Kissinger: Israel Swiped NuclearFuel.

By Israel Faxx News Services

Henry Kissinger told President Richard Nixon that he suspected Israel stole= nuclear material from the United States.

The suspicions by Nixon's national security adviser emerged in documents fr= om 1969, declassified and released Wednesday by the

"This is one program on which the Israelis have persistently deceived us an= d may even have stolen from us," Kissinger wrote in a memorandum. "There is= circumstantial evidence that some fissionable material available for Israe= l=92s weapons development was illegally obtained from the United States abo= ut 1965."

Israel does not acknowledge a nuclear weapons program. Most accounts say th= at fissile material for the weapons originally was obtained from France.

Kissinger wrote the notes ahead of a meeting in July 1969 between Nixon and= Golda Meir, then the Israeli prime minister. Relations between the two nat= ions were close, and Nixon and Meir admired one another.

Kissinger wondered about the best way to confront Meir about Israel's nucle= ar program. He contemplated withholding fighter jets from Israel, but worri= ed that this would prove hugely unpopular in the United States. He also dis= missed forcing Israel's hand by revealing what the United States knew of th= e Jewish state's nuclear weapons, worrying that such a revelation might lea= d to an arms race.

Historians believe the current status quo emerged from the Nixon-Meir meeti= ng. Israel does not acknowledge its nuclear weapons program, but has pledge= d not to be the first nation to use nuclear arms. The United States refrain= s from pressuring Israel to join a non-proliferation treaty.