Remember: the Israelis called it Operation "Orchard"

Senior sources in the Israeli government have privately confirmed to me that the recent New York Times articles and satellite photographs about the Israeli raid on an alleged Syrian nuclear target in Al Tabitha, Syria were of the completely wrong location.

Armed with this knowledge, I searched Google Earth satellite photos for the rest of the province of Deir al Zour for a site that would match the unofficial Israeli descriptions: camouflaged black factory building, next to a military ammunition dump, between an airport and an orchard.

There is a clear match in only one location, Longitude 35 degrees, 16 minutes 49.31 seconds North, Latitude 40 degrees, 3 minutes, 29.97 seconds East. Analysts and members of the public are invited to determine for themselves whether this was indeed the weapons dump for Saddam’s WMD.

-- John Loftus
November, 2007

Readers may recall that last year here in Punditaland we gnawed on the Syria bombing story until our gums bled. In the end, all we had were tantalizing speculations running in all directions and a bunch of map coordinates.

Was any of the mystery solved by yesterday's revelations? I am fairly certain that on October 6, 2007 Israel launched a bombing raid on one or more sites in Syria. Beyond that, I know that I will await with much curiosity the outcome of the latest round of Six-Party Talks, and that tonight I will beg off a party in Georgetown to curl on the couch and read Treasure Island by candlelight.