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.
June 2010
“The operation started immediately with firing. First it was warning shots, but when the Mavi Marmara wouldn’t stop these warnings turned into an attack”… “We continuously told them we did not have weapons, we came here to bring humanitarian help and not to fight”… “We were in international waters. The Israelis acted like pirates… They took us hostage, pointing guns at our heads; they descended from helicopters and fired tear gas and bullets. There was absolutely nothing we could do… Those who tried to resist forming a human ring on the bridge were given electric shocks.”
June 5, 2010 marks 43 years since the Six-Day War and the beginning of the occupation. Three and a half million Palestinians live under Israeli occupation which denies their most basic freedoms. Gaza is hungry and under siege, no one is allowed in or out. Families are expelled from their homes; menacing walls keep apart families and friends, and separate farmers from their lands. Freedom to travel is denied to thousands who are forced daily to undergo humiliation and harassment at the checkpoints.
An example of a so-called “pro-Israel” organization participating in Israel’s official propaganda campaign designed to whitewash its international law violations, and crimes, related to the attack on the Gaza Freedom Flotilla.
Israel’s government has been pretending it is ready to negotiate for peace, but that there is no one to negotiate with on the other side. The attack on the blockade-busters lays bare the country’s slide into contempt for international law, intolerance of dissent and wilful sabotage of viable representation for Palestinians.
Arab Knesset member who participated in Gaza aid flotilla holds press conference says, ‘It was clear from size of force that boarded ship that purpose was not to stop sail, but to cause largest number of fatalities to prevent future initiatives.’ “There was not a single passenger who raised a club. We put on our life vests. From where I was standing, I didn’t see any clubs or anything of the sort. There were gunshots, I don’t know if they were live bullets or not. There were gunshots fired from the ships in our direction.
Hebrew University of Jerusalem will remove Judge Goldstone from its Board of Governors, for the “technical” reason that he has not attended Board meetings… Substantial political pressure has been exerted by American and European donors on Hebrew University President Professor Menachem Ben Sasson and the university administration to remove Judge Goldstone following the report issued by the UN Fact Finding Mission on the Gaza Conflict, which Goldstone led.
“Israel is gradually turning from an asset to the United States to a burden,” said Dagan, speaking before the Knesset’s Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee.
IOA Editor: A similar assessment was made by Prof. Rashid Khalidi in a May 2010 interview with the IOA
. Separately, of course, there’s no discussion on the legality of sabotaging the engines of ships docked in foreign harbors.
The Higher Arab Monitoring Committee declared a general strike in Israel’s Arab sector yesterday to protest the flotilla clash… In addition, the committee also announced that protest marches and rallies would be held in Arab communities, and called on the international community to investigate the circumstances behind the flotilla’s interception.
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.
