One of the most significant pieces of information that caught my attention last week was that Hamas was—or is—targeting Israel’s nuclear reactor in Dimona.
Neither side is composed of angels, of course, but that Israel is denounced whenever it kills civilians by accident, even as its opponents deliberately target civilians in such ways, is a hypocrisy I can’t abide. That, however, is not the critical point here; what if the rockets had succeeded?
Blowing up the Dimona reactor would be akin to dropping a nuke on Israel. Perhaps not in the immediate blast effects, but the release of radiation, loss of power, and damage to the economy and lives of noncombatants would be enormous.
This action strikes me as truly insane; sure, they’d kill a lot of their enemies, but the fallout would affect their own people as well. Radiation from Chernobyl was not contained by Ukraine’s borders in 1986, and “success†at Dimona would be the same—self-defeating to a potentially fatal degree.
I don’t expect sanity from people who think that using suicide bombers to kill children in public places is a noble thing, but this action seems exceedingly stupid and evil.
Such insane fanaticism is no surprise to the people of Israel, of course. A former student of mine, Leonid, from Belarus, has moved to Israel and now lives within range of Russian Grad rockets fired from the Gaza Strip. He tells me he has 45 seconds to get to shelter from the moment the air-raid sirens go off. And yet, he feels a calling and hopes to remain in Israel permanently. Leonid has a brilliant financial mind, and I hope to invest in his business ventures some day… if he survives.
A map my friend Leonid sent, showing where he lives and the ranges of various rockets that have been fired his way by the hundreds in recent days.
The salient point for investors is the seriousness of this attack, and therefore the seriousness of Israel’s response, which is building towards a major military offensive as I write. Boots have hit the ground, missiles continue flying, casualties are mounting, and neither side seems willing to talk peace.
