Edmonton Sun | 14Jun2010 | Orest Slepokura
http://www.edmontonsun.com/comment/letters/2010/06/11/14358406.html
Israel and apartheid South Africa
Re: Mike Fegelman’s letter, June 10, 2010. South African Prime Minister
John Vorster made a state visit to Israel in 1976, where he signed
binding treaties between the Jewish state and Pretoria’s apartheid
regime. A denouement the Cockburns describe in Dangerous Liaison: “The
old Nazi sympathizer came away with bilateral agreements for
commercial, military, and nuclear cooperation that would become the
basis for future relations between the two countries.” The Guardian was
not alone in mentioning Israel’s nuclear relationship with pre-Mandela
South Africa.
Orest Slepokura
(Duly noted.)
Edmonton Sun | 12Jun2010 | Orest Slepokura
http://www.edmontonsun.com/comment/letters/2010/06/11/14358196.html
"'Baseless claims,' eh?"
Re: “Claims baseless,” letter to editor from Mike Fegelman, June 10,
2010. Felgelman’s attempt to refute letter writer Orest Slepokura’s
assertions stemming from the book Unspoken Alliance: Israel’s secret
Relationship with Apartheid South Africa -- that Israel’s Shimon Peres
offered to supply apartheid South Africa with nuclear weapons during
the ‘70s -- falls far short of the mark. To state the obvious,
the fact, as Fegelman notes, that Peres denies the accusation in no way
disproves it. As for Mr. Fegelman’s statement that Israel has “[never]
threatened the use of nuclear weapons,” I refer him to the eminent
investigative journalist, Seymour Hersh, who documents in his book The
Samson Option that during the 1973 war, Israel threatened to resort to
nuclear weapons unless U.S. President Nixon replaced its weaponry
destroyed by Egypt in the Sinai. Nixon complied, which was nuclear
blackmail.
Gary Keenan
(There is no high ground in the middle east conflict.)