Israel launches campaign against UN nuke watchdog chief

Israel's Atomic Energy Commission (AEC) recently intensified its attacks on the director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency, Dr. Mohamed ElBaradei. The AEC, one of the most classified bodies in Israel that is also, among other things, responsible for operating the Dimona nuclear reactor, does not often issue public statements, and usually plays down its activities.

But in recent months, given the IAEA director's actions relating to all aspects of Syria and Iran's nuclear programs, the committee decided, with the consent of Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, to stop tiptoeing around the issue. The AEC now hurries to respond to ElBaradei's interviews, in which he often speaks of Israeli in critical tones.

The latest expression of this new policy is a letter to be published this week in the latest issue of the American weekly magazine, Newsweek, written by the AEC spokeswoman Nili Lifshitz. Lifshitz is leaving her post at the end of the week after years on the job to assume a different position in human resources at the Nuclear Research Center (NRC, the Nahal Sorek nuclear reactor, which the AEC also oversees). But she does not hesitate to criticize the IAEA director sharply. More

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