Major Questions About a Major Ally : Israel couldn’t possibly have sold Patriot missile technology, could it?

Rumors and allegations that Israel illegally transferred U.S. weapons technology to third countries have not been laid to rest, despite strong denials from Jerusalem.

A statement last week from the Israeli Embassy in Washington, noting that reports of unauthorized sales “are sensitive matters which are subject to negotiations” between the two governments, may in fact have unintentionally undercut some of the denials.

A number of the recently described weapons transfers turn out to be fairly old stuff--those dealing with sales of cluster bombs to Chile and Ethiopia, for example. But there are new allegations as well, the most serious involving Israeli transfers to China of the Patriot anti-missile missile and parts for an air-to-air missile. If true, these would involve sharing some possibly state-of-the-art American technology with a totalitarian country whose own involvement in the global arms trade often adversely impinges on U.S. interests.

Israeli Defense Minister Moshe Arens, after meeting in Washington on Monday with Defense Secretary Dick Cheney, said Israel is willing to receive a U.S. fact-finding team or do anything else to disprove the allegations of illicit transfers to China.

Arens said further that Cheney did not refer to any specific cases of technology transfers, but only “to some intelligence information the United States has.” The exact nature of that intelligence is unknown and likely to remain so, because revealing it could place sources at perhaps mortal risk.

The compelling need now is to get to the bottom of this disturbing business as quickly as possible. If Israel illicitly transferred U.S. arms technology it not only broke faith with its major ally but perhaps put American security at risk as well. If, as some in Israel claim, the leaked allegations are part of a campaign to weaken the bilateral relationship, then that too must be exposed, the sooner the better.

The story about the Patriot missile, which originated in the Washington Times, is both the most serious allegation raised and the least credible. Israel for years has had a significant weapons relationship with China, which it has now been forced to officially acknowledge.

At the same time China has become a supplier of missiles and other weapons to such sworn enemies of Israel as Syria and Iran. For Israel to give China access to Patriot technology, which in turn could permit China to improve the survivability of the missiles it sells to Syria and others, would seem to be madness.

Is the story a malicious fabrication? It’s vital that Washington and Jerusalem cooperate to begin providing answers.