Inside Israel's Secret Nuclear Weapons Program

In 1968, a German cargo ship named the Scheersberg A was quietly sailing the Mediterranean, carrying 200 tons of raw uranium—known as yellowcake. Its official destination was Genoa, Italy. But the ship vanished without a trace. No distress signals. No ransom notes. Nothing. Weeks later, it reappeared—empty—in a Turkish port. The uranium had mysteriously disappeared.

What really happened was one of the boldest covert intelligence operations in modern history—a secret mission by Israel’s Mossad to secure nuclear materials. But this was only a single piece in a much larger puzzle: Israel’s determination to build a secret nuclear weapons program.

Why Did Israel Want Nuclear Weapons?

To understand Israel’s nuclear ambitions, we must go back to 1948. After surviving a war of independence and the horrors of the Holocaust, Israel’s first Prime Minister, David Ben-Gurion, viewed nuclear weapons as “existential insurance”—a way to guarantee the survival of the Jewish state against much larger, hostile Arab neighbors.

He believed conventional military strength wouldn’t be enough. What Israel needed was a final weapon—one that would deter future wars through fear alone.

The Early Steps: Secret Scientific Teams and Foreign Help

Soon after 1948, Ben-Gurion created a secret scientific unit within the Israeli Defense Forces to look for uranium in the Negev Desert. But local supplies were insufficient. Israel needed foreign help—for technology, expertise, and raw materials.

Key Figures Behind the Program

Dr. Ernst David Bergmann: Holocaust survivor and the first head of Israel’s Atomic Energy Commission (IAEC).

Shimon Peres: Appointed Director General of the Ministry of Defense at just 29, he became the program’s key diplomat and strategist.

The US Said No, But France Said Yes

In the early 1950s, Israel asked the United States for a nuclear research reactor under Eisenhower’s “Atoms for Peace” program. The US declined, suspecting Israel’s real goal was weapons development.

So Israel turned to France, a country feeling isolated after the 1956 Suez Crisis and resentful toward Egypt’s leader Gamal Abdel Nasser.

The 1957 Secret Nuclear Deal with France

France agreed to provide Israel with a 24-megawatt nuclear reactor and blueprints for a plutonium reprocessing plant.

The deal was so secret that even France’s Foreign Ministry was kept in the dark.

Israel paid for everything, funded by global Jewish donations.

When Charles de Gaulle became French President in 1958, he was furious to discover the deal. He tried to stop it, but by then, the critical materials and documents had already been shipped to Israel.

Building the Reactor at Dimona—and Hiding It

By 1961, Israel was constructing its nuclear facility in the Negev Desert near Dimona. A U.S. U-2 spy plane spotted the reactor under construction.

Israel’s Response?

They claimed it was a “textile factory.” When U.S. President John F. Kennedy demanded inspections, Israeli officials allowed visits—but staged a massive deception:

Fake control rooms

Hidden underground reprocessing facilities

Actors posing as local officials

Israeli scientists overwhelming inspectors with technical jargon

Despite suspicions, U.S. inspectors never found concrete proof of weapons development. After Kennedy’s assassination in 1963, President Lyndon B. Johnson eased the pressure on Israel.

Secret Uranium Smuggling and Operation Plumbat

Stealing HEU from the U.S.

In the 1960s, Israel allegedly obtained highly enriched uranium (HEU) from the U.S.-based NUMEC facility in Pennsylvania, run by a Zionist scientist, Dr. Zalman Shapiro. Hundreds of kilograms went missing.

Years later, radiation sampling in Israel matched the unique isotopic signature of NUMEC uranium—strong evidence, though the U.S. never publicly confirmed the theft due to political sensitivity.

Operation Plumbat (1968)

Israel needed natural uranium (yellowcake) for the Dimona reactor. In 1968:

Mossad set up a fake German company to buy 200 tons of yellowcake from Belgium.

The uranium was loaded onto the Sheersberg A, a cargo ship.

In the Mediterranean, the cargo was transferred at sea to an Israeli ship.

The original crew was paid off, and the ship was sailed to Turkey and abandoned.

The uranium was now untraceable—the perfect crime.

The Samson Option and the 1967 Six-Day War

In the tense weeks before the Six-Day War in 1967, Arab armies massed on Israel’s borders. Fearing invasion, Israeli leaders activated a secret plan called the Samson Option.

They assembled their first nuclear device in the desert, ready to detonate it on a remote mountaintop—not to attack, but to demonstrate their nuclear capability if the nation faced destruction. In the end, Israel won the war quickly, and the bomb was never used.

Nixon’s Agreement and the Policy of Ambiguity

By 1969, U.S. President Richard Nixon and Israeli Prime Minister Golda Meir reached a historic understanding:

Israel would not publicly admit to having nuclear weapons or test them.

The U.S. would stop demanding inspections of Dimona and turn a blind eye.

This became known as “Amimut”, or nuclear ambiguity—a policy that continues to this day.

The Vela Incident: A Secret Nuclear Test?

On September 22, 1979, a U.S. satellite (Vela 6911) detected a double flash over the South Atlantic—a signature of a nuclear test. Known as the Vela Incident, many experts believe it was a joint Israeli-South African test.

Additional evidence:

Acoustic sensors on Ascension Island confirmed an explosion.

Radioactive iodine was found in sheep in Western Australia.

Wind patterns traced the fallout to the suspected test zone.

President Jimmy Carter quietly concluded it was likely Israeli, but the U.S. never confirmed it publicly.

Today: Israel’s Unspoken Nuclear Arsenal

Israel has never signed the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT). It has never officially declared its nuclear weapons. But it is widely believed to possess between 80 to 400 warheads, along with advanced missile delivery systems and submarine-based platforms.

Ironically, Israel has acted militarily against nuclear programs of NPT signatories:

Iraq: Osirak reactor bombed in 1981.

Syria: Alleged reactor bombed in 2007.

Iran: Ongoing cyber sabotage and threats.

Final Thoughts: The Power of Ambiguity

Israel’s nuclear history is one of audacity, secrecy, and survival. It reveals how existential fear, brilliant planning, and global politics combined to create one of the most sophisticated and mysterious nuclear programs in the world.

It also raises powerful questions:

Can nuclear ambiguity be sustainable in the 21st century?

What message does it send to countries like Iran or North Korea?

And how long can the world pretend not to see what’s long been known?