JINSA’s Maj. Gen. (ret.) Yaakov Amidror Challenges Pakistani Official: “Iran Built Thousands of Centrifuges Just For Fun?”

JINSA Distinguished Fellow Maj. Gen. (ret.) Yaakov Amidror, former Head of Israel’s National Security Council, participated in a substantive—and at times contentious—panel discussion about the Iran war, hosted by Al Arabiya on March 26.

The panelists, including Maj. Gen. (ret.) Amidror, former Pakistani Defense Committee Chairman Mushahid Hussain, and U.S. political commentator Brandon Weichert, exchanged their views about the Iran war and its causes.

Maj. Gen. (ret.) Amidror pushed back on some misconceptions about the lead-up to the war, including the far-fetched assertion, made by Mr. Hussain, that Iran was not pursuing nuclear weapons.

Pointing out that Israel possesses “the whole plan” of the Iranian nuclear program, which Israel obtained through covert operations in 2018, Maj. Gen. (ret.) Amidror said denying that the Iranian regime wanted nuclear weapons is like denying “the reality of the world.”

Maj. Gen. (ret.) Amidror further stated, “to say that what they did—building all the centrifuges, enriching uranium—was just for fun and not for a nuclear military capability, at the end of the day, it’s not a serious argument.”