Israel Strikes Iraqi Nuclear Reactor

The Israeli pilots who flew non-stop to Iraq to take out the Osiraq nuclear reactor felt they were doing it to prevent another Holocaust. Learn about the international condemnation Israel faced at the United Nations as well as the many who later thanked Israel for preventing Iraq from going nuclear. Hear from Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin, United States Secretary of State Alexander Haig, and others on the dramatic strike.

Israeli Air Force F-16A Netz #243 aircraft flown by Colonel Ilan Ramon in Operation Opera. Credit: Brno-Tuřany, IAF air show, 2004.

Prime Minister Menachem Begin at a special press conference following Operation Opera, 1981. Credit: Ilan Meiri, Israeli Government Press Office

Don’t forget to listen to the special Gulf War episode: Purim & the Gulf War – An Oral History

NOTES:

• Israeli Planes Destroy Iraq Nuclear Reactor: Furor Spreads - JTA, June 1981

• Israel Defended, Criticized at House Hearings on Iraq Raid - JTA June 1981

• ‘Iraq’s Open Call’ for Nuclear Weapons ‘confirms’ Israel’s Fears - JTA July 1981

• Begin Says Gulf War Vindicated Israeli Attack on Reactor - AP, July 1991

• Iraq and the Rules of the Nuclear Game - Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, July/August 1991

• Target: Saddam’s Reactor

• Operation Opera - Raid on Iraqi Nuclear Reactor - Jewish Virtual Library

• From Condemnation To Praise: Why Israel’s Bombing of Iraq’s Osirak Nuclear Reactor Stands Test of Time

• Operation Opera - Israel's Raid on the Iraqi Reactor 1981

• Two Minutes Over Baghdad By Amos Perlmutter, Michael I. Handel, Uri Bar-Joseph

• Operation “Opera” - Israeli Air Force

• Operation Opera––An Inside Look into one of the Most Infamous IDF Operations - IDF

• Israel's Best Defense by Col. Eliezer Cohen