Israel's Well-Kept Secret
On this day, June 13, in 1952, David Ben Gurion ordered the establishment of Israel's Atomic Energy Commission.
This commission is in charge of Israel's nuclear activity. This basically means we have no idea what it does... Israel's nuclear program is probably the best well-kept secret, since the day the state was established. You're more likely to get invited to a meal by Sarah Netanyahu than to find out anything about Israel's nuclear activity.
Israel maintains a "strategic ambiguity" policy, meaning it doesn't really deny or confirm anything about its nuclear capabilities, rather it prefers the issue to be open to speculation and thought. Israel has never admitted to possessing any nuclear weapons. Nevertheless, the estimates are that Israel has between 80-400 nuclear warheads.
So Israel is part of a very short list (all speculation of course), alongside nine other nations that are believed to possess nuclear weapons.
The list includes nine sovereign countries, only five of which are considered official Nuclear Powers that have signed the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons. Those five countries include the USA, Russia, UK, France, and China. The other three countries that possess nuclear weapons but haven't signed the treaty are India, Pakistan, and North Korea. The last member of the lucrative list is Israel, but that is only according to foreign speculation of course.
Israel has two nuclear activity centers, the Soreq Nuclear Research Center near Yavneh, and the Shimon Peres Negev Nuclear Research Center, near Dimona.
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As in many other fields, Israel has become part of the world's elite in nuclear research. Either way, be it true or false, it definitely adds a mysterious aura to our little country, and that is always fun.
