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Israeli Nuke Plant Blamed for High Cancer Rates
JERUSALEM, July 11 (IslamOnline & News Agencies) - An Arab Israeli MP (Member of Parliament) has asked for personal access to the Dimona nuclear reactor complex in order to assess whether or not it is responsible for the high rate of cancer and other diseases suffered by Arab Bedouins and workers living nearby.
The MP, Taleb al-Sanaa, told Israel's public radio that he would appeal to the Supreme Court if he did not get authorization to inspect the site from Israel's hawkish Prime Minister Ariel Sharon.
"The rate of cancer and other illnesses is higher among Bedouins who live near the reactor and it is my duty as an elected official to find out why," he said.
Zeev Baum, an Israeli MP from Sharon's right-wing Likud party, dismissed Sanaa as a "provocateur", and claims that giving him access to Dimona would be like letting Palestinian President Yasser Arafat into the top-secret facility.
An Israeli health official from the south, which remains occupied by Israel, told the radio station that the cancer rate among Bedouins in the area was "within the national average" but went on to say that there was no information available on cancer rates among workers at the plant.
Around 50 Dimona workers, who have been stricken with cancer, protested outside the site in May, news agencies reported.
Israel also has another nuclear reactor at Nahal Sorek, south of Tel Aviv. It has never admitted that it has nuclear weapons, but international experts believe the Dimona reactor has allowed the Israeli government to manufacture around 200 nuclear warheads.
According to the BBC online service, the Federation of American scientists (FAS) took photos of the secret Israeli nuclear facility last year, suggesting that Israel could have produced enough plutonium for at least 100 nuclear weapons, but probably not significantly more than 200 weapons.
The FAS draws its conclusions from comparisons of the latest images with pictures of the Dimona facility taken by a U.S. reconnaissance satellite in 1971.
Part of the FAS work is to monitor non-conventional weapons capabilities throughout the world.
Israel is now the only state with nuclear weapons that does not admit to them. It has always refused to allow international inspection of the Dimona facility and is among the few states that have refused to sign the nuclear non-proliferation treaty.
In 1986, Mordechai Vanunu, a former Israeli technician at the site, was jailed for 18 years for providing information about Dimona, including photos published in the U.K.'s Sunday Times.
Israel reportedly maintains what is known as a policy of 'nuclear ambiguity' in the Middle East.
Arab Israelis are Palestinians who came under Israeli rule after the Jewish state launched its first war in 1948 against its Arab neighbors. Israel has given them citizenship, but they are resisting the term "Arab Israelis" saying that they are still Palestinians and prefer to be referred to as "1948 Palestinians."
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