“The World’s Most Secret Bomb”… Why Does “Israel” Refuse to Join the Non-Proliferation Treaty?

Qatar’s recent call to subject Israel’s nuclear facilities to international oversight has raised repeated questions about why Israel continues to refuse to join the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT). On March 8, 2025, during the quarterly session of the Board of Governors of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) in Vienna, Qatar urged the international community to intensify efforts to place all Israeli nuclear facilities under IAEA safeguards and to have Israel join the NPT as a non-nuclear state.

Qatar’s Permanent Representative to the United Nations and international organizations in Vienna, Jassim Al-Hamadi, emphasized the need for international institutions to fulfill their commitments under UN Security Council resolutions, the UN General Assembly, the IAEA, and the 1995 NPT Review Conference, which called on Israel to place all its nuclear facilities under IAEA safeguards. He pointed out that “all countries in the Middle East, except Israel, are parties to the NPT and have active safeguards agreements with the IAEA.”

This is not the first time that Qatar, other states, or international organizations have called for Israel to place its nuclear facilities under IAEA safeguards or to sign the NPT. However, Tel Aviv has always refused to sign the treaty and subject its highly secretive nuclear facilities to UN inspections, often labeling these calls as “shameful and hypocritical.” So why does Israel continue to refuse to join this treaty and maintain ambiguity regarding its nuclear arsenal?

Why Does Israel Refuse to Join the Non-Proliferation Treaty?

For decades, there has been a widespread belief that Israel possesses nuclear weapons, making it the sixth country in the world to develop such weapons. It is one of four nuclear states that are not defined as nuclear-armed under the NPT, with the other three being India, Pakistan, and North Korea.

Israel is not a party to the NPT and has not accepted the safeguards proposed by the IAEA for some of its key nuclear activities. Generally, its policy of nuclear ambiguity has been tolerated by its allies, who also helped Israel develop its nuclear program.

Under this policy, which has been in place for decades and aims to “deter surrounding enemies while avoiding provocations that could lead to an arms race,” as Reuters puts it, Israel neither confirms nor denies possessing nuclear weapons, nor does it disclose the number of bombs it possesses. Israel refuses to sign any safeguards that could expose its nuclear activities or experiments, maintaining its exclusive nuclear advantage in the Middle East.

For years, Israel has resisted numerous international calls for a Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD)-free zone in the Middle East, including those made at the NPT Review Conferences in 1995, 2005, and 2010. The draft final document at the 2015 NPT Review Conference urged the UN Secretary-General to hold a conference on creating a WMD-free zone in the Middle East by 2016, but the U.S., U.K., and Canada blocked the document. The indefinite postponement of the conference meant that “Israel is not required to disclose its nuclear capabilities.” Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu has consistently stated that Israel will never sign any nuclear non-proliferation treaties.

In 2015, the U.S., Canada, the U.K., France, and 60 other countries rejected a draft decision from the Arab Group in the UN Security Council that would have demanded Israel subject its nuclear program to IAEA oversight.

How Much Nuclear Power Does Israel Possess?

Various estimates suggest that Israel has around 90 to 300 nuclear warheads based on plutonium and has produced enough plutonium to make between 100 and 200 nuclear weapons. It is widely believed that the plutonium for Israel’s nuclear weapons program was produced using a reactor built with French assistance. The IRR-2 research reactor at the Negev Nuclear Research Center in Dimona is not subject to IAEA safeguards.

The Stockholm International Peace Research Institute reported that as of 2021, significant construction was taking place at the Negev Nuclear Research Center near Dimona, according to commercial satellite images. The institute’s data indicates that Israel possesses air, land, and sea-based delivery systems for its nuclear arsenal. These bombs can be dropped from aircraft, including F-16 and F-15 models, and are likely stored near air bases such as Tel Nof Air Base in central Israel or Hatzerim Air Base in the Negev Desert. It is believed that when Israel sent six F-16s from Tel Nof to the UK for training in 2019, a U.S. official referred to this as Israel’s “nuclear squadron.”

According to reports, Israeli nuclear weapons can be launched via Jericho ballistic missiles. It is believed that these missiles are stationed at the Sdot Micha Air Base near Zakariya, about 25 kilometers west of Jerusalem. Israel also operates five German-made Dolphin-class submarines, powered by diesel and electricity, which are based at the Haifa port on the Mediterranean coast. Some or all of these submarines may be equipped to launch nuclear-armed cruise missiles.

Has Israel Ever Acknowledged Possessing Nuclear Weapons?

Israel’s possession of nuclear weapons has long been a well-known fact, but Israeli officials rarely confirm it. As part of a policy known as “Amimut,” meaning “opacity” or “ambiguity” in Hebrew, Israeli leaders refrain from confirming or denying the country’s possession of nuclear weapons, supposedly to maintain non-proliferation in the Middle East.

However, former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert briefly acknowledged Israel’s nuclear arsenal during an interview with German broadcaster Sat 1 on December 11, 2006. He quickly retracted his statement without confirming or denying Israel’s possession of nuclear weapons, and at a press conference with former German Chancellor Angela Merkel, he insisted that “Israel’s stance on the ambiguity surrounding nuclear weapons has not changed.” However, his comments failed to quell criticism within Israel, with opposition leaders accusing him of “irresponsible” conduct and calling for his resignation.

In early November 2024, less than a month after the beginning of Israel’s war in Gaza, Israeli Minister of Heritage Amihai Eliyahu suggested that dropping a nuclear bomb on Gaza was one of the options available. This was seen as an implicit admission of Israel’s nuclear capabilities. While Eliyahu was publicly reprimanded by Prime Minister Netanyahu, and his participation in Cabinet meetings was suspended, he retained his position in the government and even reaffirmed his pro-nuclear stance at the end of January.

The continued ambiguity regarding Israel’s nuclear program, combined with U.S. protection of it, remains a major obstacle to the creation of a WMD-free zone in the Middle East. The global pledge to establish such a zone in 1995 was crucial in securing the indefinite extension of the NPT. However, the absence of such a zone today due to Israel’s refusal to disclose its nuclear status continues to challenge this critical treaty.

How Did Israel Deceive Everyone and Build Its Nuclear Capabilities in Secret Since the Early 1960s?

In the 1960s, Israel built its nuclear bomb in near-total secrecy, even deceiving the U.S. government in a famous case regarding its activities and objectives. The first Israeli leader, David Ben-Gurion, initiated the Israeli nuclear program in the mid-to-late 1950s, establishing the Israeli nuclear complex in the Dimona region (in the south) at a time when only three countries possessed nuclear weapons.

A decade later, on the eve of the Six-Day War in 1967, Israel secretly assembled its first nuclear devices, with French assistance. Israeli leaders viewed the Dimona project as a “secret within a secret.” The first secret was the French-Israeli nuclear agreement of 1957, which led to the construction of the Dimona facility. The two countries negotiated the agreement in secrecy, aware of its sensitivity.

Despite strong opposition from the U.S., led by President John F. Kennedy, Israeli leaders were determined to achieve their goals. They viewed the nuclear project as a commitment to ensuring the country’s future, as Foreign Policy magazine notes, a commitment not to repeat past mistakes, especially in light of the Holocaust. Boldness and deception were key elements in Israel’s continuous pursuit of nuclear capabilities in the subsequent decades.

In January 2025, the National Security Archive at George Washington University published a new e-book containing twenty documents on Israel’s nuclear project. These reports shed light on what the U.S. government knew about Dimona’s secrets and how Israel concealed them.

Evidence suggests that when the U.S. discovered the Dimona project in late 1960, it was unaware of the deeper secret. Internal discussions in the U.S. focused on assessing the nature of the project and its motivations, questioning whether it aimed at producing weapons (i.e., producing plutonium), generating energy, or conducting scientific research.

This ambiguity was reflected in the first National Intelligence Estimate issued by the CIA on December 8, 1960, about Dimona, which realistically stated that “Israel is engaged in building a nuclear reactor complex in the Negev near Beersheba.”

In his address to the Knesset on December 21, 1960, in response to U.S. pressure, Ben-Gurion confirmed the construction of the Dimona reactor but insisted that it was a “research reactor… that would serve the needs of industry, agriculture, health, and science.” These intelligence findings raised suspicions within the Eisenhower administration, which expressed surprise upon discovering the reactor. Ben-Gurion denied any intentions to develop nuclear weapons, angrily telling U.S. Ambassador Ogden Reid, “We are not subordinate to America… and we will never be.”

In 1960, Israel claimed to the U.S. State Department that the Dimona reactor was a “research center for mineral industries.” Israeli Foreign Minister Shimon Peres assured U.S. President John F. Kennedy in a 1963 White House meeting that Israel would not “introduce nuclear weapons into the region.”

Kennedy was so concerned about the Israeli nuclear program that he requested that U.S. inspectors be allowed to visit Dimona. The Israelis agreed but arranged things so that the visits would not expose anything incriminating. U.S. inspectors were not allowed to bring equipment or collect samples from the site, according to a 2014 investigative report by The Guardian.

Between 1961 and 1969, Israel committed to a complete deception campaign against the Americans. This required not only concealing the underground reprocessing plant but also camouflaging other components at Dimona to present a convincing but false image of the reactor’s purpose. This operation was politically and technically complex. During this period, the U.S. conducted eight inspection visits to Dimona, seven of which took place after Kennedy pressured Israel to allow regular visits in 1963. For Kennedy, these visits were valuable for both political messaging and intelligence gathering, a effort that continued under his successor Lyndon Johnson.

The released reports, declassified in the new archive publication, cover visits in 1965 and 1966, along with an early 1967 visit. During these three years, Israel achieved significant nuclear milestones. By 1965, Israel had completed its highly secret underground reprocessing plant, and by 1966, it began producing plutonium suitable for weapons. By the eve of the 1967 war, Israel had assembled its first nuclear devices. Despite these milestones, all reports from the U.S. visits during this period claimed that no clear, direct, or indirect evidence of weapons-related activities was found. Each of the three visits ended with U.S. teams confident in their conclusions.

As Foreign Policy magazine concludes, Israel is a unique nuclear power. While all other nuclear powers have publicly declared their status, Israel has not. A secret deal in 1969 between U.S. President Richard Nixon and Israeli Prime Minister Golda Meir provided cover for this, after Americans became convinced that Israel possessed nuclear weapons. Since then, the ambiguity surrounding Israel’s nuclear status has acted as a shield from scrutiny, and to this day, Israel refuses to confirm or deny its nuclear status.

Ironically, Iran may now be mimicking its arch-enemy’s strategy from the 1960s, inching closer to the ability to possess nuclear weapons without conducting any tests. Iran’s current proximity to nuclear capabilities may be similar to where Israel was in 1967, according to Foreign Policy.