- Britain secretly sold Israel a key ingredient for its
nuclear programme in 1958, according to official documents obtained by
BBC News.
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- "It is very surprising to me we were not told because
we shared information about the nuclear bomb very closely with the British."
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- --Former US defence secretary Robert McNamara
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- "They just seemed to be concerned with making a
bit of money."
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- --Former Conservative defence and foreign office minister
Lord Gilmour
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- "The Israeli project is much too live an issue for
us to get mixed up in it again."
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- --Sir Hugh Stephenson
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- Papers in the British National Archives show a deal was
done to export 20 tonnes of heavy water for about £1.5m.
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- This was vital for plutonium production at the top-secret
Dimona nuclear reactor in Israel's Negev desert.
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- No "peaceful use only" condition was placed
on its use. Officials said imposing one would be "over zealous".
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- Ministers in Harold Macmillan's government were unaware
of the deal. It was also kept secret from the US.
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- In one of the documents Foreign Office official Donald
Cape concluded: "On the whole I would prefer not to mention this to
the Americans."
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- Washington had refused to supply heavy water to Israel
without a guarantee it would only be used for peaceful means.
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- US President John F Kennedy's defence secretary from
1961, Robert McNamara, told BBC News he was "astonished" by the
cover-up.
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- "It is very surprising to me we were not told because
we shared information about the nuclear bomb very closely with the British.
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- "The fact Israel was trying to develop a nuclear
bomb should not have come as any surprise.
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- "But that Britain should have supplied it with heavy
water was indeed a surprise to me."
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- The heavy water - surplus from a consignment bought from
Norway in 1956 - was shipped from a British port to Israel.
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- Officials presented it as a deal between Norway and Israel.
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- Former Conservative defence and foreign office minister
Lord Gilmour told BBC News the revelations were "quite extraordinary".
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- The civil servants involved must have known Israel would
use the heavy water to develop a nuclear bomb, he added.
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- "They just seemed to be concerned with making a
bit of money."
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- By the time Israel asked the UK for more heavy water
in 1961, the existence of the Dimona reactor and a probable nuclear weapons
programme had been exposed by the Daily Express newspaper, leading the
Foreign Office to block the sale, the papers show.
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- Sir Hugh Stephenson wrote: "I am quite sure we should
not agree to this sale. "The Israeli project is much too live an issue
for us to get mixed up in it again."
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- While Israel has not publicly conducted a nuclear test
and does not admit or deny having nuclear weapons, it has not signed the
Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty.
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- This means the International Atomic Energy Agency does
not have the power to inspect Israeli nuclear facilities.
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- The Israelis say that will not change as long as they
feel threatened by countries in the Middle East.
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- http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/1/hi/uk/4743987.stm
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