Israellycool

Cool doesn’t even begin to describe this.

Israel’s newest soldier can see at night, never nods off on sentry duty and can carry 300 kilograms (660 pounds) without complaining.

The Guardium, an unmanned ground vehicle commissioned by the Israel Defense Forces is essentially a robotic soldier, among the first in the world to be operational. It can replace human soldiers in dangerous roles, cutting casualty rates.

Like the pilot-less drones that have become a mainstay of air forces in Israel, the U.S. and elsewhere, the four-wheeled Guardium is operated from a command room that can be far from the front line. It can be mounted with cameras, night-vision equipment and sensors, as well as more lethal tools like machine guns.

Following pre-programmed routes, it can navigate alone through cities - the vehicle knows how to deal with intersections, traffic and road markings. It can patrol borders, its cameras scanning 360 degrees at all times, and alert operators if it spots anything suspicious.

The Guardium never mentally wanders or falls asleep, as soldiers have been known to do during mind-numbing guard or patrol missions. And it doesn’t have a family that will miss it when it’s away on reserve duty.

“Representatives of armies with troops who are taking high casualties in asymmetric warfare, from threats like roadside bombs, get excited about this product,” said Erez Peled, director general of G-Nius Unmanned Ground Systems, the company that developed the robot.

The control panel includes two large screens and a joystick. If the operator wants to take control, he can do so from a steering wheel and gas and brake pedals that lend the console the look of a video arcade game.

“Any kid who grew up with a PlayStation will be able to come in here and learn this in seconds,” Peled said.

A vehicle alone costs approximately $600,000 (385,000 euros). With the operating system, the price runs to several million dollars, depending on what equipment is installed on the robot.

The Israeli military said the Guardium has yet to enter operational service, and would provide no further comment.

John Pike, director of the Virginia-based military think tank Globalsecurity.org, said there is only one other similar vehicle operational - a South Korean robot used to patrol the demilitarized zone with North Korea. With the details of the Korean vehicle classified, Pike could not say which was more advanced.

“Robots like this are potentially the future of ground warfare,” Pike said.

“A robot does what it’s told, and you’ll be able to get them to advance in ways it’s hard to get human soldiers to do. They don’t have fear, and they kill without compunction.”

“But more importantly,” he added, “A robot means you don’t have to write a condolence letter.”

An Israeli has solved an almost 4-decade-long mathematical mystery.

A mathematical mystery that has baffled the top minds in the esoteric field of symbolic dynamics for nearly four decades has recently been cracked — by a 63-year-old former security guard.

Avraham Trakhtman, a mathematician who worked as a laborer after immigrating to Israel from Russia, has succeeded where dozens have failed, solving the elusive “Road Coloring Problem.”

The conjecture essentially assumes that it is possible to create a “universal map” that would direct people to arrive at a certain destination, at the same time, regardless of their original location. Experts say this proposition, which seems to defy logic, could actually have real-life applications in the fields of mapping and computer science.

“In math circles, we talk about beautiful results — this is beautiful and it is unexpected. Even in layman’s terms it is completely counterintuitive, but somehow it works,” said Stuart Margolis, a colleague who recruited Trakhtman to Bar Ilan University near Tel Aviv.

He said the discovery was especially remarkable given Trakhtman’s age and background. “The first time I met him he was wearing a night watchman’s uniform,” he said.

The “Road Coloring Problem” was first posed in 1970 by Benjamin Weiss, an Israeli-American mathematician, and a colleague, Roy Adler, who worked at IBM at the time.

Weiss said he believed that given a finite number of roads, one should be able to draw up a map, coded in various colors, that would lead to a certain destination regardless of the point of origin.

For eight years, he tried to prove his theory. Over the next 30 years, some 100 other scientists attempted to as well. All failed, until Trakhtman came along and, in eight short pages, jotted the solution down in pencil last year.

Trakhtman said it took him a year to solve the problem. But that wasn’t nearly as impressive as the journey he took to get to his current lofty position.

Originally from Yekaterinburg, Russia, Trakhtman was already an accomplished mathematician before he came to Israel in 1992, at the age of 48. But like many immigrants in the wave that followed the breakup of the former Soviet Union, he too struggled to find work in the Jewish state and was forced into stints working maintenance and security before landing a teaching position at Bar Ilan in 1995.

The soft-spoken Trakhtman declined to discuss his arduous odyssey, saying those were the “old days.” He said he was “lucky” to be recognized, but played down his recent achievement as a “matter for mathematicians” and said it hasn’t changed him a bit.

“The solution is not that complicated. It’s hard, but it is not that complicated,” he said in heavily accented Hebrew. “Some people think they need to be complicated. I think they need to be nice and simple.”

Trakhtman’s solution is available for viewing on the Internet and will soon be published in the Israel Journal of Mathematics.

Weiss said it gave him great joy to see someone solve his problem, adding that Trakhtman’s solution “is something that is understandable.”

Joel Friedman, a math professor at the University of British Columbia, said probably everyone in the field of symbolic dynamics has tried to solve the Roadmap Coloring Problem at some point, including himself. He said people in the related disciplines of graph theory, discrete math and theoretical computer science have also tried.

“The solution to this problem has definitely generated excitement in the mathematical community,” he said in an e-mail message.

Trakhtman’s achievement is hardly the longest open problem to be solved recently. In 1994, British mathematician Andrew Wiles solved Fermat’s last theorem, which had been open for more than 300 years.

Margolis, Trakhtman’s colleague at Bar Ilan, said the solution could have many applications.

“Say you’ve lost an e-mail and you want to get it back — it would be guaranteed,” he said. “Let’s say you are lost in a town you have never been in before and you have to get to a friend’s house and there are no street signs — the directions will work no matter what.”

But even more exciting, he said, was Trakhtman’s personal history and advanced age, at least in the math world.

“The heartwarming part of it is here is a guy who had a good reputation for his work in the Soviet Union and couldn’t get work,” he said.

“Math is usually a younger person’s game, like music and the arts,” he said. “Usually you do your better work in your mid 20’s and early 30’s. He certainly came up with a good one at age 63,” he said.

Meanwhile, the only mathematical problem the palestinians have tried to solve is how to kill as many Jews as possible.

Update: You can view Avraham’s solution here. Here’s an excerpt:

The synchronizing word of deterministic automaton is a word in the alphabet of colors (considered as letters) of its edges that maps the automaton to a single state. A coloring of edges of a directed graph is synchronizing if the coloring turns the graph into deterministic finite automaton possessing a synchronizing word.

My head hurts.

AFP reports on our latest ingenuity.

It might harm their reputation, but Israel’s air force is considering giving its combat pilots Viagra to improve their performance in the air.

A recent study conducted by Israeli doctors among mountain climbers in Africa found a link between erectile dysfunction drugs and improved performance in high altitudes, the mass-selling Yediot Aharonot reported.

The active ingredient in the drugs was found to make climbers perform better in an environment with less oxygen, which causes fatigue and dizziness.

This has led army doctors to consider giving jet fighter pilots - who can fly at altitudes of up to 50,000 feet - the same drug.

“The Viagra family of drugs is considered effective in these conditions because when there is a long shortage in oxygen it leads to high blood pressure in the lungs, and the drugs help fight that,” the report quoted military medical sources as saying.

Gives new meaning to the words “up in the air.”

Scientific American has announced the winners of this years’ SciAm 50, the magazine’s annual award celebrating “visionaries from the worlds of research, industry and politics whose recent accomplishments point toward a brighter technological future for everyone” (hat tip: Scott).

This year’s award winners includes 3 professors from Tel Aviv University: Itay Baruchi and Eshel Ben-Jacob for replicating the formation of memories via neurons attached to a computer chip, and Beka Solomon for research in treating Alzheimer’s. You can read more about their exploits here.

Surprisingly enough, no palestinians made the list despite advancements in the field of homemade projectiles.

After decades of being treated as a pariah, Israel finally managed to get a resolution approved by the UN:

The resolution encourages able nations of the world to develop farming technology for developing countries.The resolution was passed by the UN General Assembly’s Second Committee, dealing with development issues. There were 118 votes in favor and 29 abstentions, with no opposing votes. The resolution will be brought before the full General Assembly next week.

“For Israel, this is a very dramatic development, and an historic day at the UN,” Ambassador Dan Gillerman told reporters. “It is the very first time that Israel initiates and authors and submits a resolution which has nothing to do with the conflict. It is not easy for Israel to have its resolutions and its points of view adopted,” he added. “This makes Israel a much more normal and acceptable member of the UN. One of our main aims is to not be a one issue country and to bring awareness of Israel’s excellence to the world.”

Who can argue with helping poor countries farm?

A look at the countries that abstained from this vote is instructive:

Included in the 29 abstentions were South Africa and 19 Arab states present – though not including Muslim Afghanistan and Pakistan, who voted in favor. Iran did not take part in the vote. The abstentions came from Algeria, Bahrain, Brunei, Darussalam, Djibouti, Egypt, Indonesia, Iraq, Jordan, Kuwait, Kyrgyzstan, Lebanon, Lesotho, Libya, Malaysia, Mauritania, Morocco, Niger, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, Swaziland, Syria, Tunisia, United Arab Emirates, Yemen, Zambia and Zimbabwe.

So what do the Arab nations have against helping third-world farmers?

Palestinian Authority United Nations representative Riyad Mansour criticized the move, telling Reuters that Israel was “trying to score political points” and had rejected a move that would have obscured the Jewish state as the author of the resolution in favor of its presentation as a “consensus resolution.”

OK, so it is not that the Arab nations - even the ones supposedly at peace with Israel - have anything against the resolution.

They just cannot stand to agree with anything Israel says, no matter how innocuous. It is easier to abstain than to even give the appearance of being on the same side as the hated Zionists on any issue.

This is beyond politics - this is just a seething hatred for anything that Israel does; this is misoziony. The very idea of agreeing with the Jewish state on anything sticks in the throats of the Arab world. For them, emotion trumps logic, and visceral hate makes real peace impossible.

(cross-posted on Elder of Ziyon)

While our neighbors have long been using terror cells to murder innocent people, Israeli doctors are using adult stem cells to try improve the lives of many.

Neurologists at Jerusalem’s Hadassah-University Hospital, Ein Kerem, are the first in the world to help multiple sclerosis (MS) and amyotropic lateral sclerosis (ALS) patients by injecting their spinal columns with large numbers of adult stem cells taken from their bone marrow and multiplied in culture.

The clinical trial, while “encouraging” and “promising,” remains highly experimental, as all the patients have undergone a single injection with no untreated control group for comparison. With the first patients having received it two years ago, it is too early to know how successful it will be in the long term.

Prof. Dimitrios Karousis, a senior Greek-born neurologist at Hadassah for the past 19 years, told The Jerusalem Post on Wednesday that the clinical trial was “the first in the world with this type of stem cells.” There have been, though, unproven and much-criticized claims of the doubtful scientific value of stem cell injections in desperate MS patients at private clinics in Russia and China.

Karousis added that a hospital in England recently announced that it would soon launch a program for stem cell injections similar to Hadassah’s.

Among his collaborators were Prof. Shimon Slavin, the world-renowned stem cell expert at Hadassah who has just retired and moved to Tel Aviv Sourasky Medical Center, and Hadassah neurology department head Prof. Tamir Ben-Hur. The team first experimented on lab mice with a model of MS and found that after a month or two (a year or two in human time), 90 percent of their neurons remained intact without any breakdown of their myelin sheath, despite the disease.

MS and ALS are incurable. One can live with MS for decades, but with growing disability; ALS, however, is usually fatal within a few years.

The researchers received official permission to conduct a small study with 25 patients - nine with MS and 16 with ALS, none of whom responded to conventional drug treatments - from the hospital’s Helsinki Committee on Human Medical Experimentation. They are waiting for permission from the Health Ministry’s Supreme Helsinki Committee to conduct a much larger study, Karousis said.

The ministry is asking a lot of questions, such as exactly what elements are in the culture medium, he added.

In addition to Israelis from various parts of the country, the patients in the trial have come from as far away as the US, South Africa and Italy to get the treatment.

“It is a Phase 1-2 trial, aimed at testing to see how safe it is. While most of the patients’ conditions are improved or are stabilized, it’s impossible to know how long it will last or how significant the improvement is, as there was no control group,” Karousis said. “Yet we are encouraged, as these are patients with advanced cases, many of them in wheelchairs. There were no side effects so far except for a passing fever or headache.”

One “dose” of adult stem cells is removed by a needle from the hip bone, then processed and “cleaned” and grown in a special culture. After two months, pure adult stem cells numbering some 50 million are produced and injected into the patient’s spinal column. The spinal injection is given only once.

“We are optimistic,” said Karousis, “as the use of stem cells is not far into the future. They have already shown some promise in the treatment of joint and bone diseases, immune conditions and ischemia of the heart.”

And here you were thinking we were only good at inventing sneaky Zionist weapons.

Nadia Abu El-Haj, who teaches anthropology at Barnard College, has received tenure from that institution.

Much has already been written about her book criticizing any archaeology that indicates a presence of an Jewish kingdom in what is now Israel, even though she has no archaeology experience herself. Her pre-conceived notion that there were never ancient Jews in the Middle East is so overpowering that she essentially dismisses the entire field of archaeology as being hopelessly biased against her version of the truth.

This was the only book she ever wrote, and it seems on its own to be pretty powerful evidence that her scholarship is suspect, to say the least. But what most people haven’t caught on to is that more recently she has been doing to the field of genetics what she had previously done to archaeology - to reach the identical conclusion. In an article in American Ethnologist she says modern genetics has disproved the idea that the Jewish maternal line originated in ancient Israel (what she calls “Palestine” even when she is talking about a kingdom that predates that term.)

It is an amazing coincidence that she has looked at two disparate fields, neither of which she is an expert in, and reached the identical conclusion - the Jews have no historic right to live in Israel. The fact that she is of Palestinian Arab origin surely has nothing to do with this eerie juxtaposition of separate proofs by assertion.

Perhaps if her only “scholarship” was concentrated in deconstructing archaeology, a case could be made that she is just doing the same as what other postmodernists do. But the fact that she uses her anthropology background as a blunt instrument to pretend to be a scholar in two separate, specialized fields of which she has no real knowledge shows not only that El-Haj is no scholar, but that she has a purely Jew-hating agenda. It is almost beyond belief that such a person, who can only be described as a bigot, can reach such a level at any university, let alone one as formerly prestigious as this one.

Columbia University (of which Barnard is part) certainly has seen its reputation collapse in the past year.

(cross-posted at Elder of Ziyon)

Coming soon: Zionist Time Machine of Death.^TM (hat tip: One Jerusalem).

Researchers at the Technion University (Haifa, Israel) claim they have developed a theoretical model of a time machine that, in the distant future, could enable future generations to travel into the past.

The team’s findings were published in the latest issue of Physical Review.

“In order to travel back in time, the spacetime structure must be engineered appropriately,” explains Professor Amos Ori of the Technion’s Faculty of Physics. “This is what Einstein’s theory of general relativity deals with. It says that spacetime can be flat. That is ” it has a trivial, simple structure. But it can also be curved with various configurations.”

The team stresses the main question is whether — according to the principles of curvature development in the theory of relativity — a time machine can be created. “In other words ” can we cause spacetime to curve in such a way as to enable travel back in time? Such a journey requires a significant curvature of spacetime, in a very special form.”

The researchers explain that traveling back in time is actually closing time-like curves so we can go back to an event at which we were present in the past. In flat space, it is not possible to close curves and go back in time. In order for closed time-like curves to exist, there has to be a curvature of a specific form on spacetime.

The question Prof. Ori is investigating is whether the laws of gravity permit the development of spacetime with the required curvature (closed time-like curves).

In the past, scientists raised a number of objections to this possibility. Now, Prof. Ori is proposing a theoretical model for spacetime that could develop into a time machine.

The Technion researchers suggest their model overcomes some of the questions, which, until now, scientists have not succeeded in solving. One of the difficult claims against a time machine was that, in order to create a time machine, it would be necessary for it to contain material with negative density. And since as of now we do not have such material — and it is also not clear if the laws of nature enable the existence of such material in the quantities required — it is not possible to build a time machine.

The team’s theoretical model does not require material with negative density — the proposal is essentially a vacuum space that contains a region field with standard positive density material.

“The machine is spacetime itself,” Prof. Ori explains. “Today, if we were to create a time machine ” an area with a warp like this in space that would enable time lines to close on themselves ” it might enable future generations to return to visit our time. We, apparently, cannot return to previous ages because our predecessors did not create this infrastructure for us.”

Prof. Ori, one of the few scientists in the world investigating this issue, emphasizes that we still do not have the technology to control gravitational fields at will, despite the fact that the theoretical principles of how to do this exist. “The model that we developed at the Technion is a significant step but there still remains a number of non-trivial open questions,” he stresses. “It may be that some of these questions also will not be solved in the future. This is still not clear.”

But surely if these questions will be solved in the future, then someone from the future would have come back already, using the time machine?

My head hurts.

Introducing our latest weapon: Zionist Death Dogs.^TM

When Michael Saliba wants his two dogs to follow his commands, he barks out the following orders: Chapes (search), Artza (lie down) Ken (yes), and Shev (sit). Pretty standard commands for any dog… if you live in Israel. But Saliba is a deputy sheriff in Santa Clara in Northern California, and until recently didn’t speak a word of Hebrew.

That all changed earlier this year, when Saliba, along with eight other law enforcement officers from six California jurisdictions, went to Israel to learn how to become the Office of Homeland Security’s first ever Counter-Terrorism Canine Handlers. Following two months of intensive training, the officers returned with their Israeli dogs to their jobs in Los Angeles, Sacramento, San Francisco, Alameda, Santa Clara and San Mateo Sheriffs’ offices - and with a new, albeit, limited command of Hebrew.

The majority of the training took place at kennels in Netanya, with field operations in the Sharon and Gush Dan areas. The $411,000 training program funded entirely by California’s federal homeland security grants was undertaken by Pups for Peace, a California-based non-profit organization dedicated to reducing death and injury through the use of specifically trained explosive detection dogs and handlers, in an effort to prevent terrorism.

Pups for Peace was established shortly after the Passover double suicide bombings at the Park Hotel in Netanya in 2002, to train dogs to send to Israel to help detect suicide bombers. “It’s amazing,” said Yoram Doctori, the Israeli director of operations for Pups for Peace, and course manager for the California Homeland Security Office. “They helped us in the beginning and now we can give back to them by training their handlers here in Israel with our dogs.”

“Israel is the place to work with world renowned experts on canine and anti-terrorism training,” added Mathew Bettenhausen, director of the California office of homeland security.

Doctori explained that some of the unique methods that Israel employs with its dogs involve advanced counter-terrorism.

“We use tactics that no one else in the world uses. Krav Maga, and martial arts to allow the dogs to detect [a possible suicide bomber] within three feet of them. We train the handlers and the dogs in places that were hit by suicide bombers. It gives them that sense of urgency that cannot be found in America,” he told ISRAEL21c.

In addition, Doctori said unlike in the US, the dogs are not just trained to detect the explosives; they’re also trained to control the suspect. Other training methods that are not employed in the US include training the dogs to work with the public. “We don’t evacuate and work in a controlled area,” Doctori said. “All our dogs are friendly and are at ease being in public.”

In fact, the dogs and their trainers joined a Purim parade held in Netanya, filled with children and merriment.

“For us it was a drill,” said Doctori. “It helped being able to work among all that noise.”

Saliba, who has now been back home for just over a month with his two Israeli dogs - Shemaya, a yellow lab and Jerry, a German Shepherd - is still amazed by how much he has learned.

“Almost every place we train here [in America] is in a controlled environment,” he said. “When we worked in Netanya we took our dogs to the bus terminal. That place is packed with people and our dogs were checking under seats, round people’s bags and everyone was fine with it.”

Saliba’s also getting used to working in Hebrew with his dogs. “I can’t say the word “stay” (tisha’er) though,” Saliba admits. “Too many ‘e’s” I’ve given up.” But he has managed to get his tongue around Azov (wait) tov (good) and lo (no). “It’s taken some getting used to,” he admits. “In America when we train dogs, it’s all silent commands. With the Israeli dogs we’re trained to talk to them and give commands constantly.”

According to Doctori the international dog training language in the canine industry is in fact German - “but we refuse to do that obviously in Israel,” he said.

Another unique aspect of the Israeli training is that each of the handlers receives not one but two dogs. “The Israelis had such foresight on this idea because the dogs work really hard and can only focus for 20-30 minutes at a time,” said Saliba. “This way one dog can rest while the other works, so we can scour an area constantly. Visibility is the best weapon against terrorism,” he explained. “Having two dogs creates more presence, saves money, and allows us to search a greater area.

“We gained so much by doing this program,” Saliba added. “By training in Israel we had tangible experiences that an average officer in America can’t get. We learned how to function in a society that has to deal with terrorism every day; we learned how society reacts to terror and how to act in order to save lives.”

Saliba also had nothing but the highest praise for his trainers - Elad and Ram. “They serve in the military, and are so smart, experienced and knowledgeable. But they’re also so humble. They shared with us how they served on the border with Lebanon with their dogs. They’re all focused on one goal to save lives and keep an eye out for terrorists.”

For Saliba the experience has been invaluable. “We now have one more weapon we can use to fight and defeat terrorism in the US. For the Israelis, there is no limit to the amount of money and training that can be utilized to save a human life. That’s what we need to do here.”

Saliba said he would go back to Israel “in a heartbeat. I hope maybe there’ll be an advanced course we can take. I have made such good friends and since I came back from Israel, I bought two big jars of green olives. I’m afraid I’ve become addicted to them,” he said, laughing.

Doctori said the whole experience has been amazing. “We can now give something back to the US. We both have the same values of democracy and freedom. We share the same enemies and we are both in this struggle for this fight against terror.”

(hat tip: Womble)

You just knew it was coming: the Zionist Deathbot.^TM

A new, smart Israeli military robot can fight its way down dark alleys, through caves and over rubble, seeking out bombs and booby traps along the way and warning human foot soldiers of enemies and danger ahead, its manufacturer said Thursday.

Elbit Systems, one of Israel’s leading defense electronics companies, said its robotic point man, designated VIPeR, is small and light enough to be carried into battle on a soldier’s back, but the 11 kilogram (25 lb), 23 centimeter (9 inch) tall tough guy packs a full-size punch.

The remote-controlled unit can be fitted with a mini-Uzi automatic pistol, fragmentation, stun and smoke grenades, explosives sniffer and day and night vision cameras, Elbit said. It can climb stairs and find its way around with preprogrammed mapping software. The company said that the Israeli military was planning to carry out operational trials with the VIPeR with a view to deploying it with infantry units.

After years of Palestinian-Israeli fighting, various kinds of robots are widely used by the Israeli army and police for inspecting suspect objects thought to be bombs, checking buildings for booby traps and sniffing out arms and explosives.

Elbit said the VIPeR is currently making its first public appearance at the winter exhibition of the Association of the United States Army, in Fort Lauderdale, Florida.

I have nothing to add beyond what Elder of Ziyon says in this post:

Israel-bashers like to talk about Israel’s huge defense system and how unequal the battlefield is. What they fail to mention is that a significant part of Israel’s defense budget goes towards weapons that minimize the loss of human lives, both Israel’s and its enemies’. Can you imagine Hamas or Hezbollah being interested in smart weapons when the same amount of money would buy hundreds of dumb bombs? Can anyone even fathom an Arab fighter who cares in the least about whether he kills soldiers or civilians?

In the end, the effectiveness of this hugely expensive robot is roughly similar to that of a Jihadist intent on reaching Paradise - and he costs nothing, in the Islamist calculus. To Israel’s sworn enemies, the thought of developing such a robot would be absurd when they have a near-infinite supply of indoctrinated Islamic human munitions. They don’t want to minimize human losses - they want to maximize them. And that is a much, much cheaper way to wage war.

Which shows again, in a nutshell, the difference between Israel and those who try to destroy her.

Update: How’s this for a laughable headline?
Israeli Firm Unveils Portable Hunter/Killer Robot 

Update: Here’s a picture of our hunter/killer robot.

Israel is developing the world’s largest unmanned aircraft, which will be used for long-range operations and destroying ballistic missiles as they are launched.The Eitan has been developed by the Israel Aircraft Industries and has a wing span of 35m ‚Äî similar to that of a Boeing 737 passenger plane ‚Äî the official told AFP.

 

According to the Yediot Aharonot daily, the drone is designed for long endurance and high-altitude flights and is equipped with an array of advanced cameras and missiles which allow it to identify and intercept long-range missiles as they are being fired on the ground.

 

It will make its maiden flight in the coming days, the paper said.

 

Israel has stepped up in recent years the development of technologies to face the threat of missile attacks, fearing most notably Iran, which has acquired long-range ballistic missiles able to reach Israel and beyond.

 

Coupled with President Mahmoud Ahmedinejad’s calls for the destruction of Israel, Iran’s controversial nuclear program, which Israel claims is aimed at acquiring an atomic bomb, has become the Jewish state’s main strategic threat.

 

Iran, which last year tested the Shahab-3 missiles which are capable of hitting targets around 2000 kilometers away, nevertheless insists the program is aimed solely at peaceful means.