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Israeli Attack on Gaza Aid Ship Violates International Law
Last night, Israeli commandos boarded a Turkish aid ship on its way to Gaza. It is reported that they killed ten to fifteen activists and injured thirty more.
The flotilla was attacked in international waters, 65km off the Gaza coast. Organizers said the flotilla was carrying 10,000 tones of humanitarian aid headed to Gaza challenging the Israeli blockade.
The Israeli Army Radio said soldiers opened fire "after confronting those on board carrying sharp objects". Israel says they offered to deliver the aid if the ships turned back.
The Free Gaza Movement, the organizers of the flotilla, however, said the troops opened fire as soon as they stormed the ships. They also said they were fully within international law delivering the aid directly to Gaza.
Turkey in a written statement condemned Israel over the deadly attacks: "This deplorable incident, which took place in open seas and constitutes a fragrant breach of international law, may lead to irreparable consequences in our bilateral relations," it said.
Turkey is a member of NATO and one of the few majority Muslim countries that has diplomatic relations with Israel. Although Israel has been a major supplier of arms to Turkey, diplomatic relations have been tense following the 2008-2009 Israel attack on Gaza.
Prior to the attack on the aid ship, Israel 's Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman said, "The aid convoy is violent propaganda against Israel, and Israel will not allow its sovereignty to be threatened in any way, in any place - land, air, or sea. There is no humanitarian crisis in the Gaza strip." The UN and numerous NGO's have described the conditions in Gaza as a humanitarian disaster.
Lieberman has openly talked about ethnically cleansing Israeli citizens of Palestinian origin. In late May 2004, Lieberman proposed a plan in which the populations and territories of Israeli Jews and Arabs, including some Israeli Arabs, would be "separated." According to the plan, also known as the "Populated-Area Exchange Plan," Israeli Arab towns adjacent to Palestinian Authority areas would be transferred to Palestinian Authority, and only those Arab Israelis who migrated from the area to within Israel's new borders and pledged loyalty to the Jewish State of Israel would be allowed to remain Israeli citizens.
I was in Israel in April of this year, my first visit since 1998. I interviewed Michel Warschawski, founder of the Alternative Information Centre, who spoke about the significance of Lieberman: "it's not anymore a small lunatic right wing, like [Meir] Kahane gang 20 years ago. He's minister of foreign affairs. He's government. He's part of the coalition, an important part of the coalition. So what we have is the blatantly racist language and measures that were on the margin of Israeli politics are now in the middle."
After Israel's attack on Gaza in 2008, the UN appointed a Fact Finding Mission to investigate alleged war crimes. The mission, led by renowned South African jurist Richard Goldstone, produced a report that accused both Israel and Palestinian militias of war crimes.
The UN human rights council referred Goldstone's report to the UN General Assembly in Washington for follow-up, but under US pressure, the report never reached the Security Council for possible referral to the International Criminal Court. The Canadian government joined the US in denouncing the report.
On Thursday Amnesty International accused the US and European states of obstructing justice by using their position on the UN Security Council to shield Israel from accountability for war crimes committed in Gaza.
As long as the American, Canadian and European governments continue to allow Israel to flout international law without consequence, defend and expand illegal settlements, maintain a "secret" stockpile of nuclear weapons, sustain the siege of Gaza . . . Israel will continue on this road with impunity.
The American and Canadian elites support such actions of Israel not because they love Jews or care about a Jewish state. A long history of North American and European anti-Semitism says otherwise. They do so for their own geo-political objectives. Like most issues in the Middle East, it's mostly about oil and maintaining a system of regimes, Israeli and Arab, which make sure that fabulous oil revenues remain in very few hands.
I think most ordinary Americans and Canadians, including those of Jewish origin, do not agree with a policy of unconditional support for the increasingly fanatical direction of Israeli policy.
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Show AllI believe Hitler would harbor some feelings of pride if he knew how well his former victims have taken to methods employed by the Nazis.
Dang, now we're killing white people - when is the murderous cabal going to be put to rest !
At your Shabbat services this coming weekend, say Kaddish for those people killed or wounded by the Israeli attack on the humanitarian Peace Flotilla.
OK, I'll put it in a nutshell. Here again if the American government trys to protect Isreal from this blatant act of war in international waters, murder,and piracy; well this is a public foram. Do you get my drift? Or are you one of the brainwashed masses. Those boats along with flying the Turkish flags, were American flags flying high. Is this the U.S.A. or is it the United States of Isreal?
As far as any strong reaction is concerned, I think my money would be on the Turks. Considering the fact that the U.S. already condoned an Israeli attack on the USS Liberty, one of its naval vessels, it seems unlikely to do much about just any old ship flying a U.S. flag.
It is the policy of the U.S. government that no U.S. flag merchant ship be permitted to fall into enemy hands. However, unlike most other countries, the right of American ships and boats to fly the American flag is not explicitly spelled out by law or regulation. It stems rather from a combination of the laws determining what constitutes a vessel with American nationality, judicial precedent, and the customary international law that gives vessels of a particular nationality the right to display that flag.
REF: http://mysite.verizon.net/vzeohzt4/Seaflags/customs/law.html
Israel is a racist outlaw regime and should be isolated, sanctioned and boycotted by people of goodwill everywhere.
"Israel is a racist outlaw regime and should be isolated, sanctioned and boycotted by people of goodwill everywhere." –(Thalidomide)
While true, "boycotting Israel" is not enough. Similarly to the American empire, it must be dismantled and cease to exist as presently constituted as a malignant geo-political entity.
The discourse is not served by repressing because of squeamishness, cowardice or fear of being labeled Anti-Semitic– solely for the sake of good manners and subterfuge. What is beyond argument is now transparently obvious. It should be stated as such. That is the first step. Maintaining appearances to the contrary serves only the perpetrators of the barbarism, jeopardizing the entire human project.
While incremental action may be commendable, even necessary, one must not flinch from being satisfied with half baked solutions brokered by those with a stake in the status quo. It should be noted here that this goal is not a bio-genetic or racial effacement of a noble people in some Hitlerian racist eschatology.
As a corollary and similar to to American state terror and fascism, talk of sanctions, boycotts and all other forms of passive aggressive actions against Israel– designed to precipitate 'reforms'– would only be fig leaf solutions at best, masking continuation of what is fundamentally unconscionable, by official deception.
Having said that the politics concomitant to visionary and necessary goals are certainly anything but pragmatic, but they should–despite that– be held firmly in mind, if one is remotely serious.
Anything less is designed only to mollify the progressive ilk, to make it feel good about its own powerlessness in the face of what is implacable and obscene.
This is the same way a living array of cancer cells, in the human organism, is contraindicated to all that is beautiful in human life. It is a living death sentence.
To tolerate Israel is to repress life itself and to embrace the inhuman.
AMEN.
Israel just does not care about international opinion. This is a stick in its eye. If they really cared they could have offered to help offload the aid and in so doing been sure that no contraband was included.
Actually, an occupying country is required, under international law, to care for the needs of the people in the territory under their control. For the UN (and others) to step in merely lets Israel off the hook.
As long as the US provides 3 billion/year to Israel in mostly military aid they will continue to try to squeeze the Palestinians out. Israeli constantly carp about Palestinians wanting to drive them into the sea while doing just that, with much success, to the Palestinians.
Turkey has announced it will use its navy to escort future aid convoys. They really should be joined by many nations. Israel has made a prison camp out of Gaza, and has lost all moral standing as a nation.
Everyone should call the Whitehouse and congress and demand an immediate end to aid to Israel. Over three billion dollars is sent each year, and Israel uses it for aggression and to create mayhem in the middle east.
On the eve of the invasion of Iraq I witnessed Israeli leaders publicly demanding that the US military be used to crush Israel's neighbors. Right wing Israelis and dual citizens in the US pushed our country into wars on Iraqis and Afgans that have cost many thousands of lives and over one trillion dollars and counting. Tens of thousands of civilians were killed, including many women and children, and this has only increased hatred toward the USA.
On this memorial day I just emailed a very long list of US military who lost their lives in these senseless endless wars of aggression. We cannot allow one more US soldier to die for Zionism and big oil.
"Somehow this madness must cease" as Martin Luther King Jr said about the Vietnam War in his talk on it and other US policies in 1967. We can stand with Dr King or with the fruit cakes carrying out this madness.
AD
I am very upset and crying right now. I can't begin to express my sorrow for those brave people who were killed. The price of peace is always high, and eventually the world will find the conjones to punish Israel as they do every rogue nation. Enough is enough. My condolences go out to the families of those killed, you are all in my thoughts. make Israel pay a price.
On this Memorial Day, I remember the victims of Israel, including those who tried to help its victims, like Rachel Corrie.
But any party or pol who tried to cut off Israeli extortion payments, I mean aid, would find themselves suddenly targeted by vilification campaigns & their aid cut off.
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Just as the US has claimed the right to wage pre-emptive war on any country in the world, Israel has claimed the right to pre-emptively attack any vessel it fears in international waters. The proper US response would be to move a carrier group to the eastern end of the Mediterranean to protect its NATO ally Turkey. I wonder how the US Govt is going to spin this one? I'm sure they'll agree with 'bibi' netanyayhoo who is claiming there were weapons aboard some of the ships in the flotilla. And of course people defending themselves with knives and sticks against soldiers armed with machine guns are said to have become belligerent when the Israelis boarded their vessels.
Israel In Yo Face. Ya gotta give the Zionists credit for tenacity. They will have their way or they will take the world down with them.
You wanna see da weapons????
http://www.uruknet.info/?p=m66527&hd=&size=1&l=e
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JvS9PXZ3RWM&feature=player_embedded
Who knew the IDF had such a sense of humor? Now THAT'S comedy!
Unbelievable............
Israel's attacks on these peaceful vessels in international waters is an act of war. At the very least, the world must place sanctions on Israel.
"it's mostly about oil"
Will someone help me with this. How is supporting Israel helpful to the US in securing oil?
Are we not pissing off those who produce oil by our one sided allegiance to this rogue state?
Control of profitable source allocations, refinement facilities and delivery routings might be more accurate. In other words, "freedom", or the unfettered global rights of full spectrum dominance by USA Incorporated, especially the capitalist "free enterprise" right to exploit public resources for private gain regardless of nominal sovereignty or geopolitical boundaries and regardless of any alleged environmental consequences.
As for pissing people off, USA Incorporated's imperial motto is the same as Caligula's: Oderint Dum Metuant. (Let them hate so long as they fear.) And Israel, with its nuclear arsenal and "Samson option" policies, is an excellent ally in helping to maintain the empire's fear levels in the region. Or it has been. They've been getting a bit panicky about losing their grip recently. That's mostly what some of their recent "attack dog" demos have been about and why the U.S. keeps supporting them (so far) despite some other counter-productive side effects.
As long as Israel survives the US has a military staging point for anywhere in the middle east. Which means they project there power to any oil rich country in the region, plus defend the Suez Canal and the Strait of Hormuz, where the worlds three largest reserves of oil flow from Saudi Arabia, Iraq and Iran. As of right now the score is two compliant regimes, Saudi Arabia and Iraq. Now you may see why Obama and the neo-cons in both wings of the corporate party want regime change in Iran. One perfectly sunk oil tanker in the Strait of Hormuz cuts off the oil from the #2 & #3 oil reserves in the world.
International Law means nothing to Israel.
And the U.S. always provides the Zionists cover with the veto in the UN Security Council so no meaningful penalties or sanctions are ever used when Israel commits war crimes time after time.
At the same time Israel and its apologists defame the UN, they also use double standards in that body time and again by not making Israel account for its war crimes and crimes against humanity for which the Zionists are guilty of millions and millions of times over.
Israel dislikes the UN because the nations of the UN calls Israel on their war crimes.
"I think most ordinary Americans and Canadians, including those of Jewish origin, do not agree with a policy of unconditional support for the increasingly fanatical direction of Israeli policy."
Consistent voting for elite candidates in the US elections indicates that the great majority of USans unconditionally support business as usual on its catastrophic trajectory. And obviously those who fail to vote unconditionally support it too.
Thanatopsis.
In their graves, three men have awakened and are tossing in silent frustration. They are: Count Folke Bernadotte, French Col. Andre Serot, and Dr. Ralph Bunche.
O Israel - - what are you worshiping now?
In the present age, and also in virtually all other preceding historical ages, violations of what we humans like to devise and call by one fine-sounding name or another, International Law or Universal Humanitarian Law, have only had the remotest legal potency for redress of violations thereof, when and as the dominant nations that execute such Laws (which nations also, mostly manipulatively and cynically, write such laws to begin with), have initiated or sanctioned the violation complaint to begin with.
The acknowledgement of IL/Human Law violations, in any case, certainly only happens Today when it's in the raw power-maintenance interests of dominant nations or their proxies to acknowledge such. Israel's sociopathic conduct, here and elsewhere, being among the historically latest and perhaps most glaring example of the age-old, pathetically-easy failure of human conscience.
Still, a nation's positing of, and then rank violation of, humanitarian IL, in whatever ancient or modern form, is the reality for most of human history, and surely still for the present: as social creatures, we largely remain all-too-transfixed at the narrow tribal/national level of Self-Other perception; easily goaded, thence, to fellow mostrousness beyond our better words and nobly-intended universal ideas.
I think that if baseline humane global Law is ever to reach some minimal functional fruition, especially within present international legal structures, it would mean, for one thing, a radical re-vamp of the UN's Charter; so that the UN's General Assembly, instead of the bogusly-controlled Security Council, would become the final source of international law-making and enforcement of common human standards, as those standards come to be defined by a democratically-constituted General Assemply.
Is the human race up for such a gambit?
It doesn't seem so.
But, while it's arguable that we humans, as a commonly exact DNA tribe, seem still-hopelessly far from enforcing whatever humane International Law we've managed to devise and officially write-up to date, it is notable -- and I think cause for some degreee of unsentimentalized hope -- that we have at least succeded in defining such Law more openly and precisely since WW II, than ever before in our recorded species history -- even if via the disingenuously interested help of some deeply powerful rotters among us, and even if insufficiently few humans are momentarily paying attention to this possible advance.
If enough of us can't adduce and value any such advance like this, at least on paper, and try to build on it, we're probably destined -- sooner than we think -- to the consequence of giving up on ourselves.
That would be, in a single word, Oblivion.
Suffering from a Masada complex, Zionist Israel is setting itself up for a modern day reprise of the mass suicide of Jewish Zealots that took place in the year 73 CE on this 1300 feet rock plateau that overlooks the Dead Sea. What happened was that, under Roman siege, said Zealots chose suicide, rsther than surrender. Israelis are fed this imagery From their earliest years, with soldiers who have completed their basic and mandatory IDF training gathering for a ceremony atop the Masada which ends with the declaration that "Masada shall not fall again". Israel's modern day equivalent of Masada, assuming the settler state stays the course, will be self-instigated, but not entirely self-inflicted. What'll happen is that Israel will find itself totally isolated, as its remaining few allies pull away, rather than incur the wrath of a world that can't take Israel's crimes against humanity any longer. The worst case scenario finds Israel nuking Iran and Syria, whereupon, various doomsday possibilities come into play. The best outcome would be that the BDS movement catches on and brings Israel to its senses (assuming it has any left).
Violent propaganda?
One day soon, some nation will implement the "Delilah option" on this organized crime syndicate masquerading as a nation, and that will be that.
All that will be left is cheering so loud it could be heard on the moon.
The only way to deal with Israel is to not deal with Israel.
The major governments of the world will not do anything so it is up to each citizen to do everything in his or her power to prevent Israel from profiting off of us.
Make her pay financially. Make her companies pay financially.