Case Closed?

Conventional wisdom is slowly congealing around the opinion that Israel's bombing strike last month did, in fact, target a Syrian nuclear facility. It bears mentioning that this story has been driven in large part by excellent reporting by the New York Times and The Washington Post. The photo on the left shows the suspected nuclear facility in August, before the bombing. After the bombings, satellite photos show that the 150 square-foot building had been completely bulldozed:

"But the images, federal and private analysts said Thursday, suggest that the Syrian authorities rushed to dismantle the facility after the strike, saying its removal could be interpreted as a tacit admission of guilt.

'It's a magic act -- here today, gone tomorrow,' said a senior intelligence official. 'It doesn't lower suspicions; it raises them. This was not the long-term decommissioning of a building, which can take a year. It was speedy. It's incredible that they could have gone to that effort to make something go away."

Of course, no amount of information is going to be enough to convince some people. After all, Syrian Ambassador Imad Moustapha says there wasn't!