The deal between the U.S. and Saudi Arabia wasn't opposed by Netanyahu, but all countries aiming for a military nuclear program did so under the guise of a civilian program. Just look at Iran
The apparent willingness of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to refrain from opposing the United States building an advanced nuclear program for Saudi Arabia is likely to turn out to be a huge historical mistake. Apparently here too, as in all his moves in recent months, Netanyahu is willing to sacrifice national security and endanger Israel’s very survival to improve his personal status at home and abroad.
Israeli governments have fought against the nuclearization of the Middle East for at least four decades so that Israel would be the only country in the region in possession of nuclear weapons – according to foreign sources. Israel has never declared that it has nuclear weapons. As part of this battle, the Israeli military twice set out to implement the strategy of the “Begin doctrine,” which maintains that no country in the Middle East can be allowed to approach the ability to develop nuclear weapons.
Nuclearization of the Middle East is the last thing that a sane leader in Israel would want.
In 1981, the Israel Air Force bombed the Osirak nuclear reactor near Baghdad and in 2007 the pilots did the same in Syria and destroyed the nuclear reactor in Deir ez-Zur. Now Netanyahu is willing to enable Saudi Arabia to become a nuclear country, as part of a package deal.
National Security Council Director Tzachi Hanegbi is trying to downplay the importance of the move. “Dozens of countries have civilian nuclear reactor projects. In our neighborhood Egypt has such a reactor, as does the United Arab Emirates,” he said on Monday in an interview on the Kan Bet radio station. That’s a partial truth. Yes, dozens of countries have nuclear reactors for generating electricity. Egypt has a small research reactor and the reactor in the UAE is run with uranium enriched at a low level, which is received from an outside supplier.
Saudi Arabia, on the other hand, wants to build its own independent facilities for uranium enrichment, just like Iran, which claims – falsely – that its nuclear program is for civilian needs only.
But there’s an even bigger problem, which Hanegbi, who is reflecting Netanyahu’s opinion, is totally ignoring: All the countries attempting to attain a military nuclear program did so under cover of a civilian nuclear program, whether for research purposes, or generating electricity, or both. That’s what was done in India, Pakistan, North Korea, South Africa (which dismantled its military program after the fall of the apartheid regime) and – according to foreign sources – Israel as well.
These countries and others originally receive the knowledge, the technology, the equipment and even the complete reactors from the West (the United States, France, Canada) or from the USSR and China. They did so in the 1950s and 1960s as part of the Atoms for Peace program initiated by U.S. President Dwight Eisenhower, and later the International Atomic Energy Agency was established. From 1966 to 1968 the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) was formulated, and Israel refused to join it.
Atoms for Peace and the establishment of the IAEA were reactions to the trauma experienced by the world with the dropping of the atom bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki at the end of World War II. Many scientists who participated in the Manhattan Project, in which the first bombs were produced in the Los Alamos National Laboratory, regretted their part in the project. The most important of them was Robert Oppenheimer, who is the subject of an excellent new film.
Others, including Israel, actually came to the opposite conclusion, to the effect that they had to enlist nuclear science and technologies to guarantee their national security, to improve their foreign relations and for deterrence. Some exploited the “gifts” that they received from the great powers, and under cover of the civilian program, developed a military program. That’s also what Iran did and continues to do. It has no nuclear weapons as yet, but it isn’t far from nuclear capability.
Israel went further than any of them. Not only is it not a signatory to the NPT, it permitted itself to provide knowledge and technologies to countries that it wanted to please. According to reports, Israel’s nuclear scientists cooperated with South Africa, Taiwan and Iran during the reign of the Shah. In addition, Israeli missile plants discussed the sale of Jericho missiles to these countries. We can only be horrified at the thought that if this relationship had continued, Khomenie’s Iran would have long-range missiles based on Israeli knowledge and technology, and directed at the “Zionist entity.”
The United States also conducted such transactions with Iran during the Shah’s reign. It sold it nuclear reactors and encouraged Iran to buy more. In 2006, I interviewed Dr. Ahmad Etemad, the pre-revolutionary chairman of Iran’s Atomic Energy Organization, who later fled to France. “I recall many instances when I was sitting in his office, and His Imperial Majesty [the Shah] spoke about the glorious future that nuclear power would bring to Iran. On at least one occasion he spoke to me about the need to consider the possibility of producing a bomb in the future. For him, nuclear capability symbolized power, glory and regional hegemony.”
If not the United States, China will come
In the interview with Kan Bet, Tzachi Hanegbi added that the question of Saudi nuclear capability is a “bilateral issue.” In other words, between the United States and Saudi Arabia. It’s true that the administration of President Joe Biden needs a foreign policy achievement prior to the election, and arms deals to the tune of tens of billions of dollars to strengthen the economy, and therefore he’s trying to achieve normalization with Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Salman. For that purpose, the Americans are even willing to forgive the Saudi leader for his involvement in the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi.
On the other hand, Bin Salman has far-reaching demands: a NATO-style defense alliance with the United States, the supply of modern sophisticated weapons worth tens of billions of dollars, and a nuclear program that will include enriching uranium on Saudi soil. One of the important reasons why the United States is willing to consider all this is that if it doesn’t satisfy Bin Salman’s demands, China will.
At present the supply of these aircraft is being delayed. Now, at a time when Netanyahu is desperately seeking achievements, he sees the treaty with Saudi Arabia as the crowning achievement of his policy and his legacy. That’s why he and his assistants are willing to turn a blind eye to the contacts on the Washington-Riyadh axis, and certainly won’t publicly oppose them.
The intelligence and security establishments – Mossad, Military Intelligence and the Atomic Energy Committee – believes Israel must oppose the U.S.'s intention to offer Saudi Arabia a nuclear program. Chief of Staff Herzi Halevi, MI head Aharon Haliwa and Mossad Chief David Barnea, believe that it is a dangerous move. The latter even expressed his opposition during his meetings about two weeks ago with senior White House officials and the CIA in Washington.
Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, who was dismissed by Netanyahu and was saved by the skin of his teeth, shares this opinion. He has been paralyzed at this stage because he can’t permit himself to open a new front against the prime minister.
Past experience teaches that Netanyahu doesn’t listen to the professionals, not even on security issues. For example, in 2015 he opposed the nuclear agreement with Iran despite the opinion of all the professionals, and even blatantly defied then-U.S. President Barack Obama on the subject when he spoke to Congress. When in the background there’s the public protest, an expansion of refusal to volunteer for IDF reserve duty, and a judicial overhaul that’s running amok, it’s even harder to rely on Netanyahu’s judgement.
Fortunately, there’s one major obstacle in his path: The United States is conditioning its willingness to sign an agreement with Saudi Arabia on Israeli concessions towards the Palestinian Authority. These must include Netanyahu’s promise not to annex the West Bank, not to build in the settlements, to ease freedom of movement for residents of the West Bank and to work to improve their economic situation. Even if Netanyahu is ready for that, we can assume that his coalition partners, Itamar Ben-Gvir and Bezalel Smotrich, won’t be happy to help him and will threaten to dismantle the government.
If the United States gives Saudi Arabia a nuclear program, we can assume that there will be very tight U.S. supervision over it. At the same time, Netanyahu must remember three things: The first is related to Etemad’s words – like the Shah in his day, Bin Salman also dreams of a military nuclear program; the second thing is that if Saudi Arabia has a nuclear program, other countries in the region, led by Turkey and Egypt, will also try to achieve that; and the third – a Saudi nuclear program is likely to provide Iran with the excuse for crossing the threshold and producing nuclear weapons.
Nuclearization of the Middle East is the last thing that a sane leader in Israel would want.