Breaking News! Israel murders more than 10 Peace
Activists on the Freedom Flotilla!
EDITOR: Pirates of the Mediterranean hit again!
Now, more than 36 hours after the massacre, we still do not know anything about:
How many have been murdered, injured and what are their names?
What is going on in the detention centre where over 620 people, kidnapped on the boats, are being held illegally?
When will people be released?
and most importantly, when will the illegal and immoral Blockade on Gaza be terminated?
Israel, a pariah terrorist state of pirates and murderers, has again killed and maimed innocent people, kidnapped and arrested them, denied their human rights, and all this with perfect immunity. Do not be confused by the noises of the leaders of the western nations, please! None of this means anything. Israel has NEVER paid for any of its crimes, because our leaders have supported it, and will continue to do so. The only route to change in the Middle East is total Boycott, Divestment and Sanction, like we have pushed for successfully in the case of South Africa! There is no more time for Mr. Nice Guy O’Bummer – good oratory is leading us nowhere, and we should say so. Trust not in the politicians – what we need is a mass civic campaign, and we can do this, and will.
Do not forget! Do not Forgive! Do not overlook War Crimes! Do not avoid the voices of Palestine and Gaza calling out, calling for an end of the decades oif nightmare called Zionism. Let the ‘friends of Israel’ defend this murder – we will fight against this vile entity until it is gone, like apartheid South Africa!
La Luta Continua!
Gideon Levy: Operation Mini Cast Lead: Haaretz
By Gideon Levy, Haaretz – 1 June 2010
Like in “Mini-Israel,” the park where there is everything, but smaller, Israel embarked yesterday on a mini Operation Cast Lead. Like its larger, losing predecessor, this operation had it all: the usual false claim that is was they who had started it – and not the landing of commandos from helicopters on a ship in open sea, away from Israeli territorial waters. There was the claim that the first act of violence came not from the soldiers, but the rioting activists on Mavi Marmara; that the blockade on Gaza is legal and that the flotilla to its shores is against the law – God knows which law.
Again came the claim of self defense, that “they lynched us” and that all the dead are on their side. Once more the use of violence and excessive and lethal force was in play and once more civilians wound up dead.
This action also featured the pathetic focus on “public relations,” as if there is something to explain, and again the sick question was asked: Why didn’t the soldiers use more force.
Again Israel will pay a heavy diplomatic price, once which had not been considered ahead of time. Again, the Israeli propaganda machine has managed to convince only brainwashed Israelis, and once more no one asked the question: What was it for? Why were our soldiers thrown into this trap of pipes and ball bearings? What did we get out of it?
If Cast Lead was a turning point in the attitude of the world toward us, this operation is the second horror film of the apparently ongoing series. Israel proved yesterday that it learned nothing from the first movie.
Yesterday’s fiasco could and should have been prevented. This flotilla should have been allowed to pass and the blockade should be brought to an end.
This should have happened a long time ago. In four years Hamas has not weakened and Gilad Shalit was not released. There was not even a sign of a gain.
And what have we instead? A country that is quickly becoming completely isolated. This is a place that turns away intellectuals, shoots peace activists, cuts off Gaza and now finds itself in an international blockade. Once more yesterday it seemed, and not for the first time, that Israel is increasingly breaking away from the mother ship, and losing touch with the world – which does not accept its actions and does not understand its motives.
Yesterday there was no one on the planet, not a newsman or analyst, except for its conscripted chorus, who could say a good word about the lethal takeover.
The Israel Defense Forces too came out looking bad again. The magic evaporated long ago, the most moral army in the world, that was once the best army in the world, failed again. More and more there is the impression that nearly everything it touches causes harm to Israel.
EDITOR: “Friends of Israel’?
Friends of Israel? Friends of murderers, pirates and fascists? Friends of those who incarcerate and starve almost two million people in Gaza, for over four years, just because they exercised their vote which displeased Israel? Friends of the apartheid wall, of the racist Jewish state? Friends of vile vice, of brutality and bloodthirsty regime? What are they friends of? Not of us, the rest of humanity!
Israel’s ‘friends’ also to blame: Al Jazeera
By Mark LeVine
Americans protest against the attack on the Gaza aid flotilla [AFP]
Perhaps now Americans will understand the true nature of the Israeli occupation.
It has never been about security. Not for one day. It has been about land and power. And this is where it has led. And we have made it possible.
Since at least the mid-1970s, only one country has had the power to force Israel to give up its dreams of permanent occupation of the West Bank: The US.
After the success against Soviet-backed Arab forces in 1967, Israel suddenly became a “strategic asset” – a useful proxy in the global great game against Communism.
For three decades the US and its political class have feigned concern, affection and even love for Israel; the reality is that Israel has always been a tool to advance US strategic goals and power, and nothing more.
All the while, thoughtful Israelis – not to mention Palestinians and the rest of the world – have begged the US to intervene, to stop the insanity before it created an abscess that threatened not just the Jewish state, but the whole region, and even global peace.
But the US goal was never to “protect” or “support” Israel.
Facilitators
The US’ goal was never to protect or support it’s ‘friend’ Israel [AFP]
We have pretended to be its friend, but we are the friend in the way your drug dealer is your friend, sitting with you late at night listening to your problems while hooking you up with your next fix – only in strange twist, the American people rather than the Israelis are paying for the habit their government and corporate elites grow richer sustaining.
We are the ultimate facilitators of this insane and immoral arrangement, which is part of our larger addiction to war that now reaches $1 trillion per year.
We cannot see Israel and the occupation for what they are, because to do so would be to look into the most uncomfortable mirror imaginable.
We are like the local arms dealer – Nicholas Cage’s character in the chilling film Lord of War, only real, and 300,000,000 strong.
We tell Israel everything is okay when it is disastrously wrong. We reinforce every bad habit while declaring its behaviour largely above reproach.
We “defend” Israel from every criticism – “No! It doesn’t have a problem!” “It’s the only democracy in the region!” “We stand with Israel!” – really, we stand beside Israel, give it some more “brown-brown” (cocaine mixed with gun powder) to snort, hand it some new weapons and send it out to kill and oppress some more, in our name.
Some friend.
Politicide
The occupation has been an act of sheer brutality for decades. What has happened in Gaza – what the US and the world community have allowed to happen, for we could always stop it with a simple phone call from the US president to the Israeli prime minister – is sheer madness.
It is politicide. It is slow starvation, of the soul and mind as much as the body. Not the kind that produces pictures of distended bellies, blank eyes and ragged clothes, but that slowly eats away at the personality, the will to fight, the ability to overcome, that produces medical problems that will haunt a million people for life.
And because the US and other so-called “great powers” would do nothing and Palestinians have little power left to effectively resist, people around the world, average people, from Palestinians to Holocaust survivors, have felt compelled to act.
They have sent ships now numerous times to break the siege of Gaza. Israel could not allow the siege to be broken because if the world saw what Gaza has become, not merely a prison but something far worse and hard to speak of, even its vaunted “hasbara” or propaganda machine, would not be able to spin it.
And the worse it gets, the more Israel’s backers, like the US, cannot afford the world to see it because we have made it happen.
Moral turpitude
Israel’s backers cannot allow the world see the result of the siege they have let happen [AFP]
And now at least 10 people are dead because of the shame, because of the inability of Israel’s best friends to look it in the eye and say: “Stop this insanity. Treat Palestinians like humans before you destroy not only them, but you.”
We cannot say that because we are guilty as well, and the US has proved singularly unable to come to grips with our own culpability in occupations from Iraq and Afghanistan to Gaza and, of course, our own original sin, which demanded millions of dead native Americans to ensure the creation of the very country that now supplies Israel with its weapons and tells it everything is going to be okay.
Some day you can let the Palestinians have casinos and they will thank you.
It is tragically fitting that this disaster should happen on Memorial Day in the US.
The martyrs of the ships are heroes, they are warriors every bit as deserving of our tears and support as the soldiers of American wars past and present.
They are, in fact, the soldiers of the future – the only ones who can help us get out of the disastrous slide to moral turpitude that we, as much as Israel, have descended as a country.
Let us hope that the deaths of the Gaza flotilla activists will not be as in vain as those of the 5,000 American soldiers who have died in our own illegal and useless wars in the last decade.
Mark LeVine is a professor of history at UC Irvine and senior visiting researcher at the Center for Middle Eastern Studies at Lund University in Sweden. His most recent books are Heavy Metal Islam (Random House) and Impossible Peace: Israel/Palestine Since 1989 (Zed Books).
“Israel is Giving Piracy a Bad Name!”
Pirates of the Caribbean
Naomi Klein speaks at Gaza Freedom Flotilla protest in Toronto, Canada
rabbletv — May 31, 2010 — On May 31, 2010, Torontonians took to the streets to protest the Israeli attack on the Gaza Freedom Flotilla carrying aid supplies to Gaza overnight.
The rally and march ended in Dundas Square, where Naomi Klein delivered an impassioned speech about the attack which has left an estimated 20 people dead and many more injured, and about the need for Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions against Israel.
Filmed by Bob Chandler, edited by Michelle Langlois for rabbletv.
“Israel is the only Piratical Jewish Democracy in the Middle East”
President and Chief War Criminal, Shimon (Smiley) Peres
Israël, l’impunité jusqu’à quand ?: Le Mond Diplomatique
L’assaut donné le 31 mai à l’aube par l’armée israélienne contre la flottille de bateaux transportant une aide humanitaire à Gaza aurait fait une vingtaine de morts. Cette attaque s’est déroulée dans les eaux internationales. Elle a suscité de nombreuses condamnations, y compris de pays européens et du gouvernement français. Bernard Kouchner a déclaré que « rien ne saurait justifier l’emploi d’une telle violence, que nous condamnons ». Plusieurs pays, dont la Suède, l’Espagne, la Turquie et la France ont convoqué l’ambassadeur israélien. La Grèce a suspendu des manœuvres aériennes avec Israël et annulé une visite du chef de l’armée de l’air israélienne.
Bien sûr, ces condamnations sont les bienvenues. Même s’il reste quelques personnes qui osent trouver des justifications à l’action israélienne. Ainsi, le porte-parole de l’UMP, l’ineffable Frédéric Lefebvre, a fait savoir, selon l’AFP, que son parti « regrette » les morts, mais dénonce les « provocations » de « ceux qui se disent les amis des Palestiniens ».
La veille de cette action militaire, faisant preuve d’une prescience qui fait partie de ses innombrables qualités, Bernard-Henri Lévy déclarait à Tel-Aviv : « Je n’ai jamais vu une armée aussi démocratique, qui se pose tellement de questions morales. » (Haaretz.com, 31 mai). Il est vrai que, lors de la guerre de Gaza, notre philosophe s’était pavané sur un char israélien pour entrer dans le territoire. Réagissant à l’attaque aujourd’hui, Lévy l’a qualifiée, selon l’AFP, de « stupide » car risquant de ternir l’image d’Israël. Pas un mot de condamnation, pas un mot de regret pour les tués…
La seule question qui se pose maintenant est de savoir quel prix le gouvernement israélien devra payer pour ce crime. Car, depuis des années, les Nations unies ont adopté des dizaines de résolutions (« Résolutions de l’ONU non respectées par Israël », Le Monde diplomatique, février 2009), l’Union européenne a voté d’innombrables textes qui demandent à Israël de se conformer au droit international, ou tout simplement au droit humanitaire, en levant, par exemple, le blocus de Gaza. Ces textes ne sont jamais suivis du moindre effet. Au contraire, l’Union européenne et les Etats-Unis récompensent Israël.
C’est ce qu’a prouvé l’admission d’Israël dans l’Organisation pour la coopération et le développement économiques (OCDE), la semaine dernière, et la visite en France du premier ministre israélien Nétanyahou pour assister à l’intronisation de son pays. Comme le précisait un communiqué de l’Association France-Palestine Solidarité (AFPS) du 30 avril, « Israël à l’OCDE ? Un mauvais coup contre la paix ! », cette adhésion valait acceptation de l’inclusion de la Cisjordanie et du Golan dans le « périmètre » israélien. Le fait qu’Israël se permette quelques jours plus tard d’attaquer la flottille de la paix confirme que cet Etat voit dans ces bonnes manières un feu vert pour toutes ses actions.
Cela avait déjà été le cas en décembre 2008. C’était alors l’Union européenne qui avait décidé le « rehaussement » des relations bilatérales avec Israël, donnant à cet Etat des privilèges dont ne disposaient jusque-là que quelques grandes puissances. Les chars israéliens pouvaient quelques jours plus tard partir à l’assaut du territoire de Gaza et commettre, en toute impunité, des « crimes de guerre », voire des « crimes contre l’humanité ».
Richard Falk, envoyé spécial des Nations unies pour les territoires occupés, écrivait, dans Le Monde diplomatique (mars 2009) un texte intitulé : « Nécessaire inculpation des responsables de l’agression contre Gaza ». Quelques mois plus tard, la commission des Nations unies présidée par le juge sud-africain Richard Goldstone remettait ses conclusions. Elles étaient accablantes pour Israël, même si elles n’épargnaient pas le Hamas. Le texte confirmait que c’était bien l’armée israélienne qui avait rompu le cessez-le-feu et mettait en lumière les crimes commis. Ce texte confirmait de nombreux rapports déjà publiés par Amnesty International et Human Rights Watch.
Ces textes n’ont débouché sur aucune sanction contre le gouvernement israélien. Un des arguments avancés pour justifier cette passivité est que les faits incriminés seraient l’objet d’enquêtes sérieuses en Israël, ce que dément de manière argumentée la juriste Sharon Weill, dans Le Monde diplomatique (septembre 2009) : « De Gaza à Madrid, l’assassinat ciblé de Salah Shehadeh ».
On assiste d’ailleurs en Israël à une offensive sans précédent contre les organisations de défense des droits humains, qu’elles soient internationales ou israéliennes, considérées désormais comme une menace stratégique pour l’Etat, juste après la menace de l’Iran, du Hamas et du Hezbollah. Une véritable entreprise de délégitimation se déploie contre ces organisations à travers des groupes soutenus par le gouvernement et l’extrême droite comme NGO Monitor, menée parallèlement à une guerre de propagande pour justifier l’injustifiable (lire Dominique Vidal, « Plus le mensonge est gros… », Le Monde diplomatique, février 2009). Est-il vraiment étonnant que des soldats israéliens considèrent les militants venus apporter du ravitaillement à Gaza comme des « terroristes » et les traitent comme tels ?
L’impunité durera-t-elle ou certains gouvernements oseront-ils prendre des mesures concrètes pour sanctionner Israël, pour faire comprendre à son gouvernement (et aussi à son peuple) que cette politique a un prix, que la répression a un prix, que l’occupation a un prix ?
Dans le cadre de l’Union européenne, Paris pourrait suggérer à ses partenaires de suspendre l’accord d’association en vertu de l’article 2, qui affirme explicitement qu’Israël doit protéger les droits humains (lire Isabelle Avran, « Atermoiements de l’Union européenne face à Israël », La valise diplomatique, 25 juin 2009).
La France pourrait déjà, seule, sans attendre l’accord de ses partenaires européens, prendre trois mesures :
d’abord, et ce serait seulement se conformer au droit et aux décisions de l’Union européenne, lancer une campagne pour tracer l’origine des produits israéliens exportés en France et interdire (pas seulement taxer) les produits des colonies ;
ensuite, affirmer que l’installation de colons dans les territoires occupés n’est pas acceptable et que ceux-ci devraient donc être soumis à une demande de visa s’ils désirent se rendre en France – une mesure facile à mettre en œuvre à partir des adresses des individus désirant visiter notre pays ;
enfin, proclamer que des citoyens français qui effectuent leur service militaire en Israël ne sont pas autorisés à servir dans les territoires occupés. Leur participation aux actions d’une armée d’occupation pourrait entraîner des poursuites judiciaires.
Bernard Kouchner a annoncé qu’il n’y avait pas de citoyens français parmi les personnes tuées sur les bateaux. Mais sait-il s’il y a des citoyens français parmi ceux qui sont responsables de ce crime ?
This motion was just passed with one or two votes against, by the UCU Congress!
Congress is appalled at the Israeli act of piracy in international waters on 31 May. It condemns the armed attack on the Gaza convoy and the murders of people seeking to bring aid to the people of Gaza suffering from the Israeli and Egyptian blockade.
Congress believes this constitutes a prima facia crime against humanity.
Congress believes that the senior Israeli government members and senior military and naval officers responsible for commissioning this action should be tried for this crime.
Congress demands that the UK government does not change the rules on universal jurisdiction to impede bringing the people responsible for these murders to justice.
Netanyahu: World criticism won’t stop Israel’s blockade of Gaza: Haaretz
Ministers likely to call for probe into Gaza flotilla raid; PM tells cabinet that naval blockade needed to ensure weapons not be smuggled into Hamas-ruled territory.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told his political-security cabinet on Tuesday that international condemnation would not stop Israel’s naval blockade of the Gaza Strip.
The Israel Navy’s deadly raid of a Gaza-bound flotilla carrying humanitarian aid awakened a storm of criticism among Israel’s friends and foes alike, leading many members of the United Nations Security Council to call on Israel to lift its years-long siege of the Hamas-ruled coastal territory.
But Netanyahu told ministers at a special meeting convened in the wake of the raid that the blockade was still necessary to prevent weapons from being smuggled into the Gaza Strip.
“We know from the experience of Operation Cast Lead that the weapons entering Gaza are being turned against our civilians,” Netanyahu said, referring to Israel’s three-week offensive on the Gaza Strip that ended in January 2009.
“Gaza is a terror state funded by the Iranians, and therefore we must try to prevent any weapons from being brought into Gaza by air, sea and land,” he said.
Netanyahu acknowledged that militants were still capable of smuggling weapons in via tunnels from Egypt, but emphasized that the large amounts of weapons that could be brought by sea made the threat a completely different affair.
“On the Francop ship alone we confiscated some 200 tons of weapons being smuggled to Hezbollah,” the prime minister said, in reference to the Antiguan-flagged ship Israel intercepted off the coast of Cyprus in November 2009.
“Opening a naval route to Gaza will present an enormous dangerous to the security of our citizens,” said Netanyahu. “Therefore, we will stand firm on our policy of a naval blockade and of inspecting incoming ships.”
“It’s true that there is international pressure and criticism of this policy, but [the world] must understand that it is crucial to preserving Israel’s security and the right of the State of Israel’s to defend itself.”
Netanyahu added that Israel regretted that nine lives were lost in the operation on Monday, but defended the Israel Defense Forces soldiers as having been justified in the actions of their mission.
“This was not a peace flotilla, but a violent force,” he said.
The special cabinet meeting on Tuesday was expected to result in a demand to establish a panel of inquiry to investigate how and why the decision was made to carry out the commando raid on the flotilla.
Senior ministers have been sharply critical of the fact that the decision to seize control of the flotilla to Gaza was made after two meetings of the forum of seven senior ministers but without official deliberation by the inner cabinet, the body that has the authority to approve military actions of this scale.
Netanyahu returned to Israel on Tuesday morning from the United States, after canceling his scheduled meeting with President Barack Obama in Washington. He convened the inner cabinet for 4 P.M. to discuss the implications of Monday’s military operation.
Senior ministers have noted that, in contrast to the handling of similar incidents in the past, the inner cabinet did not discuss issues related to the flotilla, receive operational briefings or approve the operation. The forum of seven, which did consider and approve the plan, is a consultative body only and does not have the legal authority to pass resolutions.
The forum – Netanyahu, Defense Minister Ehud Barak, Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman, Intelligence and Atomic Affairs Minister Dan Meridor, Strategic Affairs Minister Moshe Ya’alon, Interior Minister Eli Yishai and Minster without Portfolio Benny Begin – held just two meetings on the flotilla, the latest on Wednesday. They approved the operation and the continuation of the Israeli policy of barring ships from docking in Gaza.
Much of the session was devoted not to the military operation but rather to media and public relations issues surrounding the issue. “The ministers who attended the meeting didn’t get the impression from the defense establishment that a violent confrontation of this scope was likely,” one senior Jerusalem official said. “The sense during the discussion was that the navy would come and the organizers would take fright, do an about-face and flee,” he said.
According to senior officials who attended the session, a few ministers expressed differing views but in the end a consensus was reached and there was not even a vote. One of the most vocal participants in Wednesday’s session was Cabinet Secretary Zvi Hauser.
He was against the raid and said the ships should be allowed to dock in Gaza in order to avoid a diplomatic and public relations crisis as well as the embarrassment to Israel that a violent confrontation with demonstrators on the ships could cause. After senior defense officials expressed their opposition to Hauser’s views, his position was rejected.
Fate of Gaza flotilla passengers still unclear; security clampdown in Israel, OPT: JNews
Tuesday, 1 June, 2010 – 13:05
Source: PHR-Israel, PCATI, Adalah, Israeli press, other
More than 24 hours after a bloody seaborne attack on a flotilla bearing aid for Gaza, Israeli authorities have yet to release information regarding the numbers, status and condition of the flotilla’s passengers.
As of Tuesday morning, Israeli authorities continue to deny access and information on casualties and detainees to the consular representatives of many passengers, to relatives, and to lawyers and rights groups.
According to unconfirmed Israeli press sources, 679 passengers and crew from about forty different countries were on the ships attacked by the Israeli army early Monday morning. Some of the passengers were Palestinian citizens of Israel, including an Israeli Member of Knesset.
Israeli authorities have claimed that nine passengers were killed during the attack, although other reports quote higher numbers of deaths. The ships carrying the surviving passengers were captured and towed to Ashdod port, north of Gaza.
Today, although Israeli authorities have not provided official information to the public, the Ministry of Health told Israeli group Physicians for Human Rights-Israel (PHR-Israel) that 54 wounded passengers had been admitted to Israeli hospitals. Earlier, Israeli outlet Ynet reported that twelve of the injured people were in serious condition.
Rambam hospital in Haifa has confirmed it is still currently treating 6 wounded people and Barzilai hospital in Ashqelon still has 15, including people from Qatar, Morocco, Indonesia, Turkey and the United States. Sheba Medical Centre in Tel Hashomer reported 9 arrivals but refused to give details on the numbers still hospitalized on Tuesday.
Consular representatives of some countries have apparently been able to contact some of the wounded in Israeli hospitals.
Israeli press has also reported that 48 passengers have agreed to be returned immediately to their home countries, while 610 foreign citizens have been placed under administrative arrest prior to deportation and sent to ‘Ella’ detention facility in the south of Israel, near the town of Beer Sheva.
Israeli rights groups Adalah, the Public Committee Against Torture in Israel (PCATI) and Physicians for Human Rights-Israel (PHR-I) appealed to the Israeli High Court of Justice on Monday, demanding disclosure of the names of people killed and injured on the Gaza Freedom Flotilla by the Israeli navy; the names and locations of those detained and their condition; and unrestricted access of lawyers, relatives and consular representatives to those arrested, detained or in hospital.
According to Adalah, refusal to provide this information violates the legal rights of detainees as well as breaching a legal duty to provide information on their location.
Palestinian and German human rights groups have also pointed out that the passengers were unlawfully captured in international waters and called for their immediate release.
Protests in Israel; restrictions in Israel and the West Bank
Palestinian citizens of Israel were among those arrested and interrogated on Monday, and a hearing is to take place on their cases today.
Rumours were reported on Monday of injuries to Arab citizens of Israel, and fear and anger were prevalent in their communities as Jewish-Israeli press and politicians condemned their participation in the flotilla.
One of the Arab passengers, Israeli Member of Knesset Haneen Zou’bi, was released today thanks to diplomatic immunity and gave a press conference in Israel. She called for an international commission of inquiry by the UN and said that the aim of the activists had been to break the siege, not to start a confrontation.
On the raid, she said that at 23:30 [21:30 GMT – JNews] the captain had been contacted by the navy from a group of four Israeli boats and asked to stop, to which he had answered that they were a Turkish boat and that its location was 130 miles from the coast. “At 04:15 [02:15 GMT] we saw …rubber dinghies and helicopters,” Said Zou’bi. “At 04:30 forces quickly boarded the ship. I heard no warning because the noise came mainly from the helicopters and boats. Within ten minutes there were already 3 corpses. The whole operation was one hour long.”
Protests and demonstrations were held by thousands of Palestinian citizens of Israel in towns and villages around the country on Monday. Israeli police clashed with protesters in the towns of Umm el-Fahm, Nazareth and Haifa, as well as the Palestinian neighborhood of Issawiya in East Jerusalem. Israeli press has reported eighteen arrests.
The Arab community within Israel has declared a general strike today, and all businesses and schools are closed. Israeli police forces continue to be deployed throughout the country. Wadi Ara, a main highway in the north of Israel, was reportedly closed to traffic by police on Monday.
Jewish peace activists attempted to reach Ashdod Port to protest against the attack on Monday but were turned back by police. Hundreds of Jewish and Arab protesters demonstrated the same day in universities and outside the Ministry of Defense in Tel Aviv, to express their outrage at the attack on the aid flotilla. On Tuesday, other students demonstrated in support of the Israeli army.
In the West Bank, all crossings were closed on Monday and new checkpoints were placed to further restrict freedom of movement within the occupied territory. Israeli press reported increase in troop numbers on many routes.
Practical information for relatives
For information regarding access to detainees and wounded, the International Committee of the Red Cross has opened a line for people from countries that have no diplomatic relations with Israel: +972 3 5245286 (English, Russian, Hebrew).
There is also an information hotline on the wounded, operated by Israel’s emergency medical service, Magen David Adom, at +972 732630020
Hospitals to which passengers were sent include Rambam in Haifa (6), Sheba in Tel Hashomer (9), Hadassah Ein Karem in Jerusalem (4), Barzilai in Ashqelon (21) and Beilinson in Petah Tiqva (14).
According to the Israeli army, the issue of detainees is no longer under its responsibility but under the responsibility of the police, the Immigration Authority in the Ministry of Interior, and the Israel Prisons Service.
According to the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs situation room, relatives should contact their national representations in Israel.
Thousands rally for Freedom Flotilla in Stockholm: Electronic Intifada
Sami Halabi and Assaad Thebian writing from Stockholm, Live from Palestine, 1 June 2010
The central Sergels Torg square in Stockholm is not the place you would normally expect to hear the words “stop the blockade,” or “boycott Israel,” or even “In our souls and with our blood we support you Palestine,” in Arabic no less.
But that is what happened as thousands of people descended on the square on 31 May in support of the Freedom Flotilla, the name given to the convoy of six passenger and aid ships attacked by the Israeli military in international waters early that morning.
Predominantly Palestinian and Turkish flags flew high above the square as thousands of Swedes of all backgrounds gathered to protest Israel’s actions.
“This is something that Israel has been doing for a long time and it’s obvious that this is contrary to international law no matter how you view the conflict,” said Magnus Alfonson, 25. The sense of anger amongst the crowd was evident in the somber manner that they gazed upon the speakers who stood atop a staircase surrounded by demonstrators many wearing traditional Palestinian kuffiyeh scarves.
Sweden has had rocky relations with Israel in the last year after a Swedish journalist alleged that Israel had stolen organs from Palestinians for use in transplants during the 1990s. Sweden, as did Turkey, Denmark and Greece and several other countries, also summoned the Israeli ambassador in Stockholm for questioning over the fate of some 11 Swedish citizens that were among the passengers of the flotilla which included one Swedish-owned and flagged vessel.
“We want a clarification over what has happened,” Swedish Foreign Minister Carl Bildt told Sveriges Radio. “We know that there are Swedes on some of the ships and we want to know what has happened to them. There appears no reason to question media reports that a Turkish vessel has been boarded, that a fire fight occurred and that people have been killed.”
One of those citizens is world best-selling Swedish author Henning Mankell. Another is Emile Sarsour, a dual Swedish-Palestinian citizen born in a refugee camp in Syria, according to his daughter Samaa Sarsour, a 26 year-old activist and organizer of the protest. While at the demonstration she stated she had just received a phone call from the Swedish foreign ministry telling her that the Swedish embassy in Israel had been denied access to her father and that he was at the Beersheva prison in Israel. She added the official on the phone said the Israeli authorities had said that “maybe” they would gain access to her father the following day.
“It’s obvious that no matter where you stand on the issue, this is a crime against a nonviolent organization,” said Daniel Free, a Jewish Swede also present at the protest.
“Israel must be brought to the international court of justice,” said Zaida Catalan, legal advisor for the local Green Party in the Swedish Parliament to resounding applause before the crowd dispersed.
As for the Swedes still being detained by Israel, their fate remains unclear. However, their resolve may be less ambiguous. “When I told my father I was scared before he left,” said Sarsour, “he said to me that if he as a Palestinian could not do this; who else would?”
Sami Halabi is a Beirut-based journalist and editor who covers the Middle East and North Africa. Assaad Thebian is a Beirut-based journalist.
Witnesses cast doubt on Israel’s convoy raid account: BBC
Page last updated at 18:32 GMT, Tuesday, 1 June 2010 19:32 UK
Israeli army footage showing the violence on board the flotilla – the captions and circled points on this video were inserted by the Israeli army
Eyewitness accounts from ships raided by Israeli commandos have cast doubt on Israel’s version of events that led to the deaths of at least 10 people.
German pro-Palestinian activist Norman Paech said he had only seen wooden sticks being brandished as troops abseiled on to the deck of the ship.
Israel says its soldiers were attacked with “knives, clubs and other weapons” and opened fire in self defence.
The raid led to widespread condemnation and the UN has called for an inquiry.
LEGALITY OF CONVOY RAID
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The UN Charter on the Law of the Sea says only if a vessel is suspected to be transporting weapons, or weapons of mass destruction, can it be boarded in international waters. Otherwise the permission of the ship’s flag carrying nation must be sought.
The charter allows for naval blockades, but the effect of the blockade on civilians must be proportionate to the effect on the military element for the blockade to be legally enforceable.
A ship trying to breach a blockade can be boarded and force may be used to stop it as long as it is “necessary and proportionate”.
The Israeli Defense Forces say soldiers acted in self-defence.
An investigation, either by the UN or by the ship’s flag-carrier Turkey, is required to find if the use of force was proportionate to a claim of self defence.
The six ships, carrying aid and campaigners, had sailed from Cyprus in a bid to break Israel’s blockade of the Gaza Strip.
“This was not an act of self-defence,” said Mr Paech, a politician, as he arrived back in Berlin wrapped in a blue blanket.
“Personally I saw two and a half wooden batons that were used… There was really nothing else. We never saw any knives.
“This was an attack in international waters on a peaceful mission… This was a clear act of piracy,” he added.
Mr Paech had been a passenger on the Turkish passenger ship Mavi Marmara where most, if not all, of the deaths occurred.
Fellow German activist Inge Hoeger said they had been on the ships “for peaceful purposes”.
“We wanted to transport aid to Gaza,” she said. “No-one had a weapon.”
She added: “We were aware that this would not be a simple cruise across the sea to deliver the goods to Gaza. But we did not count on this kind of brutality.”
Activist Bayram Kalyon, arriving back in Istanbul, had also been a passenger on the Mavi Marmara.
“The captain… told us ‘They are firing randomly, they are breaking the windows and entering inside. So you should get out of here as soon as possible’. That was our last conversation with him.”
Meanwhile, in Nazareth, Israeli Arab MP Haneen Zuabi – who was on the flotilla – told a press conference that Israeli forces began firing while still in the helicopters hovering over the ships.
“We are calling for an international committee to investigate this tragedy,” she said.
Diplomatic sources in Ankara have said at least four of those killed were Turkish. Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan said the assault was a “bloody massacre” and must be punished. He said Israel should not test Turkey’s patience.
UN criticism
Further criticism of Israel came from UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon on Tuesday.
In an interview with the AFP news agency he said Israel’s blockade of Gaza was responsible for the deadly raid.
“Had Israelis heeded to my call and to the call of the international community by lifting the blockade of Gaza, this tragic incident would not have happened,” he said.
Nato Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen called on Israel to release people and boats it had seized.
He spoke after an emergency meeting of Nato ambassadors in Brussels called by Turkey.
AT THE SCENE
Jon Donnison
BBC News, Israel
Here at Beersheva prison in the Negev Desert, in the sweltering heat, a procession of foreign diplomats and lawyers has been trying to gain access to the prisoners.
Most have been let in and so has a party from the International Red Cross. Those who have come out have not said much more than that they have been able to see their prisoners.
Behind the blue and white 8m-high concrete walls, more than 600 people are being held.
For how long and to what purpose is not yet clear. Perspiring journalists can be seen scanning the Israeli newspapers, the headlines reading “Botched raid on Free Gaza Flotilla” and “Flotilla Fiasco”.
Renewed violence broke out in Gaza on Tuesday, with five Palestinians reportedly killed by Israeli fire.
Two Palestinian gunmen were shot dead after crossing the border in the south of the territory, a military spokesman said.
Three more people died in an Israeli strike in the north of Gaza, according to Gaza’s emergency services. Israel said it carried out an air strike after two rockets were fired from Gaza.
Following the Israeli sea-born raid, Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak ordered the border crossing between Egypt and the Gaza Strip to be opened.
The Rafah crossing has been closed since 2007, although special medical cases are occasionally allowed through.
The Egyptian state news agency said the latest opening was to allow humanitarian aid through. It is not clear how long it will be kept open.
The UN Security Council issued a statement after deliberating through the night.
It said an investigation should be “prompt, impartial, credible and transparent”. It also condemned the “acts” which led to the deaths.
Daily View: Israel convoy raid: BBC
Host | 12:53 UK time, Tuesday, 1 June 2010
Commentators respond to the Israeli army’s raid on the flotilla of Gaza-bound of aid ships.
Caroline B Glick in the Jerusalem Post argues that Israel is under attack from the world’s left-wing and Islamist activists. She says that, in order to win the “information war”, Israeli leaders must be stronger with their responses to the storming of the flotilla. They must counter with the “unvarnished truth”:
“Israel is the frontline of the free world. Its ability to defend itself and deter its foes is the single most important guarantee of international peace. A strong Israel is also the most potent and reliable guarantor of the US’s continued ability to project its power in the Middle East.”
Also in the Jerusalem Post, David Horovitz writes in an analysis piece that while everyone expects Israel to do badly in terms of of world public opinion over its actions in Gaza, it should not have done so badly in the technical aspects of the operation:
“Israel is concerned with eminently good reason about the smuggling of weaponry into Hamas-controlled Gaza. It may have felt it had no choice but to intercept a flotilla carrying it knew not what to the Hamas terror state. Why did it not anticipate that the activists and supporters of ‘a violent, extremist organization that supports terrorism’ would act precisely according to type?”
As news came out of the Israeli Defense Forces’ action, the Jerusalem Post reported that it was under what it called a “cyber attack”:
“Thousands of abusive e-mails were sent to newspaper staff members and general department addresses in an attempt to crash the system. The spam filter, used to separate junk mail and protect the network from viruses, showed 4,000 e-mails received in a matter of seconds. There were also attempts to hack the firewall, which can flood the network with useless data and allow entry to the newspaper’s online operating system.”
The Haaretz leader column argues that what it sees as the damage to Israel’s image and diplomatic relations is “the price of a flawed policy” in its blockade of Gaza:
“Someone must be held responsible for this disgraceful failure. There is no way to convince Israel’s citizens and its friends around the world that Israel regrets the confrontation and its results, and is learning from its errors, other than setting up a state inquiry committee to investigate the decision-making process, and to decide who should pay for this dangerous policy.”
Ari Shavit, also writing in Haaretz, calls the incident “a fiasco on the high seas” and says the Israeli government has failed to learn the lessons of its own independence struggle from the British. Mr Shavit recalls the British army’s attack on the Exodus, a boatload of Jewish refugees, shortly before the mandate crumbled in 1948:
“With a single foolish move, the Israeli cabinet cast the Muslim Brotherhood in the role of the victim and the Israel Navy as the villain and simultaneously opened European, Turkish, Arab, Palestinian and internal Israeli fronts. In so doing, Israel is serving Hamas’ interests better than Hamas itself has ever done.”
For Reuven Pedatzur in Haaretz, the raid was “a failure any way you slice it”:
“The inefficiency and the panic that overwhelmed the commandos, leading to the deaths of so many, raises worrying questions about their skillfulness and operational capability.”
David Kaufman, a US-based rabbi, writes about his support for the Israeli action on his blog, Rabbi’s Reasons. He says the US administration should also announce its support for the IDF’s raid:
“The violence on board the ship theoretically carrying non-violent protesters was instigated by the passengers, not by the soldiers who boarded out of a legitimate concern for Israel’s security.”
Kevin Clarke, who blogs at US Catholic, says that the US should turn its attention to the growing crisis in the Middle East:
“If history is a guide the Israeli military will conduct a thorough review of this morning’s massacre before clearing itself on all counts and accusing any contradicting investigations of anti-Semitism.”
Uri Avnery, a former member of the Israeli parliament, writing in the Gush Shalom blog, says the action has done terrible harm to Israel:
“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.”
The Israeli blogger Reb Mordechai blames Defence Minister Ehud Barak for what he calls a failure:
“Barak has caused a worldwide public disaster, perhaps Israel’s worst. Only time will tell what damage to the State he has caused. He has handed a propaganda gift on a silver platter to Hamas and all the hostile world media. Will Barak now resign? Will he be fired?”
Robert Fisk in the Independent asks why British politicians are so reluctant to say anything about what happened:
“[I]t is ordinary people, activists, call them what you will, who now take decisions to change events. Our politicians are too spineless, too cowardly, to take decisions to save lives. Why is this? Why didn’t we hear courageous words from Messrs Cameron and Clegg yesterday? For it is a fact, is it not, that had Europeans (and yes, the Turks are Europeans, are they not?) been gunned down by any other Middle Eastern army (which the Israeli army is, is it not?) there would have been waves of outrage.”
The Daily Mail’s Michael Burleigh suggests that the the organisers of the flotilla were aware of what Israel’s reaction might be:
“For it is clear this escapade was less about aid than about PR. Indeed, on board one of the aid vessels was Swedish novelist Henning Mankell, who wrote the Wallander detective novels. He was primed to discuss his humanitarian odyssey with newscaster Jon Snow at this weekend’s Hay Literary Festival. It is hard to imagine a more contrived form of ‘debate’.”
Melanie Phillips at the Spectator picks up on comments made by Foreign Secretary William Hague:
“[T]he Tories are now in coalition with the Israel-bashing LibDems, who would blame Israel even if jihadis were to sail a flotilla up the Thames and take the entire LibDem leadership hostage.”
EDITOR: The Long Hand of Israeli Injustice
Israelis can be proud today. Their regime may go anywhere, kill anyone, bomb whole cities, stash nuclear weapons, confiscate land illegally, and destroy a whole nation in the process. There is no one and nothing to stop them. They are above all laws, and against all legal frameworks, except those they use to enslave, steal rob and murder, in the name of their piratical law. The rest of us should bend our heads in shame, that this is the world we live in, where such lawlessness can be the law of Palestine. But we will not continue to take this quietly, I am sure. In defiance of corrupt governments who support Israel in whatever it does, cotizen are now rising to assist Palestine, where their governments have failed! The people of the world are on the side of Palestine, and that is the beginning of the end of Zionism. Most Israelis, from taxi drivers to university professors, are still supporting the murder and piracy. I doing that, they are collaborators with the murderers. There is no defence for such immorality.
Gaza aid flotilla: Israeli sabotage suspected: The Guardian
Israel’s military may have sabotaged two boats carrying Free Gaza activists after both malfunctioned at the same time in the same way prior to the raid
Israel’s raid on the Free Gaza flotilla has sparked protests around the world. Two passenger boats may also have been sabotaged prior to the raid Photograph: Yossi Zamir/EPA
Israel gave strong indications today that its forces had secretly sabotaged some of the ships bound for Gaza as part of the freedom flotilla.
Matan Vilnai, the deputy defence minister, was asked on Israel Radio whether there had not been a smarter alternative to direct assault. He answered that “all possibilities had been considered,” adding: “The fact is that there were less than the 10 ships that were due to participate in the flotilla.”
The comments appeared to dovetail with reports that two of the vessels malfunctioned at the same time and in the same way. Challenger I and Challenger II, carrying 36 activists, were forced into port in Cyprus on Friday evening when steering systems on both ships broke down on the passage from Heraklion in Crete, a campaign spokeswoman said.
Challenger II also started taking on water after the bilge pump suddenly stopped working and an inspection yesterday revealed “very suspicious” faults, according to Greta Berlin, a spokeswoman for Free Gaza.
An unnamed Israeli Defence Force source who briefed the Knesset’s foreign affairs and defence committee on the widely criticised armed interception of the flotilla at sea, also spoke of “grey operations” being mounted against the flotilla. No further detail was reported, probably because of the military censorship rules binding the Israeli media.
Both were forced to radio distress signals to Cypriot ports and Berlin said the captain of Challenger I, Denis Healey, was “frightened that he was not going to be able to get the boat in”.
“They had mechanical probles on Friday afternoon at around 3.30pm when they were going towards Cyprus to pick people up. They had been travelling from Crete and had been at sea for about 30 hours,” she said.
Once in port in northern Cyprus, Healey had to repair hydraulic lines on the vessel. Challenger II had to pull alongside the main Turkish ship, the Mavi Marmara, on the high seas 70 miles off Cyprus, to transfer its passengers before it limped into port.
The unnamed Israeli officer also said that military planners had considered trying to stop the Mavi Marmara rather than board it but had decided against it because the Turkish ship was too fast.
There is at least one precedent for naval sabotage by the Israelis. Flotilla 13, the elite naval commando unit that carried out Monday’s raid, reportedly blew up a ship named al-Awda (the Return) which was chartered by the PLO in 1988 to dramatise the plight of Palestinian refugees. It sank in Limassol harbour, Cyprus.
Robert Fisk: Western leaders are too cowardly to help save lives: The Independent
It is a fact that it is ordinary people, activists, call them what you will, who now take decisions to change events
Tuesday, 1 June 2010
Has Israel lost it? Can the Gaza War of 2008-09 (1,300 dead) and the Lebanon War of 2006 (1,006 dead) and all the other wars and now yesterday’s killings mean that the world will no longer accept Israel’s rule?
Don’t hold your breath.
You only have to read the gutless White House statement – that the Obama administration was “working to understand the circumstances surrounding the tragedy”. Not a single word of condemnation. And that’s it. Nine dead. Just another statistic to add to the Middle East’s toll.
But it’s not.
In 1948, our politicians – the Americans and the British – staged an airlift into Berlin. A starving population (our enemies only three years before) were surrounded by a brutal army, the Russians, who had erected a fence around the city. The Berlin airlift was one of the great moments in the Cold War. Our soldiers and our airmen risked and gave their lives for these starving Germans.
Incredible, isn’t it? In those days, our politicians took decisions; our leaders took decisions to save lives. Messrs Attlee and Truman knew that Berlin was important in moral and human as well as political terms.
And today? It was people – ordinary people, Europeans, Americans, Holocaust survivors – yes, for heaven’s sake, survivors of the Nazis – who took the decision to go to Gaza because their politicians and their statesmen had failed them.
Where were our politicians yesterday? Well, we had the ridiculous Ban Ki-moon, the White House’s pathetic statement, and dear Mr Blair’s expression of “deep regret and shock at the tragic loss of life”. Where was Mr Cameron? Where was Mr Clegg?
Back in 1948, they would have ignored the Palestinians, of course. It is, after all, a terrible irony that the Berlin airlift coincided with the destruction of Arab Palestine.
But it is a fact that it is ordinary people, activists, call them what you will, who now take decisions to change events. Our politicians are too spineless, too cowardly, to take decisions to save lives. Why is this? Why didn’t we hear courageous words from Messrs Cameron and Clegg yesterday?
For it is a fact, is it not, that had Europeans (and yes, the Turks are Europeans, are they not?) been gunned down by any other Middle Eastern army (which the Israeli army is, is it not?) there would have been waves of outrage.
And what does this say about Israel? Isn’t Turkey a close ally of Israel? Is this what the Turks can expect? Now Israel’s only ally in the Muslim world is saying this is a massacre – and Israel doesn’t seem to care.
But then Israel didn’t care when London and Canberra expelled Israeli diplomats after British and Australian passports were forged and then provided to the assassins of Hamas commander Mahmoud al-Mabhouh. It didn’t care when it announced new Jewish settlements on occupied land in East Jerusalem while Joe Biden, the Vice-President of its erstwhile ally, the United States, was in town. Why should Israel care now?
How did we get to this point? Maybe because we all grew used to seeing the Israelis kill Arabs, maybe the Israelis grew used to killing Arabs. Now they kill Turks. Or Europeans. Something has changed in the Middle East these past 24 hours – and the Israelis (given their extraordinarily stupid political response to the slaughter) don’t seem to have grasped what has happened. The world is tired of these outrages. Only the politicians are silent.
Diplomatic storms
*Goldstone report, November 2009
Israel launched Operation Cast Lead in December 2008 with the declared aim of halting rocket fire from Gaza into Israel. More than 1,400 Palestinians were killed in the three-week conflict along with 13 Israelis. The South African jurist Richard Goldstone’s report into the conflict found both Israel and the Hamas movement that controls the Strip guilty of war crimes, but focused more on Israel. Israel refused to co-operate with Goldstone and described his report as distorted and biased.
* The al-Mabhouh assassination, January-May 2010
Britain and Australia expelled Israeli diplomats after concluding that Israel had forged British and Australian passports used by assassins to kill a Hamas commander in Dubai. Israel has neither confirmed or denied a role in the killing of Mahmoud al-Mabhouh in his hotel room in January. Britain said such misuse of British passports was “intolerable”. Australia said it was not the behaviour of “a nation with whom we have had such a close, friendly and supportive relationship”.
*Settlements row, March 2010
Israel announces plans, during visit by US Vice-President Joe Biden, to build 1,600 homes for Jews in an area of the West Bank annexed by Israel. The announcement triggers unusually harsh criticism from the United States. Washington said it damaged its efforts to revive the Middle East peace process. US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said the project was an insult. Netanyahu said he was blindsided by planning bureaucrats and apologised to Biden. Today’s meeting with Barack Obama at the White House, called off by Mr Netanyahu so he could return home to deal with the flotilla crisis, was supposed to be another part of the fence-mending between the two allies.
*Nuclear secrecy, May 2010
Israel, widely assumed to have the Middle East’s only nuclear arsenal, has faced renewed calls to sign a global treaty barring the spread of atomic weapons. Signatories of the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) last week called for a conference in 2012 to discuss banning weapons of mass destruction throughout the Middle East. The declaration was adopted by all 189 parties to the NPT, including the US. It urged Israel to sign the NPT and put its nuclear facilities under UN safeguards.