Barnaby Frank. The Invisible Bomb: The Nuclear Arms Race in the Middle East

London: I.B. Tauris, 1993. — 239 p.Five stars for Frank Barnaby for enshrining the words of Israel's nuclear whistle blower, Mordechai Vanunu in a book that should also be read. Israel developed the Begin Doctrine of counter-proliferation and preventive strikes, denying other regional actors the ability to acquire their own nuclear weapons. The Israeli Air Force conducted Operation Opera and Operation Orchard, destroying the Iraqi and Syrian nuclear reactors in 1981 and 2007, respectively, and the Stuxnet malware that severely damaged Iranian nuclear facilities in 2010 is thought to have been developed by Israel. The Samson Option refers to Israel's deterrence strategy of massive retaliation with nuclear weapons as a "last resort" against a country whose military has invaded and/or destroyed much of Israel. Israel began to investigate the nuclear field soon after it declared independence in 1948 and, with French co-operation, secretly began building the Negev Nuclear Research Center, a facility near Dimona housing a nuclear reactor and reprocessing plant in the late 1950s. The first extensive details of the weapons program came in October 5, 1986, with media coverage of revelations from Mordechai Vanunu, a technician formerly employed at the center.