The bomb in the basement

by Michael I. Karpin

"After Israel won its war of independence in 1948, founding prime minister David Ben-Gurion realized that his country faced the possibility of having to fight Arab nations again in the future. He embraced the idea of developing a nuclear capability and put a young lieutenant, Shimon Peres, in charge of the project. This was the beginning of Israel's quest for nuclear capability, a project that could not have happened without the cooperation of the French. In The Bomb in the Basement, journalist Michael Karpin gives us the most complete account of how Israel became the Middle East's only nuclear power and how its status as an officially unacknowledged nuclear nation affects the politics of that volatile region. Karpin's research includes exclusive interviews that provide new insights into the key figures behind the program (notably a harsh rivalry between Peres and Isser Harel, the first head of Mossad). He explains how different U.S. administrations have dealt with Israel's nuclear sta