Israel extends exit ban on nuke leaker Vanunu

JERUSALEM (Reuters) - Israel has renewed an annual ban on travel abroad by nuclear whistleblower Mordechai Vanunu, who served out an 18-year prison term for treason in 2004, the Justice Ministry said on Thursday.

"There is still concern that Mr Vanunu will endanger national security," the ministry said in a statement.

Vanunu all but blew away Israel's nuclear secrecy in 1986 by discussing his work at the Dimona atomic reactor with a British newspaper. Israeli officials have said he has more military secrets to spill. He denies it.

A Jewish convert to Christianity, Vanunu, 51, says he wants to start a new life abroad.

Vanunu has the option of appealing to Israel's Supreme Court against the travel ban. Past appeals have failed, and Vanunu's lawyer, Michael Sfard, said it was not clear if he would try again.

Link;
Reuters

... I agree with Israel that they should never admit that they have weapons of terror, meaning that they express no desire to use them since they don't admit that they have them. If, however, nations believe that Israel has weapons of terror and is willing to use them for self-defense purposes, then those nations are going to be less likely to wage war against Israel. It's not Israel's fault, from a nuclear-terror perspective, if others believe that Israel is willing to practice nuclear terror for self-defense purposes.

Thus, from a political and strategic perspective, both Mr Vanunu and the Israeli government are taking the right position. Mr. Vanunu is claiming that Israel has nukes, which disourages nations from attacking Israel, while Israel denies that it has nukes, meaning that Israel is expressing no desire to use weapons of mass-terror.

If Israel admitted that it had nukes, then it would join the ranks of other terror-loving nations (from a nuclear perspective). Yet, if it did not have nukes, then others could be more willing to wage war against Israel.

Yet, Israel must let Vanunu leave Israel. He did Israel a huge favor and wants to admire Israel from some other location, so Israel should just let him go so that he can enjoy his life. Mr. Vanunu only helped Israel and thus the Israeli government should not harm him.

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/n/a/2005/05/12/international/i002431D20.DTL

Ellsberg: Vanunu Should Get Nobel Prize
By EDITH M. LEDERER, Associated Press Writer

(05-12) 00:24 PDT UNITED NATIONS, (AP) --

U.S. whistleblower Daniel Ellsberg says Mordechai Vanunu should be awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for revealing Israel's nuclear arsenal and be allowed to travel the world to promote the abolition of nuclear weapons.

Ellsberg, whose disclosure of secret Pentagon documents about the Vietnam war helped crystallize anti-war sentiment in the United States in the early 1970s, urged delegates from 188 countries attending a conference to review the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty to strongly protest Israel's restrictions on Vanunu's speech and travel and his likely return to prison.
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Mordechai Vanunu is the preeminent hero of the nuclear era. He is the one who consciously risked all he had in life to warn his own country and the world of an existing, ongoing addition to the nuclear dangers of the era. And he is the one who has actually paid that price, a burden in many ways worse than death, for his heroic and prophetic act, for doing exactly what he should have done and what others should be doing. He is a prophet who deserves honor in all the world. ---Daniel Ellsberg, author Secrets: A Memoir of Vietnam and the Pentagon Papers

'Long walk to freedom

Mordechai Vanunu served 18 years in an Israeli prison for blowing the whistle on the country's nuclear weapons programme. Last week he was arrested again - but not before he had given Duncan Campbell the following exclusive interview

Monday November 15, 2004
The Guardian

It was precisely noon in Jerusalem and the bells in the tower of St George's Cathedral were echoing over the city. The short, trim man in the apricot shirt and dark trousers who was ringing them was smiling broadly. "Down there," he said, when he had given a final pull to the centre bell and was gazing from the turrets to the sprawling civic building below, "down there is where they sentenced me to 18 years in prison. This is my way of saying I am still here."

That was 10 days ago. Since then, Mordechai Vanunu, who emerged from his 18-year sentence for revealing that Israel had a nuclear weapons programme only seven months ago, has been re-arrested and accused of disclosing classified information and of breaching the restrictions that forbid him from associating with foreigners. This week, the Israeli attorney general will decide what action to take. For the time being, he is back under house arrest in a small room at the cathedral.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/israel/Story/0,2763,1351324,00.html

...day he is killed by some settler or rots in an Israeli jail alongside refuseniks. That's the price you pay for breaking the code of silence that surrounds the Israeli nuclear program. The halo must be completely unblemished or heads will roll. Oh, the irony of it...

And rumors persist that a number of intelligence organizations had a hand in it.

Now, Likudniks like to bring up the plight of Pollard. Nobody listens, even when the arguments start to make sense to some, because of cases like this.

The Israeli government needs to drop this bullshit about "do as I say, not as I do". They're up to their armpits with the hypocrisy of it.

PB

when all the talk is about Iran's decision to pursue nuclear technology? kinda makes you wonder why they won't talk about the nation that really introduced nuclear weapons to the Middle East... in a very big way, i might add.

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vamoomoo is shit
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PB

By Yossi Melman

Almost secretly, with the information modestly tucked away in the margins of the news, the justice ministry has extended by a year the strict limitations imposed on Mordechai Vanunu. The extension was affirmed last week by the Supreme Court. Thus, the justice ministry once again responded without hesitation to a request by the defense ministry. Vanunu served out his entire sentence - 18 years in prison. He did so after a district court convicted him of aggravated espionage and treason in the wake of the Sunday Times reports in 1986 about the secrets he provided the newspaper regarding Israel's nuclear option.

Vanunu was one of the very few prisoners in Israeli history whose sentence was not reduced for good behavior, nor was he given a single day's furlough. For many years, he was imprisoned in solitary confinement, which nearly drove him insane. Two years ago, he was released and asked to leave Israel.

That's when the vengeful machinery of the defense establishment - Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz, the Shin Bet, and Yehiel Horev, head of security for the defense establishment - went into action. They imposed a series of limitations on Vanunu, restricting his freedom of movement and his right to social contacts. The worst of these restrictions is the ban on him leaving Israel.

The state claims that Vanunu remains a tangible risk to its security. That is a baseless argument, worrisome, immoral and unjust. It is baseless because Vanunu stopped working at the Dimona nuclear reactor more than 20 years ago and it is reasonable to assume that the reactor and Israel's nuclear policies have undergone technological changes that outdate his knowledge; and if not, then the fact that the state of Israel is not working on improving its nuclear capabilities should be a cause for real concern. In any case, Vanunu speaks about what the world already knows and continues to know: Israel is a nuclear power.

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/709395.html