A post by Pat
This Gaza flotilla like all its predecessors was warned that an Israeli blockade was in effect. The ships were given hours of warnings and invited to proceed to a cargo inspection area. The flotilla’s stated intent was to deliver humanitarian goods and challenge the blockade. This time the activists went further in their provocation.
There was no resistance on five of the ships. On the sixth, the Mavi Marmara, there was violence and death. Israel says the activists were waiting in ambush with knives and clubs and attacked the soldiers as they boarded the ship. Soldiers were thrown from the top deck to a lower deck. There is video evidence substantiating these claims. The flotilla organizers claim it was the Israelis who initiated gunfire as the commandos came aboard. At least 10 of the activists on board were killed. Other reports indicate as many as 19 activists were killed. Two Israeli commandos were shot, several injured.
The international outcry is once again that Israel responded disproportionately. The diplomatic huffing and puffing has begun. Netanyahu cut short his visit to Washington and returned to Israel.
Israel blames organizers for Gaza flotilla deaths
Israeli military gives version of flotilla incident
“They beat us up with metal sticks and knives,” he said. “There was live fire at some point against us… They were shooting at us from below deck.”
Some of the soldiers were tossed from the top deck to a lower deck by the activists, and jumped in the water to save themselves, he said.
Activists grabbed soldiers and tried to hold them hostage, stripping them of their helmets and equipment, he said. About 30 activists, all speaking Arabic, carried out the attack, he said.
BBC interview–Danny Ayalon, Israeli Deputy Foreign Ministry
IDF Video of Mavi Marmara Skirmish
Additional IDF video here.
The disproportionate response is, as always, against Israel. Everything is a lose-lose situation for them.
*UPDATE The Krauthammer perspective:
Tammy, you left off a few very important facts…
The peace activists were, of course, innocent babes that tried their best to surrender, but Israeli terrorists under the command of the Great Satan himself shot them all execution style, while they knelt in prayer to Allah asking him to avenge their deaths. These new martyrs to the one true faith are now at peace and enjoying eternal sexual bliss provided by their very own personal 49 brown eyed perpetual virgins.
May Allah smile on them and his prophet Mohammed (pbuh*) be praised.
*Peace be upon him.
I have been following this story for a week now. The Gaza flotilla had been told earlier in the week that they would be stopped and that their aid would get through if Israel could inspect the ships. Of course they refused. This is intentional to stir up trouble. I would not be surprised if Code Pink wasn’t there along with Obama’s friend Jodi Evans. This administration better stop with the cursing of Israel. It will come back on them.
At least Netanahu doesn’t have to hang out at the White House , I bet that sucks for him.
Thank you for bringing this up. I saw the story this morning first thing and was disgusted, imagine that, at the msm. Even reading the msm news story I was able to see that once again Israel is doing it’s job to secure her people and they are chastised for it. At least they have Netanyahu, God Bless Him.
I wish we had Netanyahu. Instead, we get Urkel.
an ambush emanating from a boat trying to push through an israeli blockade?
color me shocked.
in other news, water is wet and bears were last seen defecating near the woods.
god will protect israel, even if urkel won’t. pay attention to the aiders and abettors, including the lame stream media, like kmsimchak says. you can see the bad guys clearly that way.
bibi, don’t worry about missing your meeting with urkel. after the way he treated you last time, i think he had pork fried rice on the menu for you.
rick
Rick, “pork fried rice,” LOL!
Does anyone see a parallel between Arizona, trying to protect its citizens, and Israel ? (But of course, the MSM would probably say that they are both “Nazi Germany.”)
I watched the videos in stunned disbelief. The IDF soldiers were ambushed: five peaceful boardings to get the IDF to lower their guard, then a vicious attack on the sixth vessel If the Israeli’s showed any disproportionate response, it was that they didn’t evacuate their soldiers and use heavier weapons on the vessel.
Dogtown1 is right – the incident gave Bebe Netanyahu a reason to skip a visit to the White House and be lectured by Urkel.
I’ll bet Israel doesn’t let her guard down again on the next boarding. Thankful that none of the IDF were killed and wishing a speedy recovery to the injured. 9 less hamas terrorist sympathizers alive today.
I’m wondering why the Israelis put commandos in harm’s way by dropping them onto ships staffed by angry fanatics. Is there a navy method for disabling the propulsion of a boat without boarding it damaging the superstructure? Can they do something to tangle or damage the propeller, so it’s dead in the water and must be towed? I wouldn’t think they would drop men down into a tense situation like that if there were alternatives. Of course the Israelis hold the moral high ground, but was this a preventable tactical blunder?
They say they didn’t expect such resistance from a humanitarian aid group.
Israeli commandos ‘carried paintball guns’
The article didn’t say if the IDF was using pepperball ammunition. Do you know if they were?
From the article Pat linked:
This is sophistry. If the Israelis had full confidence that the ships were on a humanitarian mission, then they could have been allowed to pass. They were stopped because of the reasonable assumption that they were less than benign. You can’t stop a ship because you think it might be hostile and then act surprised when it turns out to be hostile. That would be a military blunder.
Again, I’m not questioning Israel’s moral right to stop those ships. Of course they had to be stopped. But, with the understanding that hindsight is always 20-20, it’s fair to ask whether the deadly hand-to-hand confrontation could have been avoided.
Along with what Pat_S said, you can’t really tell from the video how things looked when the first man came down because we don’t see it from start to finish. But you can see in one shot when they pan to the right that more terrorists are coming from what to me appears to be out of hiding. If after the first Soldier landed on the deck he was then ambushed, every one of the remaining Soldiers would continue down the rope into harms way to help their buddy.
There are ways to disable a ships running gear and I wouldn’t be surprised if they use them next time. But they are still going to have to eventually board the ship and clear it and I’m sure the terrorists would love nothing more than to create a tense stand off for all the cameras in the world.
I think they should keep doing what they are doing (with rifles next time) to include sinking the ship if it is too dangerous to board but continues on into Gaza waters.
it never matters what israel does- they could have tried to board carrying bouquets of roses, boxes of godiva chocolates and baskets of angora kittens- they’d still be painted as evil nazi jews . it’s all about the propaganda PR with these people and it always will be and israel will always be wrong.
2000 years of christian european antisemitism for all the claims of our oh so progressive modernity always comes raging to the forefront and the end is always the same: jews are smeared and demonized and someone will try to kill them en masse . it’s a real indicator of how removed a culture is from it’s prejudiced and primitive past if it doesn’t fall for this schtick. how sad is it that even after the Holocaust here in america, a country that has given haven( well except for all those boat loads of jews she turned back during ww2) to more tribes of disparate peoples than any country in history, even jews think like those who hate jews pathologically?
israel will always take a PR bath on this stuff so screw these people. if they want to be human shields, warn them thrice then give them what they want, take the boat out. soldiers should not be put in danger over some whack hamas PR con job.
During the campaign, Urkel lectured us that “words have meaning.” So, when he goes to Cairo and gives a fawning, slobbering speech to the Muslims, when he announces that the U.S. is not a Christian country (so, Urkel, did you mean we are now a Muslim country???), when he treats Netanyahu with less respect than the person who cleans the bathrooms in the WH, then, yes, words have meaning. He has emboldened Israel’s enemies, and now we get the Gaza flotilla mess. Thanks for nothing, Urkel, you D.B. (as Tammy would say)
Exactly Shifra! Our doormat-in-chief shows weakness, a disdain for this country, and the middle-finger for our laws. (How in the Puck did this guy get to be President of our United States??) Now we are reaping the crap he has sown: our borders are over run, Israel is being attacked (more intensely than usual), N. Korea is belligerent (more than usual), islamic- terriorists are much more embolden and ON THE OFFENSE! Let alone all the spending bills (as in trillions of dollars) have not turned the economy around, but unemployment is at 10% on his watch. Shall I mention the oil debacle, “ON DAY ONE?”