It's Israel's Turn: Iran Has Agreed to the Control and Monitoring of its Nuclear Facilities — How About Israel?

IKONOS Satellite image of Israel's Dimona nuclear facility.
Date: 26 January 2002
Coordinates: Long: 35 deg 8' 30'' E Lat: 31 deg N, Resolution 2m

Israel Must Now Open Its Nuclear Program to IAEA Inspection, or Face Sanctions

By Anthony Bellchambers
Iran has currently met its obligations to the IAEA under the 2015 US-­led agreement with the UN and now IT is the time for Israel to submit its nuclear program to UNSC inspection or face international sanctions. The imperative is for:

1. The Negev Nuclear Research Center at Dimona to be fully opened to inspection by the IAEA and its estimated undeclared stockpile of up to 400 nuclear warheads be put under UN supervision for eventual destruction other than those required for legitimate defence purposes, estimated not to exceed five warheads (5) in total.

2. Israel’s capacity for uranium enrichment to be severely limited for a minimum of 15 years and that all its centrifuges in excess of 5000 to be dismantled under IAEA supervision

RELATED STORY: Special Nuclear Rules for The Chosen People: Israel Resists Inspections of Its Nuke Facilities — As It Demands Access to Iran's

RELATED STORY: 'The Sampson Option' - Israel Has Threatened to Nuke European Capitals if it Ever Falls

3. That all supplies of heavy water be shipped to the US or other approved recipient, apart from the minimum required for legitimate medical isotopes

4. That inspections teams from the IAEA continuously monitor all Israeli nuclear sites and to verify all fissile materials thereupon.

5. That the state of Israel to become a party to the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) with immediate effect.

The timescale for all such specified actions to be approved by the United Nations Assembly in General Session.

Note
1. http://fas.org/nuke/guide/israel/nuke/farr.htm

_________Copyright © Anthony Bellchambers, Global Research, 2016

Reprinted with permission from Center for Research in Globalization.

Special Nuclear Rules for The Chosen People: Israel Resists Inspections of Its Nuke Facilities — As It Demands Access to Iran's

While Israel screams about the possibility of Iran getting nuclear weapons, Israel already has hundreds of atomic weapons. The West has demanded—and achieved—inspections of Iran's nuclear facilities, and negotiations to limit Iran's ability to produce atomic weapons.  Meanwhile, Israel hasn't had a single inspection, is not a signatory to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (Iran is), and hasn't agreed to negotiate a damn thing with anybody regarding its nuclear arsenal.  In fact, Iran has signed treaties forsaking the possession of biological, chemical and nuclear weapons.  Israel has not.
—Ronald David Jackson

IKONOS Satellite image of Israel's Dimona nuclear facility.
Date: 26 January 2002
Coordinates: Long: 35 deg 8' 30'' E Lat: 31 deg N, Resolution 2m

____________

Israel Wary of Subjecting its Nuclear Facilities to International Supervision

By Middle East Monitor
Israeli newspaper Haaretz reported on Monday that Israel "has begun a diplomatic campaign to thwart a resolution to subject its nuclear facilities to international supervision."

RELATED STORY: Mid East Nukes and Hypocrisy: Israel Has Hundreds of Unregulated Nukes — Yet Prepares Media Blitz Over Iran's Non-Nuke Program

The newspaper added that the draft resolution, which was submitted at International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), is supported by Egypt, Jordan and other Arab and Islamic countries.

The newspaper noted that a senior official in the Israeli Foreign Ministry expressed his fears that the deal with Iran would make it difficult for Israel to deal with such a demand.

RELATED STORY: Israel's Worst-Kept Secret - US Government Employees Are Not Allowed To Mention Israel's Massive Nuclear Arsenal

The draft resolution seeks to force Israel to open its nuclear facilities to international observers. It also calls for a meeting of the international committee specialised in making the Middle East a nuclear-free zone.

Haaretz added that such a resolution, if passed, would not be binding under the UN Security Council, but it would cause significant political damage to Israel, bring international attention to Israel's nuclear facilities and prompt the IAEA to take further steps against Israel.

RELATED STORY: 'The Sampson Option' - Israel Has Threatened to Nuke European Capitals if it Ever Falls

Mid East Nukes and Hypocrisy: Israel Has Hundreds of Unregulated Nukes — Yet Prepares Media Blitz Over Iran's Non-Nuke Program

The prime minister of Israel is preparing an all out blitz of illegal interference in the affairs of the United States. The plan is to block the Iran Nuclear Agreement via the congressman in Israel's pocket.

While Israel screams about the possibility of Iran getting nuclear weapons, Israel already has hundreds of atomic weapons. The West has demanded—and achieved—inspections of Iran's nuclear facilities, and negotiations to limit Iran's ability to produce atomic weapons.  Meanwhile, Israel hasn't had a single inspection, is not a signatory to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (Iran is), and hasn't agreed to negotiate a damn thing with anybody regarding its nuclear arsenal.  In fact, Iran has signed treaties forsaking the possession of biological, chemical and nuclear weapons.  Israel has not.

The only thing more dangerous in the Middle East than ISIS, Saudi Arabia and the
United States is Israel and its unhinged prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu.

Netanyahu prepares to fight world over Iran deal

With communications between Washington and Jerusalem all but severed, Netanyahu is hedging his bets and preparing to fight Obama on Capitol Hill once a nuclear deal is announced.

By Barak Ravid
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is preparing for a world war. The reason, what else, is Iran's nuclear program. This offensive will not involve jet fighters descending on the nuclear facilities in Natanz or Fordow, but rather a frontal charge on Capitol Hill. Netanyahu's goal was and remains to enlist enough members from both houses of Congress to vote against the nuclear deal with Iran when President Obama puts it on the docket.

____________________

The Third Temple's Holy of Holies: Israel's Nuclear Weapons
(Despite this study by a US Army officer, US officials—and corporate media
—must pretend Israel's nukes don't exist)

____________________

An Israeli source noted that Netanyahu seems optimistic about his chances. According to the source, Netanyahu recently told Jewish-American leaders that the battle is not lost. Those who heard the prime minister say it is hard to tell if he actually believes his own words or is only using the rhetoric to try to muster the forces. Either way, Netanyahu conveyed to his interlocutors that he believes that with the right steps, enough Democratic lawmakers with enough political clout can be swayed to stop the deal in its tracks.

The question remains of when the opening shot of this war will be fired. The assessment among Netanyahu and the Israeli establishment is that a comprehensive deal with Iran is a matter of days to a few weeks away. The issues that remain to be resolved between Iran and world powers cast in a doubtful shadow the chances of reaching a deal by the July 9 deadline – the final date Obama can submit the agreement to Congress before it takes its summer recess a month later.

Read More

Usless Hilllary: Says Iran Will Always Be A Threat Despite Nuclear Deal — Yet She's Silent On Israel's Hundreds of Nukes, Murder in Gaza

Hypocrisy 101: While the west cries crocodile tears over the possibility of Iran getting nuclear weapons, Israel already has hundreds of atomic weapons. The West has demanded—and achieved—inspections of Iran's nuclear facilities, and negotiations to limit Iran's ability to produce atomic weapons.  Meanwhile, Israel hasn't had a single inspection, is not a signatory to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (Iran is), and hasn't agreed to negotiate a damn thing with anybody regarding its nuclear arsenal.  In fact, Iran has signed treaties forsaking the possession of biological, chemical and nuclear weapons.  Israel has not.

Illustration by DonkeyHotey

Nuclear deal won't solve 'major problems from Iran,' Hillary warns

By Jon Ward

Hillary Clinton warned voters here ahead of the Fourth of July weekend that even if President Obama reaches a deal with the Iranian government over its nuclear program, the regime in Tehran will still pose a major threat to the United States.

RELATED STORY: Israel's Worst-Kept Secret - US Government Employees Are Not Allowed To Mention Israel's Massive Nuclear Arsenal

“I so hope that we are able to get a deal in the next week that puts a lid on Iran’s nuclear weapons program, because that is going to be a singular step in the right direction,” Clinton, the former secretary of state who is now running for president as a Democrat, told about 850 spectators in an outdoor amphitheater on the Dartmouth University campus.

But Clinton, despite her words of encouragement for Obama’s efforts to reach a deal with Iran, did not wholeheartedly endorse the process.

“We don’t know yet. It’s too soon. These things always go down to the wire,” she said.

And she quickly positioned herself in a more neutral way toward the entire process, saying that even if a deal is reached, it will not reduce the need to be vigilant against Tehran.

Read More

Japan's Ongoing Nuclear Crisis: Acres of Nuclear Waste From the Fukushima Nuclear Disaster (Video)

This nuclear wasteland was filmed by a drone.
So what happens in the case of a hurricane or another flood?

The US and Iran Reach 'Tentative' Nuclear Deal

You can expect the back stabbing Israeli PM Netanyahu and traitorous Republicans in Congress to try to derail the agreement

_______________

By Elise Labott and Mariano Castillo
The basis for an agreement for a peaceful Iranian nuclear program and a lifting of sanctions against that nation has been reached, EU foreign policy chief Federica Mogherini announced Thursday in Switzerland. "We have reached solutions on key parameters of a joint comprehensive plan of action," she said.

• Iran's enrichment capacity and stockpile would be limited, and Iran's sole enrichment facility would be at the Natanz nuclear facility, Mogherini said. Other nuclear facilities would be converted for other uses, she said.

• Under the agreement, the nuclear facility at Fordow would be converted to a nuclear physics and technology center and the facility at Arak would be redesigned as a heavy-water research reactor that will not produce weapons-grade plutonium.

• The European Union would terminate all nuclear-related economic and financial sanctions against Iran, and the United States would do the same once Iran's implementation of the agreement is confirmed, according to announcements of the deal.

• The United Nations would terminate all previous resolutions sanctioning Iran, and would incorporate other restrictions for an agreed-upon period, according to Thursday's announcements.

Read More

NUCLEAR EXODUS: The Nuclear Industry Has Created A Global Health Emergency — MIllions Sickened, Thousands Have Died (Video)

WHAT is causing the mass die off of seals, fish and birds around the world?

________________

New York Times: Nuclear Establishment Tool

U.S. nuclear weapon test MIKE of Operation Ivy, 31 Oct 1952. (Photo from Wikimedia)

The New York Times‘ longtime nuclear power reporter, Matthew Wald, has announced that he’s been hired as the senior director of policy analysis and strategic planning for the Nuclear Energy Institute, the chief lobbying arm of the nuclear industry. Investigative reporter Karl Grossman wrote a piece a few years ago on the ties between the Times and the nuclear power establishment that go back to the dawn of the Atomic Age.

By Karl Grossman
The model of a journalist being co-opted by the nuclear establishment involves New York Times reporter William L. Laurence. News Zero: The New York Times and The Bomb, by Beverly Deepe Keever, writes of how Gen. Leslie Groves, director of the Manhattan Project, personally made arrangements with Times publisher Arthur Hays Sulzberger and senior editor Edwin James to have Laurence work for the World War II program to build atomic
bombs.

The Timesman would be paid by the government while, under the arrangement, his wife would collect “his regularly weekly salary” from the Times.

“To sell the bomb, the US government needed the Times…and the Times willingly obliged,” writes Keever, professor of journalism at the University of Hawaii.

Laurence was central to the first major piece of official government media disinformation about nuclear technology. When it came time for a test of a nuclear device, in July 1945, Laurence wrote a press release to “disguise the detonation and resulting radiation,” notes Keever.

The deceptive release stated:

A remotely located ammunition magazine containing a considerable amount of high explosives and pyrotechnics exploded…. Weather conditions affecting the content of gas shells exploded by the blast made it desirable for the Army to evacuate temporarily a few civilians from their homes.

The purported source of the information was given in the release as “the commanding officer of the Alamagordo Army Air Base.”

The atomic device was detonated on July 16, 1945, at the Alamagordo Test Range in New Mexico. It lit up the night sky. The flash “was seen in Albuquerque, Santa Fe, Silver City and El Paso,” relates James Kunetka in his book City of Fire.

Meanwhile, the Manhattan Project had “stationed” an intelligence officer, Phil Belcher, at the Associated Press office in Albuquerque, states City of Fire. After AP began receiving calls about “a strange explosion in southern New Mexico,” Belcher presented the Laurence press release to AP, and AP ran it—basically as is. “New Mexico newspapers ran the story” and “it appeared in a number of radioCity shows,” says of Fire. “No further word was issued by the Alamagordo Base.”

Timesman Laurence didn’t stop with this deception. At the Manhattan Project, he prepared a 10-part series glorifying it, and after the bombs fell on Japan, the Times itself ran the series “on behalf of the government” and distributed it free “to the press nationwide,” notes News Zero. The series hardly mentioned the word radioactivity at all.The Times was chosen by Groves not because of its circulation. “The Times was hardly the nation’s biggest newspaper then terms of circulation,” notes Keever. But “the prestige of the Times was highly significant for the government that was seeking to channel first-time-ever public attitudes about the atomic bombs it was developing.” Of Laurence, she writes, “this major player served as a scribe writing government propaganda.”

Laurence boosted all things nuclear in the years ahead. He would describe nuclear power as “making the dream of the Earth as a Promised Land come true.” This avid belief in nuclear power became the institutional stance of the publication.

The Times, writes Keever, “became little more than a propaganda outlet for the US government.” It

tolerated or aided the US government’s Cold War cover-up that resulted in minimizing or denying the health and environmental effects arising from the use in Japan and later testing of the most destructive weaponry in US history in Pacific Islands once called paradise…. The Times aided the US government in keeping in the dark thousands of US servicemen, production workers and miners, even civil defense officials, Pacific Islanders and others worldwide about the dangers of radiation.

Keever, herself a veteran journalist, says that “from the dawn of the atomic-bomb age, Laurence and the Times almost single-handedly shaped the news of this epoch and helped birth the acceptance of the most destructive force ever created.”

This pro-nuclear stance of the New York Times has continued, with the US paper of record leading US media in recent years in pushing for a “revival” of nuclear power.

And after the nuclear power disaster in Japan, the Times was still at it. It acknowledged in an editorial (3/14/11) that it has “endorsed nuclear power” and went on: “We suspect that, when all the evidence is in from Japan, it will remain a valuable tool.” That said by a long-time tool of the nuclear establishment—the New York Times.


________________
Karl Grossman is an investigative reporter, a journalism professor at SUNY/Old Westbury and a FAIR associate.

Reprinted with permission from Fairness & Accuracy In Reporting.

Israel Fact Book: Israel Created Hamas, Uses Children as Human Shields, and Uses Snipers to Kill Teens in Cold Blood

Hamas Was Created by the Israeli Government

Palestinian children being used as human shields by the Israeli Army. (Screen capture
from YouTube video)

By Ronald David Jackson
We all watch as Israel bombards Gaza with 'precision' weapons that kill mostly women, children, and those unfortunate enough to be found near mosques, clinics, or in coffee shops.  Big media* tells us that the air, land and see bombardment is Israel's "response" to rockets fired by "that big bad terrorist organization" called Hamas. But big media doesn't bother to remind us that Hamas was created by the Israeli government. Even the Wall Street Journal is willing to publish that fact in an article in which one of the conspirators called Israel's creation of Hamas "an enormous, stupid mistake." 

Once every several years a big media outlet might remind us about the role of Israel in creating Hamas. That's brainwashing via lying by omission. The lie is based on the cover up of the fact that Israel created and supported Hamas in the first place — to weaken Yasser Arafat. Israel wanted a more militant, fundamentalist, and younger movement which could draw members away from  Arafat's older, more established organization and sabotage the peace process. The Israeli plotters got what they wanted. But, as usual, the "Frankenstein Monster" got out of control. Or did it?  Hamas is now a "convenient" organization that Israel can bully and blame for its own failings, use as an excuse to bomb, blockade and starve off Gaza, use to garner sympathy, and use to unify its people behind a cabal of racist, right-wing leaders (by giving Hamas no other choice but to fire rockets). And it all works very well.  As long as you don't remind everyone that Israel created Hamas in the first place.

Israel Cynically Used the Kidnapping of Israeli Teens To Trigger a Dispute With Hamas

Big media's narrative on how the rocket firing by Hama got started in the first place is more lying by omission.  Big media won't remind us that before Hamas started firing rockets, Israel had arrested hundreds of Palestinians, killed and brutalized adults and children, and blew up the homes of Palestinian "suspects" without providing a shred of evidence proving a connection between any of those killed and arrested and the kidnapping of Jewish settlers. Big media forgets to remind us that Israeli snipers murdered two Palestinian teenagers—for no reason whatsoever—weeks before the kidnapping of the Israel settlers.

Israeli snipers kill two Palestinian
teens in cold blood
(May 15th, 2014)

Warning, Graphic: Viewer discretion advised.

Big media "forgets" to remind us that the Israeli government knew the kidnapped settlers were dead almost as soon as they were kidnapped, but that the Israeli government hid that fact and pretended to conduct operations geared toward finding the kidnapped teens "alive." By extension, big media fails to tell us that therefore the Israeli government used the kidnapping as an excuse to turn the lives of ordinary Palestinians upside down, all in an effort to break the recent rapprochement of Hamas with the Palestinian Authority. 

Big media offers us virtually no commentary on the murder of a Hamas leader and his entire immediate family.  Big media won't ask the question, "Suppose Hamas dropped a bomb in Tel Aviv in an attack on an Israeli military commander and killed the commander and his entire family?"  Big media won't pose such questions for us, rendering their entire "Israel as victim, Hamas as villain" scenario just one more lie passed off as "balanced" news coverage. Lying by omission.


Big Media's "Coverage" of the "Iran Atomic Bomb Threat" is Another Lie by Omission

Big media publishes phony estimates of "how many more months before Iran will be capable of producing an atomic weapon" without reminding us that Israel already has hundreds of atomic weapons. The West has demanded—and achieved—inspections of Iran's nuclear facilities, and negotiations to limit Iran's ability to produce atomic weapons.  Meanwhile, Israel hasn't had a single inspection, is not a signatory to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (Iran is), and hasn't agreed to negotiate a damn thing with anybody regarding its nuclear arsenal.  In fact, Iran has signed treaties forsaking the possession of biological, chemical and nuclear weapons.  Israel has not. Underlying this particular super lie is the "special treatment" big media doesn't want to admit Israel gets from big media. A big media which constantly reminds us of the "big threat" of Iran's atomic bomb potential while saying nothing about the reality of Israel's hundreds of A-bombs. Thus the scenario of big media's "Iran is the nuclear threat and Israel is under nuclear threat" is yet another big lie by omission.

How Was Gaza Created in the First Place? Big Media Doesn't Like to Talk About it

An unidentified inspector from the International Atomic Energy
Agency examines equipment at the Natanz facility in Iran in
January, 2014. (Screen shot from YouTube video)

Another lie by omission is the (lack of) coverage of how Gaza was created in the first place.  Big media will seldom say. But here and there we can find a few brave and honest souls, like Robert Fisk, who will remind us:

"[N]ow the Palestinians are getting their comeuppance. Sure. But wait, how come all those Palestinians – all 1.5 million – are crammed into Gaza in the first place? Well, their families once lived, didn’t they, in what is now called Israel? And got chucked out – or fled for their lives – when the Israeli state was created.

(click image to see full-sized image)

"And – a drawing in of breath is now perhaps required – the people who lived in Sederot in early 1948 were not Israelis, but Palestinian Arabs. Their village was called Huj. Nor were they enemies of Israel. Two years earlier, these same Arabs had actually hidden Jewish Haganah fighters from the British Army. But when the Israeli army turned up at Huj on 31 May 1948, they expelled all the Arab villagers – to the Gaza Strip! Refugees, they became. David Ben Gurion (Israel’s first Prime Minister) called it an “unjust and unjustified action”. Too bad. The Palestinians of Huj were never allowed back."

Israel Uses Human Shields Too

When Israeli aerial and naval bombardment, tank assaults, ground attacks, and drone assassinations result in the death of civilians big media is more than willing to explain how Hamas embeds its military facilities near civilians and runs military ("terrorist") operations in civilian areas. The Israeli government and Western leaders are constantly accusing Hamas of using human shields. As if it was possible for Hamas to run its military facilities and operations anywhere else, given the fact Gaza's 1.5 million inhabitants are stuffed into a thin strip of land that totals a mere 139 square miles and is considered "one of most densely populated parts of the world."

At times, Palestinian civilians have acted as human shields to protect their homes and other buildings and volunteers from around the world have agreed to act as human shields to protect vital facilities in Gaza, like hospitals. Keep in mind these are volunteers, not people who are forced to act as human shields.

Video released by Israel's government show civilians acting as
human shields to protect buildings

While big media is quick to mention Hamas' alleged use of human shields, it doesn't tell us that there is actual footage of Israeli soldiers and police using Palestinians as human shields. In this case these are not volunteers but people—even children—who were forced to put their lives on the line to protect Israeli soldiers and police.

Israeli Army using Palestinian children as Human Shields

________________________

Israeli soldiers using Palestinians as Human Shields

________________________

Israeli police use cuffed teen as a Human Shield

The managers of big media know that if they were to show you Israel's use of human shields every time Israel accuses Hamas of using human shields - it would put an entirely different spin on the entire human shields debate. That's why big media doesn't show you the footage or mention Israel's proven use of human shields. And that's lying by omission.

_________________
*Big Media: Corporate media - the alphabet soup of American TV and radio (NBC, CBS, ABC, CNN, Fox News) and major corporate websites, and newspapers.

For Years the US Warned of Cyber Attacks by Governments on Governments: And the First Such Cyber Attack? — It Was By the US and Israel

The Inside Story of How Stuxnet Was Discovered

If Iran had attacked US nuclear facilities with a computer virus,
it would have been considered an act of war.

By Leslie Horn
It was January 2010 when officials with the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), the United Nations body charged with monitoring Iran's nuclear program, first began to notice something unusual happening at the uranium enrichment plant outside Natanz in central Iran.Inside the facility's large centrifuge hall, buried like a bunker more than fifty feet beneath the desert surface, thousands of gleaming aluminum centrifuges were spinning at supersonic speed, enriching uranium hexafluoride gas as they had been for nearly two years. But over the last weeks, workers at the plant had been removing batches of centrifuges and replacing them with new ones. And they were doing so at a startling rate. At Natanz each centrifuge, known as an IR-1, has a life expectancy of about ten years. But the devices are fragile and prone to break easily. Even under normal conditions, Iran has to replace up to 10 percent of the centrifuges each year due to material defects, maintenance issues, and worker accidents.

RELATED STORY: Stuxnet Was Work of U.S. and Israeli Experts, Officials Say

In November 2009, Iran had about 8,700 centrifuges installed at Natanz, so it would have been perfectly normal to see technicians decommission about 800 of them over the course of the year as the devices failed for one reason or another. But as IAEA officials added up the centrifuges removed over several weeks in December 2009 and early January, they realized that Iran was plowing through them at an unusual rate.

[...]

What the inspectors didn't know was that the answer to their question was right beneath their noses, buried in the bits and memory of the computers in Natanz's industrial control room. Months earlier, in June 2009, someone had quietly unleashed a destructive digital warhead on computers in Iran, where it had silently slithered its way into critical systems at Natanz, all with a single goal in mind—to sabotage Iran's uranium enrichment program and prevent President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad from building a nuclear bomb.

Read More

Japan's Nuclear Disaster is Ongoing: Fukushima's Children 'Are Dying' — 48% of Young People Have Precancerous Growths, Thyroid Cancer Jumps 40 Times Normal

Nuclear Regulatory Commission Officials visit Fukushima Dai-ichi Complex, Dec. 13,
2012. (Photo by Nuclear Regulatory Commission)

By Harvey Wasserman
Some 39 months after the multiple explosions at Fukushima, thyroid cancer rates among nearby children have skyrocketed to more than forty times (40x) normal.

More than 48 percent of some 375,000 young people—nearly 200,000 kids—tested by the Fukushima Medical University near the smoldering reactors now suffer from pre-cancerous thyroid abnormalities, primarily nodules and cysts. The rate is accelerating.

More than 120 childhood cancers have been indicated where just three would be expected, says Joseph Mangano, executive director of the Radiation and Public Health Project.

The nuclear industry and its apologists continue to deny this public health tragedy. Some have actually asserted that “not one person” has been affected by Fukushima’s massive radiation releases, which for some isotopes exceed Hiroshima by a factor of nearly 30.

But the deadly epidemic at Fukushima is consistent with impacts suffered among children near the 1979 accident at Three Mile Island and the 1986 explosion at Chernobyl, as well as findings at other commercial reactors.

The likelihood that atomic power could cause such epidemics has been confirmed by the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission, which says that “an increase in the risk of childhood thyroid cancer” would accompany a reactor disaster.

Read More

U.S. Nuclear Agency Lied About Japan's Nuclear Disaster: Hid Concerns, Hailed Safety Record as Fukushima Melted

US Nuclear Regulatory Commission officials visit Fukushima
Dai-ichi Complex. (Photo by Nuclear Regulatory Commission)

By Bill Dedman
In the tense days after a powerful earthquake and tsunami crippled the Fukushima Daiichi power plant in Japan on March 11, 2011, staff at the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission made a concerted effort to play down the risk of earthquakes and tsunamis to America’s aging nuclear plants, according to thousands of internal emails reviewed by NBC News.

The emails, obtained via the Freedom of Information Act, show that the campaign to reassure the public about America’s nuclear industry came as the agency’s own experts were questioning U.S. safety standards and scrambling to determine whether new rules were needed to ensure that the meltdown occurring at the Japanese plant could not occur here.

At the end of that long first weekend of the crisis three years ago, NRC Public Affairs Director Eliot Brenner thanked his staff for sticking to the talking points that the team had been distributing to senior officials and the public.

"While we know more than these say," Brenner wrote, "we're sticking to this story for now."

There are numerous examples in the emails of apparent misdirection or concealment in the initial weeks after the Japanese plant was devastated by a 9.0 earthquake and 50-foot tsunami that knocked out power and cooling systems at the six-reactor plant, eventually causing releases of radioactive material:

• Trying to distance the U.S. agency from the Japanese crisis, an NRC manager told staff to hide from reporters the presence of Japanese engineers in the NRC's operations center in Maryland.

Read More

Japan's Ongoing Nuclear Disaster: Fukushima Nuclear Workers Rally Against Plant Operator Over Low Pay, Dangerous Conditions

Fukushima Radiation Mask (Illustration by Surian Soosay)

By Agence France-Presse
Fukushima nuclear plant workers rallied outside the headquarters of operator Tokyo Electric Power on Friday, complaining they were forced to work for meager pay in dangerous conditions.

The group of about 100 demonstrators shouted and pumped their fists in the air as they railed against being cheated by contractors hired to find recruits to clean up the shattered site and surrounding area.

“Workers at the Fukushima plant have been forced to do unreasonable tasks with no decent safety measures,” said one man in his thirties, who declined to give his name.

He said he was laid off after several months in the job due to heavy radiation exposure.

“Workers are forced to handle contaminated water in such grim working conditions, where any human being should not be put to work,” he said.

“They tend to make easy mistakes under the pressure, but it’s not they who are at fault — it’s the conditions that force them to do terrible tasks.”

Read More

Japan's Fukushima Nuclear Disaster 'Worse Than Chernobyl' Says Ex-Prime Minister of Japan — Says He's Now Against Nuclear Power

RELATED STORY: Fukushima Radiation Reaches Waters Off the Coast Of Canada—Expected To Reach US Soon

RELATED STORY: Japan's Ongoing Nuclear Disaster: Systematic Coverup About Spreading Radioactive Contamination From Destoyed Nuke Plants

RELATED STORY: US Sailors Poisoned By Radiation From Japan's Nuclear Plant Disaster - Mounting Toll

Nuclear Cover Up In Washington State?: CNN Reports Big Jump In Horrible Birth Defects — Doesn't Mention Super-Polluted Nuclear Site Nearby

The Number of Newborns With Anencephaly Was
4 Times The National Average

Source: American Association of Neurological Surgeons

________________

CNN Story Ignores A Possible Cause For the Jump in Brain and Spinal Defects: The Hanford Research Facility
Located Near the Affected Areas - Franklin, Benton, Yakima
(Affected Areas Indicated by blue circles, nuclear facility by black circle)

Source: Centers for Disease Control and Prevention

________________

Chemical and Radioactive Contaminants Distribution in
Ground Water at the Hanford Facility

Source: Department of Ecology, State of Washington

________________

This CNN Report Says Nothing About
The Hanford Nuclear Facility:
One of the Most Polluted Nuclear Sites in the U.S. 

The Hanford site represents two-thirds of the nation's
high-level radioactive waste by volume.

RELATED STORY: CNN Doubles Down on Pro-Nuclear Bias

The Pro-Israel Lobby and It's Partners in Congress Are Trying To Kill The US-Iran Nuke Agreement

Protester holds sign at an American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) Conference
(Photo by Elvert Barnes)

By: MJ Rosenberg
On Sunday, the United States, China, Russia, Britain, France and Germany (known as the P5+1) reached full agreement with Iran on the next steps in the process of freezing Iran’s nuclear program in exchange for the easing of economic sanctions.

This is great news.

Nonetheless, Democrats in Congress are moving to terminate the agreement by imposing new sanctions on Iran despite our government’s signed promise to lift sanctions. They are joining the Republicans who, as on health care, will sabotage anything the President supports.

This is insane. Even more insane is the reason why more than a majority of senators (close to the two-thirds necessary to override the President’s promised veto) are cosponsoring new sanctions.

The answer is the lobby. AIPAC wrote the bill. It is its number one priority and it is telling Members of Congress that support for sanctions will determine whether AIPAC supporters will support their campaigns.

Continue Reading...

Nuclear Hypocrisy: A-Bomb Maker Pakistan Breaks Ground On New Nuke Plant - Not A Peep From US, Israel or Europe

Pakistan has Atomic weapons, have tested them and is even reportedly willing to supply an A-bomb to Saudi Arabia on demand.  And when Pakistan starts construction on another nuclear plant (with China's help), we don't here a peep from the United States, Europe, or Israel.  Yet the United States, Europe and Israel work feverishly to control Iran's development of nuclear power.

Bomb. (Illustration: _Gavroche_)

Pakistan launches largest nuclear power project (via AFP)

Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif on Tuesday launched the construction of the country's biggest atomic power plant and vowed to pursue further projects to make nuclear the largest energy source. The 2,200-megawatt plant is to be built with Chinese…