Epstein Secrets

act. Was the dream of nuclear second-strike capability lost? By no means. In January 1991, the US air force attacked Iraq, and then Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein reacted by firing modified Scud missiles at Tel Aviv and EFTA00712606 Haifa. The bombardment lasted almost six weeks. Gas masks, some of which ca

air force attacked Iraq, and then Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein reacted by firing modified Scud missiles

ce attacked Iraq, and then Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein reacted by firing modified Scud missiles at Tel A

ng with their German allies, however, Israeli politicians used language that hardly concealed the truth. When the legendary former Defense Minister Moshe Dayan visited Bonn in the fall of 1977, he told then Chancellor Helmut Schmidt about neighboring Egypt's fear "that Israel might use nuclear weapons." Da

pecially the US. Under Begin, we'd already bombed Saddam Hussein's nuclear reactor without telling the Ame

ady to carry out. Several of the most complex centered on the new threat posed by Palestinian groups in Lebanon. Before the civil war in Jordan, King Hussein had accused Fatah, the PFLP and the equally militant Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine of trying to create "a state within a state" an

nments had always calculated that we needed at least some measure of support from foreign allies, especially the US. Under Begin, we'd already bombed Saddam Hussein's nuclear reactor without telling the Americans beforehand. Shortly after I returned to the kirya, he provoked further anger in Washington by announcin

omehow clicked from time he arrived in the sayeret. I made him my deputy for my first year in command. There were two others as well, both related to Moshe Dayan, but with a self- assurance all their own: Uzi Dayan, the son of Moshe's brother, who had been killed in the 1948 war when Uzi was only months old; a

might not present a conventional threat. Yet while I’d been with my tank company in the Sinai, they were fighting a full-scale civil war against King Hussein’s army in Jordan. The catalyst: a multiple hijacking in September 1970, a sign that they were turning to non-conventional warfare, and to acts of ter

nments had always calculated that we needed at least some measure of support from foreign allies, especially the US. Under Begin, we'd already bombed Saddam Hussein’s nuclear reactor without telling the Americans beforehand. Shortly after I returned to the kirya, he provoked further anger in Washington by announcin

pecially the US. Under Begin, we'd already bombed Saddam Hussein’s nuclear reactor without telling the Ame

mehow clicked from time he arrived in the sayeret. I made him my deputy for my first year in command. There were two others as well, both related to Moshe Dayan, but with a self- assurance all their own: Uzi Dayan, the son of Moshe’s brother, who had been killed in the 1948 war when Uzi was only months old; a

reports in the weeks after the training accident made secrecy impossible. We were planning to infiltrate a Sayeret Matkal unit into Iraq, and to kill Saddam Hussein. The Gulf War had blunted any immediate threat from Iraq. But Saddam had proven he could launch missiles into the heart of Israel. We knew from our

urate at long range. But they could reach Israeli towns and cities, and could carry not just conventional explosives but chemical warheads. Moreover, Saddam had used chemical weapons: during the Iran-Iraq war, and to kill thousands of his own restive Kurdish population in the town of Halabja in the spring

t reminded me of how my father had spoken to me when I was growing up — minus the “well-off family” part. 232 HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_011703 When we got to Hussein’s country home, we were greeted by an impressively self-assured man in his late 20s who, like Hussein, had studied at Britain’s military academy in S

for the lessons to be learned from the intifada, my view that we needed a political dialogue had inadvertently become public, from remarks I made in Moshe Dayan’s honor at a memorial event a few months before becoming chief of staff. “We are currently in a struggle with the Palestinians — a long, bitter and c

ope" that I have just described, were laid by Moshe Dayan and Shlomo Gazit, and of course by Menachem Begin and Anwar Sadat, Yitzhak Rabin and King Hussein of Jordan, and again Rabin and Shimon Peres. We must not allow the shortsighted populists that currently lead us to destroy this achievement, and

ges, and not paralysis. Rather, complexity and nuanced approach, without losing the ability to make decisions and take action. This is the story of Moshe Dayan and Shlomo Gazit in the past. But it is just as relevant today—both on the micro and the macro level. The struggle is between populism, over-simpl

0s, he and his fighters had been expelled by King Hussein’s army from Jordan and were re-based in Lebanon.

01. It was led by a 25-year-old named Ariel Sharon, who had been a platoon commander in 1948. With Ben-Gurion and especially his army chief-of-staff, Moshe Dayan, determined to hit back hard at the fedayeen attacks, Sharon took a few dozen hand-picked soldiers and began mounting a different kind of retaliatory

0s, he and his fighters had been expelled by King Hussein’s army from Jordan and were re-based in Lebanon.

01. It was led by a 25-year-old named Ariel Sharon, who had been a platoon commander in 1948. With Ben-Gurion and especially his army chief-of-staff, Moshe Dayan, determined to hit back hard at the fedayeen attacks, Sharon took a few dozen hand-picked soldiers and began mounting a different kind of retaliatory