Summary
The 1986-1988 affair of Mordechai Vanunu’s nuclear revelations, abduction and secret trial, presented by Zionist Israel and the Question of Palestine as the working of the “Policy of Opacity” and of the Israeli order’s principle of “not being allowed to speak” (Zionist Israel and the Question of Palestine, PDF p.130-136 / printed p.121-127).
Details
- On September 21, 1986 Prime Minister Shimon Peres decided with Yitzhak Shamir and Yitzhak Rabin to abduct Vanunu; he was confirmed in Israel under arrest only on November 16, 1986, seven weeks after his disappearance from England, and then only under international pressure (PDF p.131).
- Peres briefed the Editors’ Committee to allow no local reporting or comments for forty-eight hours after the Sunday Times publication and to omit details about security glitches, assuming its cooperation as a matter of course (PDF p.134).
- Testifying for the defence in January 1988, Peres insisted the publications had harmed “Israel’s security” but gave no reasons and refused to answer whether the article had caused damage or was even true, adhering to government instructions on what was not to be discussed in the courtroom (PDF p.134-135).
- The work notes that Israeli law let the government categorise anything it wished as a state secret without defining the term, and that the Knesset acquiesced, leaving such tasks to the “security experts” (PDF p.136).
Related pages
Mordechai Vanunu, Policy of Opacity, Dimona, Shimon Peres, Zionist Israel and the Question of Palestine