"Decision Points" reveals that in 2007 Israel's then-Prime Minister Ehud Olmert asked the United States to bomb a suspected nuclear facility in Syria, which Israel's Ynet News calls a "dramatic revelation."
Bush writes that he refused, on the grounds that "bombing a sovereign country with no warning or announced justification would create severe blowback,” according to a review in The Jerusalem Post.
Mr. Olmert replied, “Your strategy is very disturbing to me.” He then authorized a preemptive strike on the Syrian facility on Sept. 6, 2007, which Bush says he did not “green light."
"[Mr. Olmert] had done what he believed was necessary to protect Israel,” writes Bush, adding that he felt the Israeli strike on Syria vindicated Israel after its 2006 war against Hezbollah.
Bush refused to comment at the time on the suspected Israeli bombing, leading David Ignatius to write in the Washington Post that "the silence from all parties has been deafening, but the message to Iran is clear: America and Israel can identify nuclear targets and penetrate air defenses to destroy them."
