Gaza Flotilla Causes Battles Over Fact And Fiction

nytimes.com:

SOME see a parallel with the Exodus, the ship filled with Jewish refugees that tried to break the British blockade of Palestine in 1947 and helped sway world opinion toward Zionism. Others are struck by the insistence on transporting basic aid -- food and cement -- when it is no longer needed.

Read the whole story: nytimes.com

Comments

[BigMitch]

12:39 PM on 07/07/2011

I reject your implicit accusation that I am racist. Nothing could be further from the truth. I do believe that Israel has a right to defend herself within the bounds of the law, and the blockade is clearly a legal response to a terrorist-led government on her border.

Furthermore, Martin, the people being brutalized ARE Jewish. They are being showered with rockets coming from Gaza. Obviously, you are indifferent to that reality. I suppose it would be presumptuous of me to ascribe motivations to your willful ignorance. It just seems like you don't really care if it is Jews being murdered.

[realpeace285]

01:44 PM on 07/06/2011

The radical, extremist, anti-Israel, terrorist-appeasing force is strong here today.

[Ali1812]

10:20 PM on 07/06/2011

its strong every day maybe that says something about your messed up definition of the "other side"
maybe thats why you keep spamming that same comment on every israel/palestine post

[BubbaC33]

08:26 AM on 07/07/2011

You are ignoring the reason for the blockade. Hamas takes control in Gaza after Israel leaves, forcing Israeli citizens to abandon homes and businesses in the process. The Arabs destroy the businesses and homes. Hamas starts a series of rocket attacks on southern Israel. Israel bolckades Gaza in an attempt to stem the flow of illegal arms to Hamas.
Israel now allows far more goods to enter Gaza, but retains the blockade in order to stop Hamas from re-arming. The folks in the flotilla are told anything they wish to take to Gaza can go, but only after the ships dock in Israel or Egypt and allow their boats and contents to be searched.
So, the basis for the flotilla is not to help the people of Gaza, but to try to hurt Israel.

[Gracie fr]

05:58 AM on 07/05/2011

The Gaza Flotilla story plays as an infringment on Human Rights and both the pro and con paties respond to it as such. But in reality, it deemonstrates the newest strong-arm tactics of coercion to force nations or states into compliancy . The tools are more economic than military. Governments have learned them from international corporations, the ones threatening to take business elsewhere, or flex military muscle to quell indigenous noncooperation and dissent and individuals are threatened with an untenable financial burden in legal fees….

[mogendaved]

10:37 AM on 07/05/2011

Better than bombing eh?

[Ted Abhor]

04:25 AM on 07/05/2011

http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_VRejQerbKa4/TQXrd0PkcXI/AAAAAAAAD3I/P8UXRw52SL0/s1600/sinking-ships%255B1%255D.jpg

San Remo Manual on International Law Applicable to Armed Conflicts at Sea:
Section II, paragraph 98 - Merchant vessels believed on reasonable grounds to be breaching a blockade may be captured. Merchant vessels which, after prior warning, clearly resist capture may be attacked.

Section IV, paragraph 60 (e) - enemy merchant vessels become a legitimate military target after refusing an order to stop or actively resisting visit, search or capture;

[RubalKhali]

05:04 AM on 07/05/2011

Also from the San Remo ManualThe following classes of enemy vessels are exempt from attack:

(a) hospital ships;

(b) small craft used for coastal rescue operations and other medical transports;

(c) vessels granted safe conduct by agreement between the belligerent parties including:

(i) cartel vessels, e.g., vessels designated for and engaged in the transport of prisoners of war;

(ii) vessels engaged in humanitarian missions, including vessels carrying supplies indispensable to the survival of the civilian population, and vessels engaged in relief actions and rescue operations;

(d) vessels engaged in transporting cultural property under special protection;

(e) passenger vessels when engaged only in carrying civilian passengers;

Of particular note are section(ii) and (e).

[TheLonelyGod]

09:01 AM on 07/05/2011

Exempt from *attack,* not from searching. The two articles don't contradict each other.

[RubalKhali]

05:09 AM on 07/05/2011

Also exempt from attack,
(g) small coastal fishing vessels and small boats engaged in local coastal trade, but they are subject to the regulations of a belligerent naval commander operating in the area and to inspection;

Something the Israelis continually do is attack small fishing vessels out of Gaza. Seems like another conravention, as in the Geneva Convention and International Humanitarian law that Israel has no problem breaking to the great silence of the West, and complicity of America.

[BubbaC33]

05:43 PM on 07/05/2011

Whatever Israel may or may not do to small fishing vessels is not relevant. All that matters in this discussion is the legality of the Israeli government to detain and search vessels heading to Gaza in this flotilla.

[Brewerstroupe]

04:01 AM on 07/05/2011

George Parr, British Ambassador to Washington explains the origin of conflict:
http://tinyurl.com/39y93w

[RubalKhali]

02:53 AM on 07/05/2011

Recent terrorist activity in Gaza is on the rise! Two farmers have returned to their fields and some fishermen cast their nets, this will be met with the usual force as Israel reserves the right to defend itself from terror.

[mogendaved]

10:40 AM on 07/05/2011

As long as the animals of Hamas are the representative government of the Palestinian people, and as long as rockets fly over the border with Israel, and as long as they continue to target School Buses with anti tank missiles that kill 15 year old Israeli school children, they will be blockaded, they will be built upon, they will be excises with pinpoint surgical strikes, and they will every now and again, be invaded. Should they wish to make peace and have their own homeland they would have it tomorrow, though they won't, and it will continue to go very badly for them. Israel can wait. Tick Tock. Tick Tock.

[Brewerstroupe]

08:11 PM on 07/05/2011

"the animals of Hamas":

"The political leadership of Hamas is probably the most highly qualified in the world. Boasting more than 500 PhDs in its ranks, the majority are middle-class professionals - doctors, dentists, scientists and engineers. Most of its leadership have been educated in our universities and harbour no ideological hatred towards the West. It is a grievance-based movement, dedicated to addressing the injustice done to its people. It has consistently offered a ten-year ceasefire to give breathing space to resolve a conflict that has continued for more than 60 years."

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/columnists/guest_contributors/article5420584.ece

[Brewerstroupe]

08:54 PM on 07/05/2011

Former senior British diplomat Sir Jeremy Greenstock, who has made direct contact with Hamas as part of his work with the charity Forward Thinking, discusses what can be gained from talking to the militant Islamic organisation.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/today/hi/today/newsid_7823000/7823746.stm

[mogendaved]

02:56 AM on 07/05/2011

You're making us all weepy here with your stories of woe for those who have been waging war and destruction against Israel since it's inception, not because of what the Israelis do, but because they are Jews. They have twisted and contorted themselves for close to half a century now in order to serve that one singular purpose, instead of making peace and building infrastructure, schools, or industry, they've invited and welcomed in Syrian and Persian terrorists in Hamas to make war. They are ill prepared for this fight they've undertaken, always have been. Their Arab cousins wish for them to be used as cannon fodder, for they themselves could have assisted these "Palestinians" at any time for the past 63 years. They have chosen not to. Why? Because they wish for them to inflict as much actual and political harm on the Jewish state as they are able to, and the "Palestinians" are more than happy to play along, at the cost of their own children's futures. Pity them for being so selfish, pity them for being so foolish, pity them for they are lost in a imagined Arab/Persian dream. And be ashamed of yourself for egging them on to sacrifice yet more generations in this fruitless quest.

[Jenna T]

01:33 AM on 07/05/2011

Fauxtilla.

[mogendaved]

02:38 AM on 07/05/2011

Go suck a tailpipe antisemite. Shoo.

[RubalKhali]

02:51 AM on 07/05/2011

Quoting an Israeli Judge makes me an anti-semite, how droll.

[BigMitch]

09:41 PM on 07/04/2011

The legality of blockades as a response to acts of war is not subject to serious doubt. When the United States blockaded Cuba during the missile crisis, the State Department issued an opinion declaring the blockade to be lawful. This despite the fact that Cuba had not engaged in any act of belligeren­ce against the United States. Other nations have similarly enforced naval blockades to assure their own security.

The second issue is whether it is lawful to enforce a legal blockade in internatio­nal waters. Again, law and practice are clear. If there is no doubt that the offending ships have made a firm determinat­ion to break the blockade, then the blockade may be enforced before the offending ships cross the line into domestic waters. Again the United States and other Western countries have frequently boarded ships at high sea in order to assure their security.

[arkymorgan]

11:15 PM on 07/04/2011

The difficulty is when legality is used to derail ethical and moral behavior. This is the nexus where activism becomes an imperative.

[basenji]

01:05 AM on 07/05/2011

But what if one's ethics specifically states it's applicable to their own only?

[RubalKhali]

11:29 PM on 07/04/2011

So because the U.S. and other western countries do it that makes it legal, like bombing neutral countries, selling arms to embargoed countries, selling germ and chemcal weapons against prolifferation treaties,torture, ect.. the list is too long. Legality has nothing to do with it.Might makes right is what really happens.

[BigMitch]

09:36 PM on 07/04/2011

The real public relations war will occur when the flotilla is stopped by Israel, and people accuse Israel of behaving illegally. Their arguments will be mostly from ignorance, some will be from mendacity, and a sprinkling will be anti-S*metic. For the record, Hamas, which controls Gaza is a terrorist organization, according to the U.S. State Department. It is committed to Israel's destruction, according to its charter. There are ongoing rocket attacks from Gaza into the undisputed territory of Israel. Israel is a nation state with a right to protect herself, which extends to the high seas.

[Chagsameach5771]

12:27 AM on 07/05/2011

Obviously not enough of a "pariah" state for the Greeks, Ban Ki Moon of the UN and the EU to want the flotilla to be blocked, consistent with Israeli policy. Must be difficult when the facts on the ground betray y0u.r deluded hatred and propaganda.

[Jenna T]

01:58 AM on 07/05/2011

Fanned #37.

[Danny Dan]

09:28 PM on 07/04/2011

The Irony that exists around getting these ships through shows how desperate
these supporters are. More than one nation is looking to stop these ships.

[kentah]

10:59 PM on 07/04/2011

More than one nation has been pressured into stopping these ships.

[Chagsameach5771]

12:30 AM on 07/05/2011

Pressure? Is that why the UN as well as the Greeks are against these boats from moving out of port. Perhaps they don't like flotillas to violate international and maritime laws (Hint! Hint!).

[basenji]

09:18 PM on 07/04/2011

The levels they will stoop to blows your mind.

Top Israeli pol meets far-right German millionaire
July 4, 2011
BERLIN (JTA) - A top Israeli politician met with a far-right millionaire businessman in Berlin, during a weekend visit to the German capital.

Ayoub Kara, deputy minister for Development of the Negev and Galilee, a Likud lawmaker in Israel's Knesset, met with Patrick Brinkmann, a Swedish right-wing extremist who has supported neo-Nazi and right-wing populist parties in Europe, according to a report in the Israeli daily Yediot Acharonot.

Brinkmann, 44, who is pushing an anti-Islam agenda, has been reaching out to Israel in recent months, claiming to want to establish a broad-based, far-right movement "without anti-Semitism." He reportedly met with Kara and other Israeli politicians while in Israel earlier this year."

http://www.jta.org/news/article/2011/07/04/3088405/top-israeli-pol-meets-far-right-german-millionaire

[yasunari]

10:11 PM on 07/04/2011

I wonder why I'm not surprised at all:

http://uit.no/getfile.php?PageId=1410&FileId=1337

[Sam Adamson]

11:52 PM on 07/05/2011

Are you surprised that the Palestinian political leader aligned himself directly with Hitler?

[Ric NYC]

08:22 PM on 07/04/2011

End the collective punishment of the Palestinian people!
Stop the illegal occupation of the Palestinian territories!

[Vinny123]

09:01 PM on 07/04/2011

End the absurd punishment you are throwing on us by repeating the same mantra!
Stop the unceasing entitled demands that do absolutely nothing to solve the complex issues that exist between the Israelis and Palestinians!

[Danny Dan]

09:33 PM on 07/04/2011

Lets face it,The IDF does military issues and we all hope for political ones to be the diamond in a ruff neighborhood.Till then Agression is ruling the wolrd.
Look at the US.

[yasunari]

10:15 PM on 07/04/2011

What punishment?
Asking you to stop acting as a bully?

[kentah]

11:07 PM on 07/04/2011

If Gaza isn't occupied then these boats can freely port in a Gazan port right?
Also, isn't Shalit a POW? Or does it sound more nefarious to call him "kidnapped".
Were you aware that the only people picked up on 9/11 in relation to 9/11 were the famous "dancing Israelis" that eventually went on Israeli TV and stated they were there to "document the event"? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o_V9seW4W38&feature=related This is from their own mouths as opposed the the "proof" typically given for your statement (sans "condemned our killing of Bin Laden (you're a Navy Seal?)) which is typically people celebrating some event yet there is no indication of the event being celebrated save for a voice-over in English claiming what the event is. In other words it could be anything.

[Avirahim]

07:48 PM on 07/04/2011

FREE GAZA!

[Vinny123]

09:01 PM on 07/04/2011

FREE US OF YOUR YELLING (LOL)

[blackhawk78]

10:02 PM on 07/04/2011

There are no Jews in Gaza.

[Danny Dan]

09:45 PM on 07/04/2011

They love it,live it,so move to Gaza and put your life in the hands of the PLO and they can love it.Hamas is never to be trusted,they do in the moderates keeping life unstable
for a Sorry Gazan citizen.

[kentah]

11:10 PM on 07/04/2011

Can you comprehend that if boats are being prevented from engaging with Gaza then it is not free? What free country is walled-in by another and why must all cargo be "inspected" by that country walling-in the "free" country? Can you give a cogent definition of freedom?