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Israel: No Nukes? Not Yet
Leslie Susser
Israel says it is committed to a vision of a Middle East free of weaponsof mass destruction. But despite the new moves by Libya and Iran, not even Europe is pressing it to play a role yet -- partly, perhaps, because having mega-weapons in the basement could make it easierfor Israel to give up territory.
The Arab League requires that no member ratify the Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC), which bans production of poison gases and calls for the destruction of existing stockpiles. The League says its injunction will remain in place until Israel joins the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty (NPT), requiring it to dismantle its reported nuclear arsenal. But on January 12, Libya -- an Arab League member --
quietly ratified the CWC, as well as the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT), which prohibits nuclear testing.
Although many Arab states have similarly defied the League, for Israeli disarmament officials, this was apparent confirmation that Libya�s maverick leader Muamar Qadhafi is serious about dismantling his weapons of mass destruction. In the span of a few weeks, after all, Libya has also taken action on the ground: It has opened nuclear, chemical and biological weapons facilities to international inspection, showed American experts where it hid banned centrifuges used to enrich uranium for nuclear weapons, and admitted having special container trucks for the transport of deadly chemicals. And it sent a letter to the United Nations promising to abide by all the provisions not only of the CWC and CTBT, but also of two more treaties against the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction: the NPT and the Biological Weapons Convention (which it had actually signed back in 1975 and 1982 respectively).
These Libyan moves are seen by Israeli analysts as part of the ripple effect spreading across the Middle East since the toppling of Saddam Hussein. The threat of a Libyan nuclear warhead aimed at Tel Aviv, attached to a long-range North Korean Nodong missile, seems to be receding.
If it does prove genuine, the Libyan shift, and an earlier Iranian commitment to dismantle or suspend WMD programs and to accept spot checks by international weapons inspectors, would constitute a major strategic shift in the Middle East that Israel, officials here privately acknowledge, "would not be able to ignore."
Already there is a degree of public debate on how Israel might exploit the new situation: Should it rethink its policy of "ambiguity" � by which it allows the world to think it has nuclear bombs and other WMDs, but refuses to admit it? Should it ratify the chemical-arms treaty, which it signed in 1993? Most boldly, should it seize the moment to launch ambitious regional disarmament initiatives?
Israeli officials warn against getting ahead of the game. Indeed, they see the Libyan and Iranian moves as a mixed blessing. In the best-case scenario, they say, Libya and Iran dismantle their WMD programs and reduce the threat of a regional nuclear cataclysm. But in the worst case, the two rogue states get international sanctions lifted on a false promise of disarmament, continue to develop mega-weapons in secret and put pressure on Israel to open up its own undeclared programs to inspection. For now, the officials say, skepticism over both Libya and Iran is warranted; the burden of proof is still very much on them.
Fortunately for Israel, American and European decision-makers are showing similar caution. The EU is not yet providing Iran with the "easier access to Western technological aid" it promised if Teheran fulfills all its WMD commitments. Europe first wants to be sure the Iranian nuclear weapons program has been irretrievably scrapped. And the Americans won�t lift crippling economic sanctions on Libya until they are convinced Tripoli�s WMD programs have been irreversibly dismantled.
More importantly, neither the U.S. nor the EU is pressing Israel into parallel moves. On the contrary, calls from Arab countries and left-wing politicians for Israel to declare and dismantle its reported WMD programs have led both the U.S. and British governments to declare that, when it comes to WMD, Israel is a unique case.
Only Israel, British Foreign Minister Jack Straw told Parliament in early January, is actually threatened by its neighbors with extinction. And that, Straw declared, "places Israel in a different security category from any other country in the world."
Israeli officials believe there is another deep reason why even some countries that have been extremely critical of its policies regarding the Palestinians aren�t pressuring Israel on WMD: "They understand that when they urge Israel to withdraw from territory [captured in 1967], they can�t ask it to give up its life-insurance policy," a senior defense official told The Report. "I believe America�s demands of us in the WMD sphere are mild -- precisely in order to give us the confidence to withdraw from territory."
The American attitude also stems from a major ideological change on WMB control in the Bush Administration. It sets far less store by international conventions than previous administrations did, believing treaties can be used as a cover for clandestine programs, and that it is far more effective to closely monitor and exert direct pressure on rogue states like Iran and Libya.
In that light, Israeli experts agree, it is most unlikely that the U.S. would pressure a friendly state like Israel to join something like the NPT in which the administration has so little faith. Says Gerald Steinberg of Bar-Ilan University�s BESA Institute, an expert on WMD and a consultant to the International Atomic Energy Agency: "I just can�t imagine the U.S. government saying to Israel: �We don�t think this system works for us or for anyone else, but we want you to sign on.�"
Nevertheless, some Israeli non-proliferation experts believe now is the time for Israel to take the initiative, even if there is no outside pressure. The most radical proposal comes from Reuven Pedatzur, a senior lecturer in strategic studies at Tel Aviv University. "We should go to the Americans," he told The Report, "and propose that in return for giving up the West Bank, Gaza Strip and Golan Heights in permanent peace deals with the Palestinians and Syria, the U.S. and the rest of the international community should accept Israel as a legitimate nuclear power." That way, he went on,
"the Arabs would get back their land, Israel would legitimize its insurance policy and the U.S. could take credit for the deal."
In such a scenario, Pedatzur says Israel should also offer to sign the proposed Fissile Material Cut-off Treaty (FMCT), which seeks to ban production of nuclear bomb-making materials -- plutonium and enriched uranium -- while leaving existing nuclear stockpiles untouched.
So far, Pedatzur�s proposal does not have much support. Israeli officials politely reject it as "interesting" but impractical. The Arabs and Americans would never buy it, they say. In the late 90s, prime minister Netanyahu strongly opposed a quiet Clinton Administration suggestion that Israel sign on to the FMCT, partly because it would have meant opening up any nuclear stockpiles to inspection and forfeiting Israel�s longstanding nuclear ambiguity. Steinberg, too, objects in principle to relinquishing ambiguity, which he describes as an "outstanding success. I say, �Don�t fix it, it ain�t broke.�"
The FMCT treaty was designed to impose a degree of international control on India, Pakistan and Israel, the three putative nuclear states who are not members of the NPT (under which only the
U.S., Russia, Britain, France and China are allowed to possess nuclear weapons). But the Bush Administration lost interest when FMCT talks bogged down amid Egyptian calls for the eradication of existing stockpiles and Chinese insistence on linkage to disarmament in space. Shai Feldman, head of the Jaffee Center for Strategic Studies, sees a possible revival of FMCT efforts, primarily to get some control over nuclear Pakistan, which the U.S. suspects of supplying nuclear technologies to Iran. "The Americans," Feldman says, "are not sure whether to define Pakistan as a rogue state or not, and are trying to find a way to put it under some international regime." If that leads to a cut-off treaty, Feldman says Israel could come under renewed pressure to sign too. And then the Pedatzur plan could become relevant.
Feldman, however, suggests a different strategy: To show its goodwill, he says, Israel should follow Libya�s lead and ratify the Chemical and Biological Weapons Conventions. Both treaties are fairly loose in their application, he says, and neither would harm vital Israeli interests. "Israel should change its WMD policies not because the Americans will otherwise exert all kinds of pressure, but because there is an opportunity for positive change in the Middle East, and we should go with it. When [Labor�s Shimon] Peres spoke of a New Middle East, people mocked him for being five steps ahead of the game. Now we seem to be five steps behind."
But
there is little enthusiasm for any such change in either Likud or Labor. Labor�s Ephraim Sneh, chairman of the key Knesset subcommittee on defense planning and policy, for example, says Israel should not join any WMD conventions because of a profound difference between it and its neighbors: "Israel is an open society with a free press and cannot cheat," he asserts. "All the other countries in the region are closed societies that can."
And Sneh echoes deep-rooted establishment skepticism about Iran. Behind Libya�s announcement," he says, "there is a genuine strategic decision by Qadhafi to bring his country into the modern world. The Iranians, as far we know, are simply playing for time." By pretending to stop its nuclear weapons projects, he believes Teheran hopes to dupe the Europeans into providing previously withheld "dual-use" items, products designed for civilian applications which can be modified and employed in the manufacture of WMDs.
Rather than ratifying WMD treaties, then, Israel is instead planning domestic legislation to ban the sale of prohibited chemical, biological and nuclear materials and related equipment. That would be in line with America�s disdain for international treaties and its insistence that countries that don�t want to be considered rogue states assume responsibility for stopping WMD proliferation. "We don�t export any of these banned substances anyway," a senior official told The Report. "So let�s preach what we practice."
The government is about to table a bill banning sale or export of a list of banned substances, The Jerusalem Report has learned. Approved by a joint ministerial committee last month, it is now with the Justice Ministry for final drafting.
And while officials anticipate a new Egyptian campaign for Israel to come clean on its reported weapons programs, timed to coincide with a scheduled global "review" of NPT effectiveness in 2005, they are unperturbed. They note that Egypt has far less leverage now than it had in 1995, when the NPT, signed initially in 1970 for 25 years, was extended indefinitely. "There will be noises," says Feldman, "but they will find it difficult to convert them into action."
Israel�s long-term vision on WMD remains for a nuclear-free Middle East, after peace treaties are signed with all Middle Eastern nations, including Iran. Israel has made this commitment at several international forums, officials point out, including the Arms Control and Regional Security talks that accompanied the Oslo process in the early 1990s, as well as in Article 4 of the peace treaty with Jordan.
"If all the Middle Eastern countries including Iran were to make peace with Israel, we would be ready to start discussing nuclear disarmament," a senior official assured The Report. "If that messianic situ-ation were to come about, Israel would be ready to go far. If there is real verifiable disarmament, which has never existed before, we will be ready to go for it. Because if there is no threat to us, we won�t need to insure ourselves against anything."
Are the Libyan and Iranian disarmament gambits really moving toward a WMD-free Middle East, or are they mere diversions on the way to an even greater arms buildup? Israeli officials say it is too early to judge. And, until they are sure, they argue that Israel needs all the insurance it can get.
February 23, 2004
Israel
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