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Israel Prepping to Block Next Gaza Flotilla
On the anniversary of its deadly takeover of the aid flotilla to Gaza, in which nine Turkish activists died in a confrontation with navy commandos, Israel is preparing to block the next flotilla as well.
Israeli defense sources said recently that despite addressing flaws in the previous flotilla takeover, there is no alternative to taking over the boats and protesters by force. (AFP/Mohammed Abed) Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Israel prefers a diplomatic move to thwart the flotilla expected at the end of June, but if necessary would exercise force against anyone who tries to disobey the navy's orders and head to Gaza's shore.
The Israel Navy has held takeover drills and mobilized reserve combatants, on the assumption the large number of vessels (about 15 ) planning to take part in the flotilla will require reinforcements. The preparations include intelligence surveillance, based mainly on open communications and Internet sites.
The navy is focusing on riot-control measures this time, saying they will use force as a last resort.
Israeli defense sources said recently that despite addressing flaws in the previous flotilla takeover, there is no alternative to taking over the boats and protesters by force - barring an agreement that would cancel the flotilla.
Former Chief of Staff Gabi Ashkenazi testified before the Turkel committee investigating the flotilla and said that if necessary, sniper fire would be used to take down violent protesters. This would prevent face-to-face clashes that hold a greater risk to soldiers' lives.
The Turkel committee in February published the first part of its report, which on the whole justifies Israel's position and conduct. The report upholds Israel's argument that it was permitted to impose a blockade on Gaza and exercise force to prevent uncoordinated ships' entry. Two foreign observers took part in writing the report.
The committee is still hearing testimonies regarding the way Israel investigates warfare incidents.
State Comptroller Micha Lindenstrauss is expected soon to publish his own report on the flotilla. Lindenstrauss examined various aspects, from ministerial and military decisions during the preparations for the flotilla to presenting Israel's position abroad.
Immediately after the flotilla incident Israel changed its position dramatically regarding the amount and extent of goods allowed into the Gaza Strip. Egypt's decision to reopen the Rafah border crossing as of last weekend removes the rest of the coordinated siege both states had imposed on Gaza.
20 Comments so far
Show AllThe entire world would be will be so much better when Israel finally disappears.
If your beloved Israel weren't so intent on obstructing peace (see the Palestinian Papers) this issue would be settled. Instead apartheid Israel has turned Gaza into an open air concentartion camp. But that's changing. With the opening of the Rafah border crossing.
BTW, did you exhibit a similar outrage over the arab children that died in Operation Cast Lead? I doubt it because you sound like an Israeli Firster anti-arab racist.
Only concerned about the blood of the Chosen, right?
You nailed it. FDZionist is just an indicator of the reality - there is no making peace with Zionism, which is an aggressive, genocidal invasion. Israel is not interesting in anything but their own empire. If you're not for dissolution of Israel and reparations paid to all of us who suffer under Zionism, then you're not for peace.
Since 2000, FIFTEEN Israelis have been killed by the glorified fireworks called Qassams - in Cast Lead, Israel killed ONE HUNDRED TIMES that number in a few weeks.
So, FDZ, take your bullshit hasbara elsewhere - the people on this site are on to you and your ilk.
"The navy is focusing on riot-control measures this time, saying they will use force as a last resort."
Isn't that always the case...force as a "last resort"? After all, riot control measures used on humanitarian aid boats should be enough. A little shouting from a bullhorn; a bit of white phosphorous across the port bow.
End of story.
Odd isn't it, how the US media does not report Jewish opposition to occupation and ethnic cleansing.
Maybe because Jewish opposition to occupation and ethnic cleansing
is both microscopic and ineffective.
Jews as a whole supported and continue to support Zionism through Israel's worst horrific human atrocities. And Jews do it with gusto and viciousness, destroying any dissenters in its path.
No use pretending otherwise.
Blockade Israel with thousands of peaceful protesters. I mean thousands of peaceful demonstrators. Then if the bullies fire on them it'll show the world how destructive and evil Israel really is. Do not stoop to their level as hard as that may be. Be peaceful and non violent, two words absent from the Israeli lexicon. The Israeli's only know war and hate, the same tactics used on them during WWII. It's a shame they haven't learned a thing isn't it? They say never again but they do it repeatedly to their neighbors.
I hope this time Turkey properly escorts its national flag vessels with a couple of destroyers and a helicopter carrier to provide appropriate cover to any illegal attack by Israel. Let us see if they want a short and decisive war with a NATO country in order to maintain an illegal and inhumane blockade.
"In a late-breaking development, Turkey has announced that they will send more ships to aid Gaza, and that this time they'll be accompanied by the Turkish Navy. This is a provocative and dangerous move, and one that is sure to raise tensions in the region.
The implications of Turkey's threat are unknown at this time. Avi Trengo, a columnist at an Israeli news site, implies (before Turkey's announcement) that in a showdown between the two countries, Israel is likely to cave first.
http://talkingskull.com/article/turkish-navy-to-escort-more-ships-to-gaza
Well that was a year ago and and we know what happened.
Bravo, if this could happen this time it would be about bloody time.
Zionists are both Jewish and Evangelist as I understand. It could be a disastrous mistake to take all Israelis and Jews as part of the problem. Violence begets violence and consenses is what sticks people together, gets us pointed in the same directioin.
The choice looks clear: either give our lives to peace, or the perpetuation of war. We are where Christ, Rev. King and M. Gandhi were. And this ain't Sunday school.
Why wouldn't they be taken together? That's the Israeli view that allows the "group punishment" that rationalized the Gaza deaths, isn't it? The Israeli people are, as a whole, fully guilty, for they supported, again, this monstrously evil government at the polls, just as the U.S. is guilty of Iraq, Afghanistan and now Libya for tolerating the actions of the government without rising up against the criminal acts that are now widely known. As for pease, do you really think Ghandi didn't know the English would kill thousands? He arranged it. Do you think King didn't position his marches where he knew it would produce violence? Grow up. ONLY violent deaths produce significant changes in established structures. Only when the entire U.S. puppet governments of the Middle East actually rises again against Israel will this situation change.
God Bless Israel. May they blow those "Peace Flotillas" out of the water the minute the first boat appears on the Horizon.
There is no doubt that God does not support Israel. First, because the real Israel doesn't come into being until the Messiah comes and that hasn't happened, so this is a "fake" Israel with no religious legitimacy. Second, God would not honor a nation of such evil intent and history. Remember, the Zionist sank shiploads of Jewish refugees to gain sympathy. They bombed churches in England. They outright murdered people for just speaking out. The continue to conduct kidnappings, torture, murder, etc. in violation of their own religion This is not Israel, this is Zionist Nazi Jewish land, abhorrent in the eyes of the Christian and Jewish God. "Know them by their actions" is that need be known. This Israel and it's people are doomed by their own hands and voices.
A year ago shortly after the last Gaza flotilla I told a US Navy commander that this would have been an excellent escort assignment for his navy. He agreed.
The primary holiday for the jews is passover, a genocidal myth, described in the 12th chapter of Exodus. Their god told them to put blood on their door posts as an indicator to god's death angel to passover the jews and kill only the first born of the egyptians next door including their animals. Genocide is an integral part of their culture.
sugarsnap88, you are a moron. Only a Mongolian Idiot would post a comment like the one you just posted.
This racist statement proves that CJP is a racist..
Mongols are not known for being racists.
just FOR THE RECORD THERE ARE JEWS ON THOSE FLOTILLAS, AND MORE THAN ONE. COURAGEOUS COMPASSIONATE & AMAZING BEINGS.
FOR SOME IT IS ABOUT DOGMA FOR OTHERS IT IS ABOUT CAPITAL & OTHERS IT IS ABOUT FEAR FOR THE ONES ON THE FLOTILLA IT IS ABOUT EVOLVING.
ISRAELI LEADERS & THEIR BACKERS ARE THE PROBLEM. AIM WELL. OR YOU BECOME THE VERY TYRANT YOU ARE l00king @.
No terror no torture just truth.
I think that the anti-Jewish comments here are posted by the same paid propaganda groups that support Israeli Zionism, often refereed to collectively as hasbara. If so it would just be another convoluted propaganda tactic to try and show that at the base of the the threat to the survival of Israel as a Jewish state is an imaginary tide of "Anti-Semitism".
This of course is just another myth propagated by Zionists to instil fear among Jews (our back is against the wall and the whole world hates the Jews - remember the holocaust), reinforce their "unique" group identity (there is them, the Goym, and us God's chosen), and play the eternal victim (we are always persecuted).
It is not hidden but also seldom published that the Zionists had an agreement with the Nazis to encourage discrimination and apartheid back in the 1930's. The Pact was called the ‘Haavara’ Agreement. ‘Haavara in Hebrew means much like, ‘Moving house’ and in 1935 the head of the Zionist movement in Berlin wrote glowing praises in the SS Magazine Angriff of Hitler's race laws.
http://www.thebirdman.org/Index/Others/Others-Doc-Jews/+Doc-Jews-IntimateRelationToNazis/ThePactBetweenHitler&TheZionists.htm
As such, it is difficult to deny that the Zionists were at that time as well instrumental in encouraging and developing the anti-Semitic racist movement in Nazi Germany for their nationalist and political ends, and as such created the base and the framework for what would later become "the final solution". One thing is complicity, even under under duress, but open collaboration is quite another: http://www.thefinalsolutiontoadolphhitler.com/
Why you ask; Israel is a small country and the Zionists like the Nazis supported the idea of Eugenics and a "master-race", selection was key to the strength of Israel. Theodor Herzl, the founder of Zionism, was in fact anti-Semitic, he wrote, "Every nation in whose midst Jews live is, either covertly or openly, anti-Semitic; its immediate cause is our excessive production of mediocre intellects, who cannot find an outlet downwards or upwards. When we sink, we become a revolutionary proletariat. When we rise, there also rises our terrible power of the purse."
History has been selectively cherry picked to support myths new and old, both then and now. Is it not strange the similarities between the dependence on racial myths of the Jewish state of Israel, and the Aryan 3rd Reich of Germany are surprisingly akin?
Israel is proving itself to be the Nazi of the Middle East, leaving little, it any doubt, world-wide, that the disappearance of it would be a boon to the entire globe. Hopefully, the ships will be prepared to defend themselves from snipers with some RPGs and Stingers or equal. I'm sick and tired of hearing how Israel enjoys killing unarmed and undefended people. Just one good Stinger per ship would be so good!