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New Book Details Iran’s Path to a Nuclear Bomb
A satellite image shows airstrike craters over the underground centrifuge halls of the Natanz Enrichment Facility, following US airstrikes amid the Iran-Israel conflict, in Natanz County, Iran, June 22, 2025. Photo: Maxar Technologies/Handout via REUTERS
Edwin Black’s new book, Israel Strikes Iran: Operation Rising Lion – The 20-Year Backstory, is a must-read. Don’t let the fact that you are unlikely to understand the details (unless you are a defense analyst or a nuclear weapons specialist) deter you.
The lessons are in plain English.
- Iran’s intention to enrich uranium and build nuclear weapons was clear long before the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA).
- Iran’s scientists were pretty good. With the help of other countries, plus funding by the West in the form of “sanctions relief” or waivers, or by ignoring violations of sanctions, the Iranian scientists created weapons and plans.
- Iran cheated before, during, and after the JCPOA.
- A lot of people knew that — and didn’t act on what they knew.
- But there were other people, and we should be forever grateful to them.
Black, the award-winning investigative journalist and New York Times (NYT) bestselling author, has been watching and writing about Iranian nuclear progress for decades.
The introductory chapter, “The Twenty-year Wait,” is Black’s timeline, putting forward bits and pieces of information that culminated in Operation Rising Lion. He notes, “Israel Strikes Iran has been almost ready to publish for years … I wrote all but the final chapter material back in 2021 and 2022.”
Yes, it is a bit self-aggrandizing, but he’s more than entitled. Author of a dozen books — including the terrifying IBM and the Holocaust and equally terrifying Financing the Flames — Black is the master of the back story.
You know the Russian S-300 air defense system, right? But did you know that in 2008, Greece, which owned S-300s, held joint Air Force exercises with Israel? The NYT reported on them, but Black added, in The Cutting Edge News (TCEN) in July of that year, “Pivotal information … has remained below the radar. By swarming its jets into the S-300s massive electronics, Israel was able to record invaluable information about defeating, jamming and circumventing the Russian system.” Oh.
The article outlines Israel’s leaps in air superiority, but notes that Israel presumed heavy Iranian retaliation. “Israel considers itself to be in a no-win situation because years of sanctions and intense diplomacy have not stopped Iran’s cyclonic nuclear progress…More than one Israeli official has stated that the only thing worse than attacking Iran is not attacking Iran.”
Then his 2025 update.
Iran’s home-built air defense system, Bavar, was rushed to deployment. Israel’s air defense systems surpassed all prior understanding and, Iran’s April 2024 barrage of 30 cruise missiles, 120 ballistic missiles, and 170 drones managed to injure a seven-year-old Bedouin girl in Arad. Israel’s retaliation was much more effective.
Israel eliminated Hamas’ Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran, carried out the pager attacks on Hezbollah operatives on September 17, and then took out Hezbollah headquarters in Beirut on the 27th. Iran responded and Israel responded.
Now you start to see how this works.
Chapter Two is the story of the development of the Massive Ordnance Perpetrator (MOP) bunker buster, which began in 2004, as Black reported in a TCEN story in September 2009. You don’t need to understand the details to understand their success.
But in the 2025 update, you will get the details, and — as hard as it is to imagine — discover that hundreds, if not thousands, of DOD personnel, government officials, and staffers kept their mouths shut about it for more than 20 years. Spoiler alert: Jump to the last chapter and read the paean to our people by General Dan Caine, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
The result: “Operation Midnight Hammer played out as one of the most sophisticated and synchronized military operations since WWII… within the space of minutes, twelve MOPS dropped on Fordow, two MOPs plunged into the Natanz facility, and the Tomahawks pounded Isfahan.”
The development of Iran’s bomb is Chapter 3, starting with an article in The Times of Israel in 2012. The article also shows the development of the Shehab-3 missile. The chapter starts with Pakistan, but it is actually a timeline on Israel’s ops inside Iran — from stealing the nuclear archive in 2018, to the assassination of Iranian scientists, to sabotage of facilities across the country. It details American policy toward Iran — from Obama through Trump 1 through Biden and into Trump 2. For 12 of those years (guess which), the US doesn’t look too good. But remember, during all that time, the military establishment was improving MOPs and plans — silently.
As you read on, you get a comforting feeling, actually, that people in the US and Israel were determined to protect us all.
Chapters Four and Five don’t require much technical knowledge. They are the best chapters and maybe should have come first — we know the end of the story. But as you read them, everything you read before comes into focus. All the groundwork, the science, the diplomacy and lack thereof, the activities carried out in secret and in public, the coordination and cooperation between the United States and Israel becomes the stage on which Operation Rising Lion and Operation Midnight Hammer played out.
Don’t cheer yet. Black is nothing if not a realist, ending with a cautionary note: “The most important warning of this book is contained not in the text written above, but the text yet to be written below … Our destiny paragraph is yet to be written.”
Wait for it.
Shoshana Bryen is Senior Director of The Jewish Policy Center and Editor of inFOCUS Quarterly.
The post New Book Details Iran’s Path to a Nuclear Bomb first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Former Columbia University President Appointed as UK Economic Adviser
Columbia University administrators and faculty, led by President Minouche Shafik, testified before the US House Committee on Education and the Workforce on April 17, 2024. Photo: Jack Gruber/Reuters Connect
i24 News – British Prime Minister Keir Starmer has named Minouche Shafik, former president of Columbia University, as his chief economic adviser at Downing Street, a move aimed at stabilizing the country’s fragile economy and averting a potential budget crisis.
Shafik, an economist of Egyptian origin with dual British and American nationality, has held senior roles at the Bank of England, the IMF, and the World Bank.
She later led the London School of Economics and was elevated to the House of Lords in 2020.
Her tenure in the United States was more turbulent. Shafik stepped down as president of Columbia University in 2024 after just a year in office, amid fierce criticism over her handling of pro-Palestinian protests following the Hamas attacks of October 7, 2023, and the subsequent war in Gaza.
US officials accused her of failing to confront antisemitism on campus, while students and faculty condemned her decision to call in police to dismantle protest encampments.
Since returning to Britain, Shafik has played an active role in policy and cultural institutions. She advised Foreign Secretary David Lammy on international aid reform, has chaired the Victoria & Albert Museum since January, and led the “Economy 2030” inquiry for the Resolution Foundation, where she argued for reforms to the UK’s system of wealth taxation.
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Israel Mulls West Bank Annexation in Response to Moves to Recognize Palestine
The Jordan Valley. Photo: Юкатан via Wikimedia Commons.
Israel is considering annexation in the West Bank as a possible response to France and other countries recognizing a Palestinian state, according to three Israeli officials and the idea will be discussed further on Sunday, another official said.
Extension of Israeli sovereignty to the West Bank – de facto annexation of land captured in the 1967 Middle East war – was on the agenda for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s security cabinet meeting late on Sunday that is expected to focus on the Gaza war, a member of the small circle of ministers said.
It is unclear where precisely any such measure would be applied and when, whether only in Israeli settlements or some of them, or in specific areas of the West Bank like the Jordan Valley and whether any concrete steps, which would likely entail a lengthy legislative process, would follow discussions.
Any step toward annexation in the West Bank would likely draw widespread condemnation from the Palestinians, who seek the territory for a future state, as well as Arab and Western countries. It is unclear where US President Donald Trump stands on the matter. The White House and State Department did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
A spokesperson for Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Saar did not respond to a request for comment on whether Saar had discussed the move with his US counterpart Marco Rubio during his visit to Washington last week.
Netanyahu’s office did not immediately respond to a request for comment on whether the prime minister supports annexation and if so, where.
A past pledge by Netanyahu to annex Jewish settlements and the Jordan Valley was scrapped in 2020 in favor of normalizing ties with the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain in the Abraham Accords brokered by Trump in his first term in office.
The office of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas did not immediately respond to a request for comment. The United States said on Friday it would not allow Abbas to travel to New York for the United Nations gathering of world leaders, where several US allies are set to recognize Palestine as a state.
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Israel Pounds Gaza City Suburbs, Netanyahu to Convene Security Cabinet
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu speaks to the press on Capitol Hill, Washington, DC, July 8, 2025. REUTERS/Evelyn Hockstein
Israeli forces pounded the suburbs of Gaza City overnight from the air and ground, destroying homes and driving more families out of the area as Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s security cabinet was set on Sunday to discuss a plan to seize the city.
Residents of Sheikh Radwan, one of the largest neighborhoods of Gaza City, said the territory had been under Israeli tank shelling and airstrikes throughout Saturday and on Sunday, forcing families to seek shelter in the western parts of the city.
The Israeli military has gradually escalated its operations around Gaza City over the past three weeks, and on Friday it ended temporary pauses in the area that had allowed for aid deliveries, designating it a “dangerous combat zone.”
“They are crawling into the heart of the city where hundreds of thousands are sheltering, from the east, north, and south, while bombing those areas from the air and ground to scare people to leave,” said Rezik Salah, a father of two, from Sheikh Radwan.
An Israeli official said Netanyahu’s security cabinet will convene on Sunday evening to discuss the next stages of the planned offensive to seize Gaza City, which he has described as Hamas’ last bastion.
A full-scale offensive is not expected to start for weeks. Israel says it wants to evacuate the civilian population before moving more ground forces in.
HAMAS SPOKESPERSON TARGETED
Netanyahu confirmed on Sunday that Israeli forces had targeted Abu Ubaida, the spokesperson of Hamas’ armed wing. Defense Minister Israel Katz said that Abu Ubaida was killed. Two Hamas officials contacted by Reuters did not respond to requests for comment.
Gaza health authorities said 15 people, including five children, were killed in the attack on a residential building in the heart of Gaza City.
Abu Ubaida, also known as Hozayfa Al-Khalout, is a well-known figure to Palestinians and Israelis alike, close to Hamas’ top military leaders and in charge of delivering the group’s messages, often via video, for around two decades, delivering statements while wearing a red keffiyeh that concealed his face.
The US targeted him with sanctions in April 2024, accusing him of leading the “cyber influence department” of al-Qassam Brigades.
In his last statement on Friday, he warned that the planned Israeli offensive on Gaza City would endanger the hostages.
On Saturday, Red Cross head Mirjana Spoljaric said an evacuation from the city would provoke a massive population displacement that no other area in the enclave is equipped to absorb, with shortages of food, shelter and medical supplies.
“People who have relatives in the south left to stay with them. Others, including myself, didn’t find a space as Deir Al-Balah and Mawasi are overcrowded,” said Ghada, a mother of five from the city’s Sabra neighborhood.
Around half of the enclave’s more than 2 million people are presently in Gaza City. Several thousand were estimated to have left the city for central and southern areas of the enclave.
Israel’s military has warned its political leaders that the offensive is endangering hostages still being held by Hamas in Gaza. Protests in Israel calling for an end to the war and the release of the hostages have intensified in the past few weeks.