18 years after Israel’s bombardment: IAEA finds uranium traces in destroyed Syrian nuclear reactor

Traces of uranium were found in a building belonging to the Syrian nuclear reactor that was destroyed by Israel in 2007, the U.N. nuclear watchdog IAEA (International Atomic Energy Agency) announced on Monday.

In a report to its member states that was seen by Reuters, the agency said that traces of the nuclear material were found in a building that was destroyed as part of the Israeli strikes on the reactor in Deir az-Zour, in eastern Syria.

An earlier report from 2011 had concluded that the building was “very likely” part of a reactor – but until the collapse of the Assad regime at the end of 2024, most of the country was inaccessible to Western observers.

The new government has largely cooperated with international bodies and, in a first in decades, recently confirmed that it is conducting official negotiations with Israel over a security arrangement.

“Syria agreed to cooperate with the Agency, through full transparency, to address Syria's past nuclear activities,” at a meeting between IAEA chief Rafael Grossi and Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa, according to the report, which also stated that the IAEA had continued to try and reach a definitive conclusion over the past decades.

Since last year, it has been able to gather environmental samples at three unnamed locations “that were allegedly functionally related” to the nuclear site at Deir az-Zour.

The formulation indicates that IAEA personnel weren't on the ground but rather, that the Syrian government had transmitted the samples.

It found “a significant number of natural uranium particles in samples taken at one of the three locations. The analysis of these particles indicated that the uranium is of anthropogenic origin, i.e. that it was produced as a result of chemical processing,” the report said.

The report doesn’t reach a definitive conclusion regarding the meaning of the samples for the state of the Syrian nuclear program. However, it notes that the uranium had not yet been enriched.

“The current Syrian authorities indicated that they had no information that might explain the presence of such uranium particles,” said the report.

Grossi also requested the government’s help for the IAEA to conduct a mission on the ground in Deir az-Zour “to conduct further analysis, access relevant documentation and to talk to those involved in Syria's past nuclear activities.”

“Once this process has been completed and the results evaluated, there will be an opportunity to clarify and resolve the outstanding safeguards [and] issues related to Syria's past nuclear activities and to bring the matter to a close,” it said.

In September 2007, the Israeli military conducted “Operation Orchard” to destroy the nuclear reactor built by the Syrian Assad regime.

The operation was first officially confirmed by then-Intelligence Minister Israel Katz in 2018, who congratulated former prime minister Ehud Olmert for ordering the strikes.

“The operation and its success made it clear that Israel would never allow nuclear weapons to those who threaten its existence,” Katz wrote on 𝕏, adding a warning to Iran: “Syria back then – and Iran today.”

The Assad regime had denied that the site had been a nuclear site, maintaining it was part of a regular army base while rejecting cooperation with the IAEA.

The agency first officially confirmed that the site had been a nuclear reactor in 2011, during the Syrian Civil War.