Israel
In 1986, a former technician, Mordechai Vanunu, at the Israeli nuclear facility near Dimona revealed information about the Israeli nuclear weapon program to the British press, confirming widely held notions that Israel had an advanced and secretive nuclear weapons program and stockpile. Israel has never acknowledged or denied having a weapons program, and Vanunu was abducted and smuggled to Israel, where he was tried in camera and convicted of treason and espionage.
Whether Vanunu was truly involved in espionage, per se, is debated: Vanunu and his supporters claim that he should be regarded as a whistle-blower (someone who was exposing a secretive and illegal practice), while his opponents see him as a traitor and his divulgence of information as aiding enemies of the Israeli state. Vanunu did not immediately release his information and photos on leaving Israel, travelling for about a year before doing so. The politics of the case are hotly disputed.
Read more about this topic: Nuclear Espionage
Famous quotes containing the word israel:
“The greatest security for Israel is to create new Egypts.”
—Ronald Reagan (b. 1911)
“There is Israel, for us at least. What no other generation had, we have. We have Israel in spite of all the dangers, the threats and the wars, we have Israel. We can go to Jerusalem. Generations and generations could not and we can.”
—Elie Wiesel (b. 1928)
“...that he may learn that there is a prophet in Israel.”
—Bible: Hebrew, 2 Kings 5:8.
Elijah to the king of Israel who has received a letter from the king of Syria looking for someone to cure his commander of leprosy.