from Iran? I’ve not read anything recently. Since the Israeli hit on Sept 6th has Syria and Iran backed off a bit?

[El Sordo]

My unlearned opinion would suspect that the nuclear material would have come from North Korea of Iraq.

The heeyoouuge material lift from Iraq to Syria prior to the invasion has not (to my knowledge) been accounted for.

Some of it certainly appears to have worked its way to Libya.

And NK is a known proliferator who is probably looking for other working partners that can work with them to develop nuclear weapons.

I can find no reason to believe there would have or could have been a transfer of nuclear material to Syria from US sources. No way that could have been kept quiet, and Syria probably doesn’t have the buddies or contacts to pull a NUMEC-type deal.

That’s my take. Probably wrong.

[El Sordo]

Well, I suppose we will just have differing perspectives on the event then.

Barring any additional info, I’d have to stand on the opinion that it smells funny.

Time will tell, I suppose.

I must confess that I have been intensely curious as to what the Israeli special weapons and materials control structure is like right now. I can’t say I would be the least bit surprised if they had weapons in the air 24/7 these days. Like SAC during the cold war. But perhaps it’s always been that way.....

[Army Air Corps]

Other impression I've had is Nutjob is our plant. He just acts too crazy to be a true Persian.

A scenario like that really would make the Dems heads explode like the folks in the movie "Scanners."

[shield]

I thought it was a bit strange myself...but I completely trust the source....from what I could gather...it was NOT recent.

[CougarGA7]

I’d be surprised if they were nuclear armed, but that’s not saying they weren’t. I would think that some form of penetrating weapon (which again does not totally rule out nuke) would be the weapon of choice. Take a look at the historic satellite imagery of Natanz. That is a seriously hardened facility.

Bottom line is this. If a threshold is reached where the Israeli’s feel that their very survival is at stake they will finish the move with or without our blessing and they will have mine.

[txhurl]

This was my initial thought, but with Israeli flights to Iran I have to change/add flights.

---

To: Southack; Dog; jeffers; shield

How I think it happened (two planes):

Yellow flight: jamming air defense and even Lebanese cable tv, bombing the three supposed WMD sites.

Green flight: taking out the Deir al Zahr facility, trucks holding warheads from the NK ship, then taking out the facility on the Euphrates at the turkish border, then drop tanks, land, pick up IDF guys holding an evidence functional nuke who borrow a Syrian truck to cross the Turkish border with it.

Thanks for your earlier feedback, Sir. :)

78 posted on 10/07/2007 10:23:42 PM CDT by txflake (Yes there were WMDs)

[txflake]

How I think it happened (two planes):

Yellow flight: jamming air defense and even Lebanese cable tv, bombing the three supposed WMD sites.

Green flight: taking out the Deir al Zahr facility, trucks holding warheads from the NK ship, then taking out the facility on the Euphrates at the turkish border, then drop tanks, land, pick up IDF guys holding an evidence functional nuke who borrow a Syrian truck to cross the Turkish border with it.

Thanks for your earlier feedback, Sir. :)

[El Sordo]

Kewl. Where’dja get the map?

Gads I hate trying to read Arabic handwriting.