Israeli Soldiers Killing Innocent People On The Flotilla
Israel reveals its true face: The Guardian CiF
The murder of these peace activists will count. Sanctions must surely be the price
This will count. A flotilla of relief boats attacked in international waters. Armed commandos boarding a vessel carrying supplies for a besieged civilian population. More than 10 peace activists reported killed. This has to be made to count.
The dead have joined Rachel Corrie, Tom Hurndall, James Miller and Brian Avery in giving up their lives for the Palestinians. None of these young men and women went out to die or wanted to die or was accepting of death. Each and every one of them ultimately believed that they were safe; that there was a boundary – call it a boundary of legality, a boundary of civilisation – that Israel would not cross. They were wrong. And in proving them wrong, Israel has revealed, once again, its true face to the world.
This face, of course, the Palestinians know well. They see it every day in the teenage soldiers of the occupation chewing gum as they dish out humiliations, in the settlers shooting young Palestinians with impunity, in the soldiers firing gas canisters at the heads of demonstrators. The world saw that face in January last year when Israel unleashed the might of its air force on Gaza – the only time in modern warfare that a civilian population was sealed in as it was being bombed and shelled. Now Israel is out on the high seas killing internationals.
So never mind the multimillion-dollar public relations campaign – actions speak louder than words, and the murder of these peace activists is Israel’s message to the world. It does not matter what Mark Regev or any other Israel spokesperson says. It does not matter what spin the Israeli government tries to put on this; the only link between Israeli words and Israeli deeds is this: Israel uses words as a decoy and an obfuscation and a cover for its deeds. It has done so for 62 years. These internationals, dead now, murdered, have ensured that anyone who does not see this is wilfully blind.
Western governments are fond of holding up Israel as the “only democracy in the Middle East”. So should we assume that the Israeli people are behind their government? That they approve these killings? Last month I was at al-Quds University in Abu Dis. Israel’s wall shaved the edge off the campus. On it, in tall blue letters, a Palestinian student had written: “My Israeli sisters: this is not the answer.”
A few days ago, young Jewish Israeli activists told me they saw that the only hope for their country lies with the international community. Israel is on a path to self-destruction, they said, and it will take the region with it. It will not stop, they said, until the price it pays for its actions becomes too heavy. This price has to be a moral and economic price imposed by the world.
My anger and my sadness are so great that I have to deliberately draw a deep breath from time to time to ease the bands I feel around my chest. It doesn’t matter. What does matter is that millions of people in the world are feeling the same. People everywhere see and understand what is happening. Many of us feel that Palestine is nearing its South Africa moment. This latest outrage must push it closer. And it will.
Donations will, I’m sure, flood in to the other relief boats waiting in harbour. More and more people will take the boycott to heart. More civil bodies will insist on divestment from companies that do business with Israel. The time has come for the governments that represent us to stop engaging with Israeli lies and excuses. The price of Israel’s action today has to be to put the issue of sanctions squarely on the table.
’10 killed’ on Gaza aid flotilla: The Independent
Monday, 31 May 2010
Israeli naval commandos stormed a flotilla of ships carrying aid and hundreds of pro-Palestinian activists to the blockaded Gaza Strip today, killing at least 10 passengers in a pre-dawn raid that set off worldwide condemnation and a diplomatic crisis.
Israel said the forces encountered unexpected resistance as they boarded the vessels. Dozens of passengers and at least five Israeli soldiers were wounded in the confrontation in international waters.
Israel’s tough response triggered widespread condemnation across Europe; many of the passengers were from European countries. The raid also strained already tense relations with Israel’s long-time Muslim ally Turkey, the unofficial sponsor of the mission, and drew more attention to the plight of Gaza’s 1.5 million people.
Turkey announced it was withdrawing its ambassador to Israel, cancelling three joint military drills and calling on the UN Security Council to convene in an emergency session about Israel. The Israeli ambassadors in Sweden, Spain, Denmark and Greece were summoned for meetings, and the French foreign minister called for an investigation.
The violent takeover also threatened to deal yet another blow to Israel’s international image, already tarnished by war crimes accusations in Gaza and its blockade of the impoverished Palestinian territory.
It occurred a day before Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was to meet with President Barack Obama at the White House to discuss the Middle East peace process.
French President Nicolas Sarkozy condemned “the disproportionate use of force” against the flotilla.
“All light must be shed on the circumstances of this tragedy, which underlines the urgency of resuming peace talks,” he said in a statement.
Israeli Defence Minister Ehud Barak expressed regret for the deaths but blamed the violence on organisers of the flotilla, calling the effort a “political provocation” by anti-Israel forces.
Israeli security forces were on alert across the country, and the government advised Israelis to avoid travel to Turkey.
There were conflicting accounts of what happened early today.
An Al-Jazeera reporter on one of the Turkish ships said the Israelis fired at the vessel before boarding it. The Israelis, who had declared they would not let the ships reach Gaza, said they only opened fire after being attacked by activists with sticks, knives and live fire from weapons seized from the Israeli commandos.
“On board the ship we found weapons prepared in advance and used against our forces,” declared Israel’s deputy foreign minister, Danny Ayalon.
“The organisers’ intent was violent, their method was violent and the results were unfortunately violent. Israel regrets any loss of life and did everything to avoid this outcome.”
Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas condemned the Israeli “aggression,” declared three days of mourning across the West Bank and called on the UN Security Council and Arab League to hold emergency sessions on the incident.
Ismail Haniyeh, leader of the rival Hamas government in Gaza, condemned the “brutal” Israeli attack and called on UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon to intervene.
Israel’s military chief, Lt. Gen. Gabi Ashkenazi, said soldiers were forced by violent activists to respond with live fire.
The activists were headed to Gaza on a mission meant to draw attention to a three year-old Israeli blockade of the coastal territory. Israel imposed the blockade after Hamas, which it considers a terrorist group, violently seized the territory.
The Israeli military said troops only opened fire after encountering unexpected resistance from the activists. Activists attacked troops with knives and iron rods, and opened fire with two pistols seized from the forces.
A total of five soldiers were wounded, two seriously, including at least one hit by live fire, the army said. Two of the dead activists had fired at soldiers with pistols, the army said.
“They planned this attack,” said Israeli military spokeswoman Lt. Col. Avital Leibovitch. “Our soldiers were injured from these knives and sharp metal objects … as well as from live fire.”
The ships were being towed to the Israeli port of Ashdod, and wounded were evacuated by helicopter to Israeli hospitals, officials said. One of the ships had reached port by midday.
There were no details on the identities of the casualties, or on the conditions of some of the more prominent people on board, including 1976 Nobel Peace Prize laureate Mairead Corrigan Maguire of Northern Ireland, European legislators and Holocaust survivor Hedy Epstein, 85.
The United Nations expressed “shock” and condemned the killings. “We are in contact with the Israeli authorities to express our deep concern and to seek a full explanation,” said a statement from the highest-ranking UN official in the region, Robert Serry.
Netanyahu later spoke by telephone with top Israeli officials and expressed his “full backing” for the military, according to a statement from the army.
The White House said in a written statement that the US “deeply regrets” the loss of life and injuries and was working to understand the circumstances surrounding this “tragedy.”
An Israeli commando who spoke to reporters on a naval vessel off the coast said he and his comrades were surprised by a group of Arabic-speaking men when they rapelled onto the deck.
He said some of the soldiers, taken off guard, were stripped of their helmets and equipment and thrown from the top deck to the lower deck, and that some had even jumped overboard to save themselves. At one point one of the passengers seized one of the soldiers’ weapons and opened fire.
A high-ranking naval official displayed a box confiscated from the boat containing switchblades, slingshots, metal balls and metal bats. “We prepared (the soldiers) to deal with peace activists, not to fight,” he said. Most of the 10 dead were Turkish, he added.
Israel Murders Civilians on Freedom Flotilla
Israel accused of state terrorism after assault on flotilla carrying Gaza aid: The Guardian
At least nine activists killed and dozens more wounded by Israeli naval commandos
Israel was engulfed by a wave of global condemnation tonight after a botched assault on a flotilla carrying aid and supplies to the Gaza Strip ended in carnage and a diplomatic crisis involving the UN security council.
At least nine pro-Palestinian activists were killed as Israeli naval commandos stormed the largest ship in the flotilla carrying passengers. Dozens more were wounded and evacuated by helicopter to Israeli coastal hospitals.
Israel said more than 10 of its troops were injured, two seriously, in the battle that began early yesterday morning in international waters, about 40 miles from the coast of Gaza.
The UN security council was due to meet tonight in emergency session and Turkey, whose relations with Israel have been severely strained since the war in Gaza in 2008-9, called for Nato to convene over the military assault. The Turkish prime minister, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who ordered the recall of the country’s ambassador to Israel, described the operation as “state terrorism” and said Israel had violated international law. “We are not going to remain silent in the face of this inhumane state terrorism,” he said.
Israel immediately imposed a communications blackout on the detained activists while simultaneously launching a sophisticated public relations operation to ensure its version of events was dominant. Israel’s prime minister, Binyamin Netanyahu, who defended the assault, put off a meeting with US president Barack Obama at the White House scheduled for tomorrow to fly back to deal with the crisis.
Activists with less serious injuries began to trickle into Israeli hospitals late this afternoon. There were believed to be about 27 British civilians aboard the flotilla. Most of the dead were reported to be Turkish nationals.
The deaths and injuries were condemned by the UN, EU and other countries. The US, in contrast, was initially restrained in its response, expressing regret and saying it was “currently working to understand the circumstances surrounding this tragedy”.
UN secretary general, Ban Ki-moon, condemned the violence and called for an investigation. “I am shocked by reports of killing of people in boats carrying supply to Gaza. I heard the ships were in international water. That is very bad.”
The foreign secretary, William Hague, issued a statement “deploring” the loss of life. “There is a clear need for Israel to act with restraint and in line with international obligations,” he said.
The Palestinian president, Mahmoud Abbas, described the storming of the flotilla as a “massacre” and called for three days of national mourning. Israel’s navy had promised to exercise restraint in dealing with the flotilla, and the bloodshed will inevitably leave Israel open to charges of a disproportionate response involving excessive force.
The government, however, was robust in defending its actions, saying its troops had been provoked and attacked by activists aboard the Mavi Marmara, the biggest of the passenger-carrying ships in the flotilla.
However, some Israeli commentators expressed reservations about the operation, fearing that it would leave Israel internationally isolated. Alon Liel, a former Israeli ambassador to Turkey, told the Guardian the situation could have been averted. “Definitely we made mistakes and in retrospect anything would have been better – including letting the boats reach Gaza,” he said.
The assault began at 4.30am as the convoy was heading to Gaza to deliver its cargo of aid. According to a spokeswoman for Israel Defence Forces (IDF), Avital Leibovich, officers aboard its warships gave the activists several warnings before commandos were winched from helicopters on to the deck of the Mavi Marmara.
“We found ourselves in the middle of a lynching,” she told reporters in the Israeli port of Ashdod. Around 10 activists attacked commandos, she said, relieving them of their pistols.
“We didn’t look for confrontation but it was a massive attack,” she said. “What happened was a last resort.”
It was impossible to contact protesters on the ships, but the Free Gaza Movement, one of the organisers of the flotilla, said the IDF had started the violence, firing as soon as they boarded the ship. Leibovich defended Israel’s action in international waters, saying it was permissible when a country’s security was threatened.
The Mavi Marmara was brought into port at Ashdod, 23 miles north of Gaza City, tonight following the earlier arrival of two other passenger ships. The area was closed to the media.
Activists were expected to be processed in a large white tent on the quayside, where they would be offered the choice of immediate deportation to their country of origin or going through the lengthy process of the Israeli courts system.
The Israeli authorities gave no details of the injuries to activists. It confirmed that nine were dead, although government sources suggested the figure could rise
The flotilla was trying to break the Israeli blockade of Gaza, which has been enforced for the past three years.
Israel advised its nationals in Turkey to leave the country for fear of reprisals. A luxury liner, Magic 1, was diverted from the Turkish coast to Cyprus.
Israeli police cancelled leave and the army was on high alert, saying it feared possible rocket attacks from Islamist militants in Gaza and southern Lebanon.
Deadly Israeli Raid on Aid Flotilla Draws Condemnation: NY Times
Several European nations and Turkey summoned Israeli envoys for an explanation of the actions. At the request of Turkey, The United Nations Security Council met in emergency session on Monday over the attack, which occurred in international waters north of Gaza and killed at least nine people.
Mr. Netanyahu canceled his plans to meet with President Obama in Washington on Tuesday, an Israeli government official confirmed. Mr. Netanyahu, who is visiting Canada, planned to return home Monday to deal with fallout from the raid, the official said.
The White House, which had been at odds with the Israeli prime minister over settlements in East Jerusalem, released a statement saying that President Obama had spoken with Mr. Netanyahu and understood his need to return immediately to Israel. In addition to regrets about the loss of life, “the president also expressed the importance of learning all the facts and circumstances around this morning’s tragic events as soon as possible,” the statement said.
The criticism offered a propaganda coup to Israel’s foes, particularly Hamas, the militant group that holds sway in Gaza, and damaged Israel’s ties to Turkey, one of its most important Muslim partners and the unofficial sponsor of the convoy. As thousands of protesters took to the streets of Istanbul, Turkey canceled joint military exercises with Israel and recalled its ambassador, while Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan called the raid “state terrorism.”
Mr. Netanyahu defended the Israeli military’s actions, saying the commandos were set upon by passengers on the ship and fired only in self-defense. The military released a video of the early moments of the raid to support that claim.
The Israeli Defense Forces said the naval personnel boarding the largest of the six ships in the aid convoy met with “live fire and light weaponry including knives and clubs.” The naval forces then “employed riot dispersal means, including live fire,” the military said in a statement.
Greta Berlin, a leader of the pro-Palestinian Free Gaza Movement, speaking by telephone from Cyprus, rejected the military’s version.
“That is a lie,” she said, adding that it was inconceivable that the civilian passengers on board would have been “waiting up to fire on the Israeli military, with all its might.”
“We never thought there would be any violence,” she said.
At least four Israeli soldiers were wounded in the operation, some from gunfire, according to the military. Television footage from the flotilla before communications were cut showed what appeared to be commandos sliding down ropes from helicopters onto one of the vessels in the flotilla, while Israeli high-speed naval vessels surrounded the convoy.
A military statement said two activists were later found with pistols they had taken from Israeli commandos. The activists, the military said, had apparently opened fire “as evident by the empty pistol magazines.”
The warships first intercepted the convoy of cargo and passenger boats shortly before midnight on Sunday, according to activists on one vessel. Israel had vowed not to let the flotilla reach the shores of Gaza.
Named the Freedom Flotilla and led by the Free Gaza Movement and a Turkish organization, Insani Yardim Vakfi, the convoy was the most ambitious attempt yet to break Israel’s three-year blockade of Gaza.
About 600 passengers were said to be aboard the vessels, including the 1976 Nobel Peace Prize laureate, Mairead Corrigan-Maguire of Northern Ireland.
“What we have seen this morning is a war crime,” said Saeb Erakat, the chief Palestinian negotiator for the government in the West Bank. “These were civilian ships carrying civilians and civilian goods — medicine, wheelchairs, food, construction materials.”
“What Israel does in Gaza is appalling,” he added. “No informed and decent human can say otherwise.”
At a news conference on Monday in Jerusalem, Israeli deputy foreign minister, Danny Ayalon, said the flotilla’s intent was “not to transfer humanitarian things to Gaza” but to break the Israeli blockade.
“This blockade is legal,” he said, “and aimed at preventing the infiltration of terror and terrorists into Gaza.”
Ms. Berlin, of the Free Gaza Movement, said, “They attacked us this morning in international waters. According to the coordinates, we were 70 miles off the Israeli coast.”
Within hours, diplomatic repercussions began to spread from the Mediterranean to Europe, where Catherine Ashton, the European Union’s high representative for foreign affairs, called for a full inquiry into the incident and the immediate lifting of the Israeli blockade.
A joint statement from Robert Serry and Filippo Grandi, two senior United Nations officials involved in the Middle East peace process and humanitarian aid to Gaza, condemned the raid, which they said was “apparently in international waters.”
“We wish to make clear that such tragedies are entirely avoidable if Israel heeds the repeated calls of the international community to end its counterproductive and unacceptable blockade of Gaza,” the officials said.
President Nicolas Sarkozy of France called Israel’s use of force “disproportionate,” while William Hague, the British foreign secretary, said he deplored the loss of life. Tony Blair, the representative of the so-called quartet of powers seeking a Middle East settlement, said in a statement that he expressed “deep regret and shock at the tragic loss of life.”
UN Security Council members urge Israel to lift Gaza siege: Haaretz
Security Council convenes for emergency meeting session over Gaza flotilla deaths; Palestinians and Arabs call for independent probe.
Members of the United Nations Security Council on Monday urged Israel to lift its economic blockade of the Gaza Strip, in an emergency session to discuss the deadly Israel Navy raid on a convoy of international activists sailing to the coastal territory.
Assistant Secretary-General Oscar Fernandez-Taranco said in his briefing to the UN’s most powerful body that Monday’s bloodshed would have been avoided if repeated calls on Israel to end the “counterproductive and unacceptable” blockade of Gaza had been heeded.
Palestinians and Arab nations used the forum of the emergency session called by Turkey to call for condemnation and an independent investigation into the incident which left at least nine international activists dead. Most members of the 15-nation body joined the call for an investigation.
Many council members echoed earlier statements by their their governments in denouncing or criticizing the Israeli action, and said it was time for Israel’s three-year-old
blockade of Hamas-controlled Gaza to be fully lifted.
Turkey’s Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu called the raid murder conducted by a state and demanded an immediate Israeli apology, an urgent inquiry, international legal action against the authorities and perpetrators responsible, and an end to the Gaza blockade.
Following a 90-minute open meeting, the council went into closed-door consultations. Diplomats said envoys were negotiating the text of a proposed statement by the council.
United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon called for a full investigation and expressed shock at Israel’s storming of the flotilla.
“It is vital that there is a full investigation to determine exactly how this bloodshed took place. I believe Israel must urgently provide a full explanation,” he said at a press conference in the Ugandan capital of Kampala.
The White House on Monday said it “deeply regretted” the loss of life and injuries sustained in the clashes after Israel Navy troops stormed a convoy of international activists bringing aid to the Gaza Strip, leaving nine of the passengers dead.
“The United States deeply regrets the loss of life and injuries sustained, and is currently working to understand the circumstances surrounding this tragedy,” said White House spokesman William Burton.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu canceled his imminent trip to Washington, where he had been invited to meet with President Barack Obama, in the wake of the incident.
France became the first European nation to respond to the early morning’s events. Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner said he was “profoundly shocked”.
Many of the activists aboard the protest ships were European nationals and analysts have predicted a harsh diplomatic response from the European Union and its member states.
Sweden summoned Israel’s ambassador to explain the circumstances of the incident. Two Swedish citizens were on board the seized ship.
The European Union demanded an inquiry into the incident, with member nations voicing their own individual calls on the matter over the course of the day.
Germany, one of Israel’s most loyal allies, expressed shock at the deadly interception and questioned whether the action by Israeli commandos was proportionate.
Two members of the Bundestag lower house of parliament were among five Germans on board the ships, the foreign ministry said.
“The German government is shocked by events in the international waters by Gaza,” government spokesman Ulrich Wilhelm told a regular news conference, adding the government was seeking further clarification about the incident.
“Every German government supports unconditionally Israel’s right to self defense,” said Wilhelm. But he added that Israeli actions should to correspond to what he described as the “basic principle” of proportionality.
“A first look does not speak in favor of this basic principle being adhered to,” he said. Berlin would await further details before judging the incident, he added.
Italy also condemned the killing of civilians during Israel’s storming of the aid flotilla as “very grave” and asked for an EU investigation to ascertain the facts.
“I deplore in the strongest terms the killing of civilians. This is certainly a grave act,” said Foreign Minister Franco Frattini.
Referring to the European Commission, he said it was “indispensable that there be an inquest to ascertain the facts, which are still not clear.”
He also said he had asked the Israeli ambassador for clarification and hoped that it would not hurt efforts on the part of Israel and Turkey to cooperate in the search for Middle East peace.
Britain said on Monday that it was in urgent contact with the Israeli government to establish the facts about the interception of the Gaza flotilla while it “deplored” the loss of life in the incident.
“We have consistently advised against attempting to access Gaza in this way because of the risks involved,” Foreign Secretary William Hague said in a statement.
“But, at the same time, there is a clear need for Israel to act with restraint and in line with international obligations,” he added.
Hague said Britain had asked Israel for more information and urgent access to any British nationals involved.
“It would be important to establish the facts about this incident and especially whether enough was done to prevent death and injuries,” said Hague.
Israeli publicity machine cranks into gear over raid on Mavi Marmara: The Guardian
Activists on board flotilla remain silent following Israeli commando assault on convoy
From Jonah’s Hill, a lookout point 50m above the Israeli port of Ashdod, the view out to sea on Monday was one of implausible nautical tranquillity.
A handful of bathers dipped into the waves breaking onto the wide sandy beach in the baking sunshine; cargo boats unloaded onto the dock beneath towering cranes.
But out there – somewhere, beyond view – was the Mavi Marmara, the scene in the early hours of today of unexpected carnage which ended in the death of at least nine, possibly more, pro-Palestinian activists.
Jonah’s Hill itself was heaving. Shirtless Israeli men draped in their national flag waved placards declaring “Well done IDF” in both Hebrew and English, chanting, singing and applauding their support for the military operation.
Thick cables snaked across the ground from thrumming generators, delivering power to dozens of international TV crews, broadcasting across the globe against the backdrop of the shimmering Mediterranean.
Amid the crowd, a sophisticated public relations operation was underway. Spinners and spokesmen from the Israeli military and government departments politely answered questions and offered their own narrative of the day’s events. A barrage of emails and text message alerts firing into inboxes provided a background of electronic muzak.
Shahar Arieli, deputy spokesman for the ministry of foreign affairs, wearing a smart tie despite the heat, said two of the flotilla’s boats had been brought into port.
All activists would be offered the chance of immediate deportation at Israel’s expense “with their passports”, he said. “We want them to leave as soon as possible,” he added.
Those who declined would – “as long as they weren’t involved in attacks on our troops” – be processed through Israel’s justice system.
His patient courtesy was not matched by all those gathered on the hill. Chaim Cohen, a 52-year-old economic consultant from Givatayim, was dripping with both sweat and bile. “We have come to support our soldiers. It is obvious it [the Mavi Marmara] is a terrorist ship. We saw it on TV – they took out knives and put them in the stomachs of the IDF.”
There was nothing to challenge the Israeli version of events. Repeated attempts to reach the cell and satellite phones of activists on board the flotilla were rebuffed; it was unclear whether their phones had been confiscated, jammed or if they were simply out of range.
By late afternoon on Monday, activists with lesser injuries were being brought to hospitals in coastal towns and cities from the smaller passenger ships. At the Barzilai medical centre in Ashkelon, just north of the Gaza Strip, a Greek man in a neck brace told reporters: “They hit me.” Who? “Pirates,” he answered.
A dazed man with a striking black eye was unloaded from an ambulance. There had been “some brutality” on board, he said, but the activists were non-violent. “We are all Palestinian now,” he said as the doors of the ER closed behind him.
Turkish PM calls Israeli raid on Gaza flotilla ’state terror’: IOA
By Agence France-Presse, Hurriyet Daily News – 31 May 2010
www.hurriyetdailynews.com/n.php?n=turkish-pm-calls-israeli-raid-on-gaza-flotilla-state-terror-2010-05-31
Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan on Monday accused Israel of committing “inhuman state terror” with its deadly raid on a fleet of aid ships bound for Gaza.
“It should be known that we will not stay silent and unresponsive in the face of this inhuman state terror,” Erdoğan said in live televised remarks ahead of his departure from Chile to Turkey, cutting short a Latin American tour.
“International law has been trampled underfoot,” he added.
Erdoğan also called for a meeting of NATO ambassadors, who will hold emergency talks Tuesday, spokesman James Appathurai said.
Başbuğ: Raid ‘grave,’ ‘unacceptable’
Turkish Chief of General Staff Gen. Ilker Başbuğ told his Israeli counterpart in a telephone conversation Monday that the deadly raid on the Gaza-bound aid fleet was “grave and unacceptable,” the Turkish military said in a statement.
Uri Avnery: A crime perpetrated by order of the government of Israel and the IDF Command: IOA
Gush Shalom press release, via email – 31 May 2010
Uri Avnery: this night a crime was perpetrated in the middle of the sea, by order of the government of Israel and the IDF Command
A war-like attack against aid ships and deadly shooting at peace and humanitarian aid activists. It is a crazy thing that only a government that crossed all red lines can do.
“Only a crazy government that has lost all restraint and all connection to reality could something like that – consider ships carrying humanitarian aid and peace activists from around the world as an enemy and send massive military force to international waters to attack them, shoot and kill.
“No one in the world will believe the lies and excuses which the government and army spokesmen come up with,” said former Knesset member Uri Avnery of the Gush Shalom movement. Gush Shalom activists together with activists of other organizations are to depart at 11:00 from Tel Aviv to protest in front of the prepared detention facility where the international peace activists
will be brought.
Greta Berlin, the spokeswoman for the flotilla organizers located in Cyprus, told Gush Shalom activists that the Israeli commandos landed by helicopter on the boats and immediately opened fire. This is a day of disgrace to the State of Israel, a day of anxiety in which we discover that our future was entrusted to a bunch of trigger-happy people without any responsibility. This day is a day of disgrace and madness and stupidity without limit, the day the Israeli government took care to blacken the name of the country in the world, adding convincing evidence of aggressiveness and brutality to Israel’s already bad international image, discouraging and distancing the few remaining friends. Indeed, today a provocation took place off the coast of Gaza – but the provocateurs were not the peace activists invited by the Palestinians and seeking to reach Gaza. The provocation was carried out by Navy ships commandos at the bidding of the Israeli government, blocking the way of the aid boats and using deadly force.
It is time to lift the siege on the Gaza Strip, which causes severe suffering to its residents. Today the Israeli government ripped the mask of its face with its own hands and exposed the fact that Israel did not “disengage” from Gaza. Real disengagement from the area does not go together with blocking the access to it or sending soldiers to shoot and kill and wound those who try to get there.
The State of Israel promised in the Oslo Accords 17 years ago to enable and encourage the establishment of a deep water port in Gaza, through which Palestinians could import and export freely to develop their economy. It’s time to realize this commitment and open the Port of Gaza. Only after the Gaza port will be open to free and undisturbed movement, just like the Ashdod and Haifa ports, will Israel really have disengaged from the Gaza Strip. Until then, the world will continue – and rightly so – to consider the Gaza Strip under Israeli occupation and the State of Israel as responsible for the fate of the people living there.
Nobel-winning Elders deplore Gaza flotilla attack: The Hindu
Posted by admin on May 31st, 2010 and filed under FEATURED NEWS STORIES, Gaza, IDF/War Crimes. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. Responses are currently closed, but you can trackback from your own site.
By DPA, The Hindu – 31 May 2010
The Elders group of past and present world leaders, including former South African president Nelson Mandela and Archbishop Desmond Tutu, on Monday condemned as “completely inexcusable” the deadly Israeli attack on a flotilla carrying aid for Gaza.
At least 10 people are reported to have been killed when Israeli commandos raided the boats on Monday in an operation that has drawn international condemnation.
“The Elders have condemned the reported killing by Israeli forces of more than a dozen people who were attempting to deliver relief supplies to the Gaza Strip by sea,” the 12—member group said in a statement issued in Johannesburg, where it met over the weekend.
The group, which was launched by Mr. Mandela on his birthday in 2007 to try to solve some of the world’s most intractable conflicts, called for a “full investigation” of the incident and urged the UN Security Council “to debate the situation with a view to mandating action to end the closure of the Gaza Strip.” “This tragic incident should draw the world’s attention to the terrible suffering of Gaza’s 1.5 million people, half of whom are children under the age of 18,” the group said.
Israel’s three—year blockade of Gaza was not only “one of the world’s greatest human rights violations” and “illegal” under international law, it was also “counterproductive” because it empowered extremists in the Palestinian territory, they said.
The Elders includes six Nobel peace prize winners — former UN secretary general Kofi Annan, former Finnish president Martti Ahtisaari, former US president Jimmy Carter, detained Burmese leader Aung San Suu Kyi and Mr. Mandela and Tutu.
Norway’s first female Prime Minister Gro Brundtland; former Brazilian president Fernando Henrique Cardoso; former Irish president and ex—UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Mary Robinson; Mozambican social activist Graca Machel; Indian women’s rights activist Ela Bhatt; and Algerian veteran UN envoy Lakhdar Brahimi are the other members.
Israel’s Attack on Us All: Counterpunch
By JONATHAN COOK
Nazareth.
It is quite astounding that Israel has been able to create over the past 12 hours a news blackout, just as it did with its attack on Gaza 18 months ago, into which our main media organisations have willingly allowed Israeli spokespeople to step in unchallenged.
How many civilians were killed in Israel’s dawn attack on the Gaza-bound flotilla of aid? We still don’t know. How many wounded? Your guess is as good as mine. Were the aid activists armed with guns? Yes, says Israel. Were they in cahoots with al-Qaeda and Hamas? Certainly, says Israel. Did the soldiers act reasonably? Of course, they faced a lynch, says Israel.
If we needed any evidence of the degree to which Western TV journalists are simply stenographers to power, the BBC, CNN and others are amply proving it. Mark Regev, Israel’s propagandist-in-chief, has the airwaves largely to himself.
The passengers on the ships, meanwhile, have been kidnapped by Israel and are unable to provide an alternative version of events. We can guess they will remain in enforced silence until Israel is sure it has set the news agenda.
So before we get swamped by Israeli hasbara let’s reiterate a few simple facts:
* Israeli soldiers invaded these ships in international waters, breaking international law, and, in killing civilians, committed a war crime. The counter-claim by Israeli commanders that their soldiers responded to an imminent “lynch” by civilians should be dismissed with the loud contempt it deserves.
* The Israeli government approved the boarding of these aid ships by an elite unit of commandoes. They were armed with automatic weapons to pacify the civilians onboard, but not with crowd dispersal equipment in case of resistance. Whatever the circumstances of the confrontation, Israel must be held responsible for sending in soldiers and recklessly endangering the lives of all the civilians onboard, including a baby and a Holocaust survivor.
* Israel has no right to control Gaza’s sea as its own territorial waters and to stop aid convoys arriving that way. In doing so, it proves that it is still in belligerent occupation of the enclave and its 1.5 million inhabitants. And if it is occupying Gaza, then under international law Israel is responsible for the welfare of the Strip’s inhabitants. Given that the blockade has put Palestinians there on a starvation diet for the past four years, Israel should long ago have been in the dock for committing a crime against humanity.
Today Israel chose to direct its deadly assault not only at Palestinians under occupation but at the international community itself.
Will our leaders finally be moved to act?
EDITOR: Scan the ‘evidence’!
Now that we have the IDF trape produced as ‘evidence’, a number of things are clear:
This tape was NOT shot at the same time that the real events happened, as the attack took place in total darkness, and the images in the first part are clearly staged after the event, and are NOT shot by night-vision cameras, but at dawn, some 60 to 90 minutes after the events took place. Usefully, the IDF tape has no time-stamp. Of course, they could easily fake the time-stamp, but it would have looked incongruous, as the fact that the time-stamp was not real would be clear. So much for the ‘evidence’. In the next few days, the real evidence will come out, as they will have to release some 700 civilians, and the real facts will be revealed. For the time being, those murderous pirates hold 700 people illegally, do not allow press and legal representatives to reach them, do not reveal the names of those murdered or injured – how long a list of illegalities do you want?
This time, they have overreached themselves. The final decline of the pirate Zionist state has started. Let us make sure this evil regime is the pariah it has become. Not that CNN, Fox and ABC are going to help us in exposing the brutalities, and neither is the BBC.
A day after fatal raid, information scant on Gaza flotilla: CNN
By the CNN Wire Staff
June 1, 2010 — Updated 0701 GMT (1501 HKT)
Death toll in pre-dawn raid still unconfirmed
Protests planned in several cities
(CNN) — A day after Israeli forces stormed a flotilla carrying humanitarian supplies in a fatal raid, independent information on what transpired remained scant Tuesday.
The death toll of nine killed came from the Israelis, who did not release the names of those who died.
The Free Gaza Movement, one of the groups that organized the convoy of ships, said the fatalities numbered higher, but did not offer an exact number.
The surviving passengers themselves were being held incommunicado by Israeli authorities.
Video: Israel criticized for attack on flotilla Video: Israel says attack was justified Video: Expert analysis on the flotilla raid Video: Online reaction to Israeli raid
Early Tuesday morning, the U.N. Security Council issued a statement condemning the raid on international waters and regretting the loss of lives.
The 15 member-nations of the council requested the immediate release of the seized ships that made up the flotilla, as well as the civilians who were taken into custody following the raid.
And it called for a “prompt, impartial, credible and transparent” investigation into the incident.
Q&A on Israel’s Gaza blockade
The council began its emergency session Monday afternoon at the U.N. Headquarters in New York to discuss how to respond to the fatal raid. It continued into early Tuesday.
Riyad Mansour, Palestinian ambassador to the United Nations, acknowledged the statement was watered down, but that it was a unanimous stance by the council and put Israel on notice that the world was critical of its actions.
“The Security Council, usually when you adopt something, it is a compromise,” Mansour said. “And I believe what was adopted can be interpreted and read perhaps more than one way.”
Meanwhile, a team from the Turkish Red Crescent was expected to fly to Tel Aviv, Israel, on Tuesday to help coordinate the return of the dead and wounded, the organization said in a statement.
Also Tuesday, protesters in several major cities planned to take to the streets in anger. Two such rallies were scheduled in New York and Chicago, Illinois.
In Washington, U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has a pre-scheduled meeting with Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu.
Video: Flotilla attack protested in London Video: Reaction to Israel’s deadly raid Video: Netanyahu responds to flotilla raid Video: Turkish protests denounce IDF raid
Davotoglu has called the raid “murder conducted by a state.” But the Obama administration response has been more tempered.
President Barack Obama expressed “deep regret” at the deaths and “also expressed the importance of learning all the facts and circumstances around this morning’s tragic events as soon as possible,” the White House said Monday.
That did not impress Turkey’s ambassador to the United States, Namik Tan, who called the U.S. response “sort of weak.”
“Israel should not get away with this,” Tan said.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu cancelled a scheduled meeting with Obama this week to return to Israel to manage the crisis.
The Freedom Flotilla was organized by the Free Gaza Movement, a Cyprus-based human rights group, and the pro-Palestinian Turkish organization, Insani Yardim Vakfi (IHH).
The flotilla of six ships — three passenger and three cargo vessels — left Cyprus on Sunday, carrying more than 10,000 tons of aid and 600 passengers from more than 20 countries, the Movement said. The activists said they wanted to raise awareness of “the illegal siege of Gaza” by Israel.
Israel instituted a blockade on Gaza in January 2006, when Hamas won democratic elections in the Palestinian territories. It tightened that blockade in June 2007, when Hamas took over Gaza, but allows about 15,000 tons of humanitarian aid into the territories each week, Israeli government spokesman Mark Regev said.
Since then, Israel has controlled entry of all manner of goods into Gaza, including instant coffee, chocolate and construction materials. Israel has said the latter could be used by Hamas to build bunkers.
The country says the Gaza shoreline is closed to maritime traffic to stop the smuggling of arms into the territory.
The Turkish prime minister said Monday that the vessels in the flotilla were inspected before they left port in Turkey to make sure the cargo did not include weapons.
The Israeli government described the flotilla as a “provocation,” and had said it would allow the aid on the flotilla through its normal channels: unload it at Ashdod port and transfer it to Gaza.
“The organizers’ intent was violent, their method was violent and the results were unfortunately violent,” said Danny Ayalon, the Israeli Deputy Foreign Minister.
Since the summer of 2008, five flotillas have gotten through the blockade to deliver humanitarian goods to Gaza. Monday’s flotilla was expected to be the largest such mission.
But in a pre-dawn raid Monday, Israeli soldiers rappelled onto the deck of the ships from a helicopter. The boarding of the ships took place in international waters more than 70 nautical miles (130 km) outside Israeli territorial waters, according to IHH.
While the activists in five of the ships peacefully surrendered, the Israel government said soldiers faced violent resistance as they boarded the largest ship, the Mavi Marmara. The soldiers opened fire in self-defense, Israel said. Seven soldiers were wounded, it said.
The Free Gaza Movement denies there was violent resistance to Israeli soldiers, saying the soldiers immediately opened fire on unarmed civilians.
The Israeli military released a video shot from above the ship that it said showed soldiers being attacked, though the distance from which it was shot precluded immediate confirmation.
Most of the passengers in the ships were Turkish, as were most of the fatalities.
As many as nine Americans may have been aboard the boats at the time of the attack — including Edward Peck, a former U.S. ambassador to Mauritania, according to Jonathan Slevin, a spokesman for the activist group Free Palestine Movement.
The attack sparked protests in several countries; caused a diplomatic row between Israel and Turkey, its closest Muslim ally; and brought condemnation worldwide.
A number of nations recalled their ambassadors from Israel, while others called for a full investigation.
Pro-Palestinian demonstrations took place in New York City; Paris, France; and Baghdad, Iraq.
Of the hundreds of activists who were detained aboard the ships after they were escorted to the Israeli port of Ashdod, 15 were sent to Beer Sheva Prison, according to a spokesman for the Israeli prison authority. Another 25 were slated for deportation and 50 others who refused to identify themselves were being held separately.
None was allowed to speak to the news media.
Outlaws of the Mediterranean: MERIP Editorial
From the Editors
June 1, 2010
At 4 am Eastern Mediterranean time on May 31, elite Israeli commandos rappelled from helicopters onto the deck of the Turkish-registered ship Mavi Marmara, part of an international “Freedom Flotilla” that had met in Cyprus and then set sail to deliver humanitarian relief supplies to the besieged Gaza Strip. The Mavi Marmara, the largest of the relief vessels, was carrying some 600 activists, mainly Turks but also others of diverse nationalities. The commandos fired live ammunition at some of the passengers, who Israel claims were lightly armed with metal rods or knives, and may have resisted the raid. Some reports say that other ships were also boarded and/or fired upon. The lowest reported death toll among the activists is nine, and the lowest number of wounded is 34.
The details are unclear, because Israel took custody of the entire flotilla and everyone on board, dragging the ships to the port of Ashdod, where the wounded are being treated and everyone else “processed” at a detention center prepared for the purpose. Communications with all the aid vessels were cut shortly after the raid, and journalists have strictly limited access to the Ashdod facility, which is located in the section of the port belonging to the Israeli navy. The news blackout has been near total, but official Israeli sources have made it known that those of the activists who are unhurt will be deported, except a handful who refused to sign deportation orders and will be jailed. Seven hundred activists in total were aboard the flotilla.
Reaction to the raid, from Turkey to the European Union to the UN, has been swift and (almost) universally condemnatory. Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan called it an act of “state terrorism.” Turkey currently sits on the UN Security Council, which convened an emergency meeting. That meeting went into closed session as night fell on May 31. Meanwhile, Lebanese Prime Minister Saad al-Hariri dubbed the raid a “crazy move.” EU countries have summoned Israeli ambassadors to demand an explanation. “No one in the world will believe the lies and excuses which the government and army spokesmen come up with,” said Uri Avnery, a former member of the Israeli Knesset and leader of the Gush Shalom peace group in Israel. Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu canceled a visit to Washington scheduled for June 1 — perhaps in tacit agreement with Avnery, though it seems at least possible that President Barack Obama did not wish to be seen “standing with Israel” on this occasion. Publicly, in any case, the White House remains the odd man out, saying only that it “regrets the loss of life” and is “working to understand the circumstances of the tragedy.”
Much is unknown for certain about the commando operation, but it is nonetheless a moment of clarity in the ongoing drama surrounding Israel’s 43-year occupation of Palestinian lands and its ten-year siege of Gaza, which has been tightened to a stranglehold since the Islamist party Hamas won the 2006 Palestinian legislative elections. Once again, Israel has made the asymmetry of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict crystal clear. With this raid upon a peaceful ship on the high seas, Israel has made clear its disdain for international law — and its contempt for the notion that it will be held accountable for its violations. Israel will persist in this behavior until someone, and that someone is the United States, ends its impunity.
Who?
The “Freedom Flotilla” was a convoy of six ships, three bearing passengers and three cargo, organized by the Free Gaza Movement, a coalition of Palestine solidarity activists from Europe, North America, the Middle East and elsewhere. Two additional boats are being held in reserve in Cyprus. The Free Gaza Movement grew out of the first effort to bring aid by sea, in August 2008, when what organizer Huwaida Arraf called “two humble boats” arrived in the coastal strip with a shipment of hearing aids for Gazans deafened by the sonic booms of Israeli warplanes. Subsequent convoys have delivered other goods, despite attempts by the Israeli navy to deter them. In the summer of 2009, Israel interdicted an aid vessel and diverted it to Ashdod.
The activists are motivated by the desire to “break the siege of Gaza” and “raise international awareness” of Gazans’ plight, according the movement’s website. In one of eight “points of unity” on the site, the group members pledge: “We agree to adhere to the principles of non-violence and non-violent resistance in word and deed at all times.” These tactics, expressing activists’ frustration with the official international community’s inaction on Palestine and aiming to embarrass Israel in the global media, are in line with the peaceful campaigns of Palestinians and Israelis to stop construction of Israel’s wall in the West Bank. They also resemble the goals of the International Solidarity Movement, a group founded by Arraf and her husband Adam Shapiro that housed internationals with Palestinians in the West Bank (and, previously, Gaza) as witnesses to everyday excesses of occupation.
Arraf, a Palestinian-American, was aboard a smaller ship of the “Freedom Flotilla,” along with as many as 12 other US citizens, possibly including an ex-ambassador and also Code Pink activist Ann Wright, a retired Army colonel. Three German members of Parliament embarked on the boats, as well as nationals of Britain, Ireland, Greece, Canada, Belgium, Sweden, Australia and Israel, perhaps among other countries. The precise passenger lists of the seized boats are unknown, due to logistical confusion in port in Cyprus. According to Shapiro, Holocaust survivor Hedy Epstein, who was scheduled to travel to Gaza, remained in Cyprus, as did the Irish Nobel laureate Mairead Corrigan. Among the passengers who did depart is Hanan Zu‘bi, a Palestinian citizen of Israel and member of Knesset. Thus far, the blackout has covered up her whereabouts as well.
On board the Mavi Marmara were hundreds of Turks affiliated with the Foundation for Human Rights and Freedoms and Humanitarian Relief (known by its Turkish acronym, IHH), an Islamist organization whose relationship with Turkey’s “soft Islamist” ruling party, the AKP, is fraught. Close to the AKP’s more overtly Islamist precursor parties, which were banned by the Turkish courts, the IHH views the AKP as defectors who are insufficiently vocal in their engagement with “Islamic” issues, notably Palestine. The government did nothing to stop the IHH from departing for Cyprus, despite warnings from its nominal ally Israel, for fear that its own “Islamic” credentials might be further questioned. Early reports say that six Turks are among the dead, meaning that this incident will reverberate loudly in Turkish politics.
What?
Spin doctors in Israel have been working fast and furious to mold the metanarrative of what happened aboard the Mavi Marmara. The American mainstream media has mostly concentrated on Israeli allegations that some of the activists were carrying weapons and thus posed a threat to the lives of the highly trained Israel Defense Forces (IDF) commandos. Israeli Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman told European diplomats that the ship’s passengers were “terrorist supporters who fired at IDF soldiers as soon as the latter boarded the ships.” An IDF-distributed video, shot from a helicopter, shows what appears to be a melee on deck and says the activists tried to “kidnap” a soldier. The goal is to spread the story that the commandos acted in self-defense. To this tale, Adam Shapiro replies, “Our understanding is that Israeli soldiers fired first.” In Ashdod, the Associated Press briefly glimpsed one American passenger, who blurted out, “I’m not violent. What I can tell you is that there are bruises all over my body. They won’t let me show them to you,” before being hustled away.
Again, minus the carefully impounded testimony of the activists themselves, it is difficult to know what exactly precipitated the shooting. It is certainly clear that the raid itself was no panicking naval captain’s improvisation, but was approved by the Israeli security cabinet under the imprimatur of Defense Minister Ehud Barak. According to the IDF’s official statement, “This IDF naval operation was carried out under orders from the political leadership to halt the flotilla from reaching the Gaza Strip and breaching the naval blockade.”
The dispute over who started the on-board combat misses the point, however. From a legal point of view, the Israeli operation was completely out of bounds and Israel is the aggressor. The raid occurred in international waters, meaning that Israel violated the convoy’s right of free navigation. Richard Falk, an international legal scholar and the UN Special Rapporteur for the Occupied Palestinian Territories, says that the raid is “clearly a criminal act, being on the high seas.” Falk explains that storming a peaceful boat is akin to a home invasion, with the aggravating circumstance that the invaded space in this case was packed with goods intended to alleviate human suffering. “The people on these boats would have some right of self-defense,” Falk continues, as they were the ones who were under unprovoked attack. Israel’s claim of self-defense is preposterous, no matter who threw the first punch, because Israel’s self is not located at sea.