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Iran will attack israeli nuclear reactor { August 18 2004 } Original Source Link: (May no longer be active)
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/nationworld/2002008273_mideast18.htmlhttp://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/nationworld/2002008273_mideast18.html
Wednesday, August 18, 2004, 12:00 A.M. Pacific
If attacked, Iran will target Israeli reactor
By ALI AKBAR DAREINI
The Associated Press
TEHRAN, Iran — Accompanied by a warning that its missiles have the range, Iran yesterday said it would destroy Israel's Dimona nuclear reactor if the Jewish state were to attack Iran's nuclear facilities.
"If Israel fires a missile into the Bushehr nuclear power plant, it has to say goodbye forever to its Dimona nuclear facility, where it produces and stockpiles nuclear weapons," the deputy chief of the elite Revolutionary Guards, Brig. Gen. Mohammad Baqer Zolqadr, said in a statement.
Bushehr, a coastal town on the Persian Gulf, is the site of Iran's first nuclear reactor. Built with Russian assistance, it's due to come online in 2005.
Iran says its nuclear program is strictly for generating electricity. But Israel and the United States strongly suspect Iran is secretly building nuclear weapons.
Israel has not threatened to attack the Bushehr reactor, but it has said it will not allow Iran to build a nuclear bomb. In 1981 Israeli fighters destroyed a nuclear reactor under construction outside Baghdad because it feared Iraq would acquire a nuclear weapon.
In related developments:
Israel's air force launched an attack near a Gaza City home early today, killing at least five people, according to witnesses and officials on both sides. Two of the dead were identified as members of Hamas and another as a member of Islamic Jihad. Both groups are responsible for numerous bombings in Israel.
The Israeli Housing Ministry yesterday invited bids to build 1,001 more homes in West Bank Jewish settlements. Prime Minister Ariel Sharon approved the move despite an American-backed peace plan that requires Israel to freeze construction.
Sharon suspended the bids several weeks ago, apparently in an attempt to avoid aggravating tensions with the United States over settlement building. Raanan Gissin, a spokesman for Sharon, said the new construction was in keeping with understandings reached between Sharon and President Bush during their meeting in Washington in April. Bush said then that it was "unrealistic" to expect Israel to give up large West Bank settlement areas in a final peace deal.
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