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Israeli Soldiers Sell Gaza Flotilla Passengers’ Computers and Steal Hundreds of Thousands of Dollars in Cash
Israeli Government Refuses to Secure Criminal Evidence
Despite appeals from 750 passengers on the Gaza flotilla to their governments to pressure the Israeli government to protect and return their personal belongings that were taken by Israeli commandos on May 31, 2010, when they forcefully boarded the six ships of the flotilla, the Israeli government has left millions of dollars of computers, cameras and cell phones and hundreds of thousands of cash unsecured and un-inventoried.
An Israeli newspaper has revealed that four to six computers among the hundreds that were taken from passengers on the six ships have been sold by an Israeli First Lieutenant to three junior military personnel. On August 18, a second officer was arrested in connection with the theft. An Israeli military official described the case as "embarrassing and shameful." Eitan Kabel, a member of parliament from the Labour party, told Israeli media: "This is an embarrassing, humiliating and infuriating act."
Israeli government informed of passengers' property by Embassies
Passengers from the six ships gave detailed lists of their property to consular officers from their respective Embassies while the passengers were in the Beer-Shiva prison on June 2. All passengers who were flown from Israel on June 4 to Turkey also gave another list of their possessions to consular officials in Istanbul, Turkey. Most passengers followed up with letters to their respective Ministries of Foreign Affairs or Department of State and to lawyers who will be filing lawsuits for deaths and injuries inflicted by the Israeli military and claims for stolen property.
Evidence of commandos' actions on cameras, cell phones and computers should be available for independent investigation and possible criminal cases
Evidence on the flotilla passengers' cameras, cell phones and computers should be a part of the evaluation by an independent panel to determine when and where 9 passengers on the Mavi Marmara were killed and when and where 50 other passengers were wounded. With the exception of two camera cards that survived endless body inspections on the ships, in the initial processing center at Ashdod port and in the prison, all the photos and video footage taken by 750 passengers is in the possession of the Israeli government.
Hundreds of Thousands of Dollars of Cash Taken by Commandos
Israeli commandos also took cash and credit cards from passengers. A conservative estimate of $1000 cash per passenger gives a total of $750,000 cash that was taken from passengers. Commandos with weapons demanded cash from passengers stating they were "to take the money for safekeeping." Many passengers had been fundraising in their home areas to have funds to deliver to non-governmental organizations. Other passengers were taking money to families in Gaza from family members living outside of Gaza. I personally know of four persons on the passenger ships who had a total $68,000 in cash taken by commandos.
Israeli military can find out who took the equipment and money--if they want to
The Israeli military is certainly capable of finding out who took the money and equipment if they wish. The Israeli military knows exactly which military unit boarded each of the six ships, the names of each of the commandos that were on each ship and the leaders of each unit. Passengers do not know the names of the commandos as their uniforms were stripped of nametags, rank and unit insignia and they kept black masks on throughout the hours they were on the ships.
The Israeli military can order the leaders of each unit to testify if they know if any member of their unit took money or equipment and whether they have noticed if any unit member has suddenly had a change in his lifestyle that might be attributed to having stolen money or sold equipment from the passengers.
As a retired U.S. Army Colonel with 29 years in the military, I know that the barracks gossip in the military unit involved will provide some information about the stolen property and money. Checking the pawnshops near the military bases is a good bet as they are likely places that stolen goods will appear. New cars, cell phones, electronic equipment that is above the "pay-grade" of a military members is a dead give-away that the person has somehow come into new money and is living beyond his means.
U.S. military court-martials in 1984 for theft by U.S. military during Grenada invasion
I speak from experience about military personnel taking the possessions of others. In 1984, 13 soldiers from the 82nd Airborne Division of Fort Bragg, North Carolina were court-martialed and found guilty of stealing property of civilians in Grenada when the U.S. military invaded and occupied that country. I was on the U.S. military claims commission and received the complaints from Grenadians that after U.S. military personnel had occupied their houses, jewelry, money and various items were missing.
We immediately asked the criminal investigative office at Fort Bragg to go to the pawn shops around Fort Bragg to look for the items, and they found most of the them at the shops. The soldiers considered that the property of the Grenadians were "spoils of war." One young private even wrote an article for the Fayetteville, North Carolina newspaper in which he proudly described in detail what he had taken as "spoils of war." He was court-martialed and sentenced to several months in prison.
In the same manner, I suspect that the commandos decided that since their government was labeling everyone on the flotilla as "terrorists," that no one in the government would care if they took "spoils of war," the possessions of the "terrorists."
Leadership and Accountablility in the Israeli military?
I have no doubts that members of the commando units know exactly who took what and where the money and equipment is. It takes good military leadership to understand the breakdown in unit integrity and want to correct it.
We will see by the actions of the Israeli military and government what type of leadership and accountability they have.
Ann Wright is a retired US Army Reserve Colonel with 29 years of service and 16 years as a US diplomat who resigned in March, 2003 in opposition to the Iraq war. She was in Gaza three times in 2009, helped organize the 1350 person Gaza Freedom March in December, 2009 and was on the Gaza flotilla.
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34 Comments so far
Show All" It takes good military leadership to understand the breakdown in unit integrity and want to correct it."
And that is precisely what is lacking in Israel. But the IDF is the most moral army in the world, so what's to correct?
The Israel military is supposed to be one of the most tightly led militaries in the world. I find it hard to believe that a breakdown in unit integrity occurred by accident. Doesn't it sound more feasible to think that it was a tactic. The Israeli military is supposed to be so good at using tactics to gain their ends. If they had to appear and act like bandits, you can bet it was part of a strategy. The simple truth is Israel did not want these ships to do what they had set out to do, and stopped them by any means necessary. It has done this before, with the cooperation or backing of the United States. So why not now? That the world isn't buying it must come as a shock to these spoiled fascists. Israel has even gained nuclear status with the United States' cooperation. Israel stands out as the symbol of American arrogance throughout the world.
Actually, look at this incident as an indicator of military discipline within the IDF. Is this a military we want to be associated with, even if one could set aside all the other baggage that follows the IDF?
This poor level of military discipline would guarantee I would not want to go into battle with soldiers of such low ethics and morality--you never know when that low level of ethics or morality would cost you your life on the battlefield.
Little wonder Israel and its "dual citizens" wants the US to fight its wars. ANY concern for our service members would preclude our armed forces from being involved with what appear to be common thieves.
Bring America Back !!!!
**Okay then, if Col Wright advises us the IDF Assassins who killed 11 Flotilla members, would also confiscate their electronics and belongings==we are then to say, Golly gee and By Whizzy we believe it..
**To keep reporting this, Col Wright wishes the Zionists who plundered the booty, to be officially labeled as Pirates
as well.
**For many years as well, folks wonder what becomes of the foodstocks, medicins, equipment which the IDF Blockade has
halted and confiscated, and never makes it to the Gazans who are in desperate need of it.
**Perhaps if we cannot get these Genocidal Zionists convicted of war crimes, then we can prosecute them under
International high seas Piracy statutes. It is not very nice to keep our Ipods, Cellulars, PalmPilots, MP3's and DVD players. Is it ????
And Israel is a so-called Jewish state? Fundamentalists are the demons in every spiritual tradition.
This is, by any definition I have ever encountered, Piracy on the High Seas. But, when the Somali's do it...well, you know. Hang 'em from the Yardarm at dawn.
"One young private even wrote an article...in which he proudly described in detail what he had taken as 'spoils of war.'"
silly boy - these spoils belong to the government, not the grunts.
imagine if the troops started taking home oil fields - or poppies.
Check the "Democracy Now" site for Col. Wright's appearances after she returned from her brief post-flotilla detention in Israel.
Col. Wright was one of the first to report the IDF attackers' shameless looting, pillaging, and theft of the flotilla passengers' personal possessions and electronic equipment.
Frankly, I first expected the government of Israel to baldly deny this relatively minor, but significant, piece of business-- or even surreptitiously order the IDF looters to return the stolen items to avoid national embarrassment. Then, perhaps, the Israeli authorities could claim to have "located" the property ostensibly confiscated for legitimate security purposes-- and imply that irresponsible and outrageous claims of wanton theft were still more evidence of malicious anti-Semitism.
That'll teach me to underestimate the depravity of Israel's terrorist-state government and military!
Instead, illicit charges were made on stolen credit cards for weeks after they were filched. And now this.
Compared to Israel's rogue-state terrorism and genocidal policy towards the Palestinian people, the fact that the IDF forces pillaged and ripped off the flotilla members' personal possessions and equipment might seem to be a "small", relatively insignificant detail.
But it clearly stuck in Col. Wright's craw, and with good reason.
IMO, the reason it indeed matters is because this creepy robbery is like a blinking neon sign that reads "BAD FAITH". It's one element of an intentional policy of humiliating and violating the activists as far as possible.
And from all accounts, the theft was pervasive and thorough. Unlike disgusting instances in Gaza during the atrocious Operation Cast Lead, in which IDF troopers smeared feces inside civilian residences and otherwise vandalized Palestinian homes, this systematic robbery can't be explained away as the impulsive misdeeds of a few bad apples or hotheads maddened by the "heat of battle".
It's been noted a million times, but it's astonishing how thoroughly and comprehensively the Israeli authorities have internalized their historic victimhood, and incorporate the most petty and sadistic cruelties into their own Standard Operating Procedure.
It is irrefutable evidence of the Zionist government of Israel's brutal, depraved, and barbaric heart of darkness.
Inspired excellence, exhilarating in its unstinting brutality. All the more justified as it is graced with the truth.
Israelis are thieves? What a surprise.
from israel's very beginning the seeds were already there:
" ...cynicism and lawlessness that have infected this country in the 41 years of occupation.
That does not mean that there was no corruption before. There certainly was.
In my view, the corruption was born together with the state, and not by accident. A lot has been said about the Naqba on the occasion of Israel's 60th anniversary. But one phenomenon that accompanied the Naqba is consistently ignored: the massive theft of abandoned Arab property.
In the course of the 1948 flight and expulsion, some 100 to 150 thousand Arab families abandoned their homes. Many of them lived in simple dwellings, but not a few were living in elegant houses in Jaffa, Jerusalem and Haifa. What happened to the interior of these homes? To the tens of thousands of expensive carpets, fauteuils, refrigerators, wardrobes, pianos? Where did the inventories of shops and stores go?
They disappeared.
...We knew and talked about this at the time. For years one could see the sofas and armchairs covered with velvet draping in private living rooms and offices. But the phenomenon was never investigated, and later on was smothered and suppressed.
...The theft in broad daylight of the property abandoned by individuals already violated the ethos that was accepted before the foundation of the state. The denial and suppression made it worse. But the large-scale corruption, whose bitter fruit we see now in all its ugliness, started indeed with the occupation in 1967.
The occupation is corrupt, and it corrupts by its very nature. It denies all human rights, including the right to property. It fills the occupied territories with an atmosphere of general lawlessness. It enriches the occupier and everybody connected with him. It creates a climate of wanton cynicism, an environment of "anything goes". Such an atmosphere does not stop at the Green Line. It permeates the state of the conqueror.
That's where the rot set in."
uri avnery
This only perpetuates the obviously spurious myth that once property comes into the hands of Jewish people it is almost impossible to get them to give it back. I'm certain that Israeli authorities will move swiftly to dispel this false perception by returning to the passengers their belongings, lest certain virulent anti-semitic detractors use the accusation of piracy to reinforce common stereotypes about Jewish acquisitiveness. These are Israel's finest after all, not a pack of masked thieves. What a shame if all of Israel's famous generosity and fair mindedness should be compromised by this isolated incident of apparent viciousness and larceny.
A minor masterpiece of mordantly black humor all the more true for its unflinching brutality.
I agree, of course-- and it's telling that Israeli authorities are either unaware of, or indifferent to, being caught out here. They are usually quick to deploy one of their patented one-size-fits-all fig leaves to hide their shame.
Not that I wish to summon them, but it's likewise notable that neither the well-known hasbarist True Believers nor newcomers (or the newly-nymed) have ventured their usual spin here.
Yeah, what a guy! Furfarshtinkimfumkaupf, voxclamantis.
vox, i have to tell you, i have never heard this spurious myth. Dont get me wrong, i understand your intention. But, truth be told, i didn't know that particular 'slander'.
It must be one of those things.....
rita
Really?
They also have aquired all the worlds' banks, plus it's movie industry, (except the Hindu's Bollywood) and they also hold these secret meetings, where they draw up secret "protocols" for world economic domination!
Oh, and they all wear secret little bags of gold around their necks...
I am surprised they didn't also take and sell the body parts of the activists that they so viciously murdered.
I wonder what Colonel Wright thinks of those American Jews who join Israel's army, rather than the US military, as a way to get ahead in the US. I also wonder how many politicians who take Israel Lobby money agree that Americans who enlist in Israel's military are wiser than those who enlist in the US military. When those politicians claim to defend the interests of active duty soldiers and of veterans, we should ask if they mean Israel's or the US's.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/in-desperate-search-for-
recruits-israeli-army-targets-foreigners-2004793.html
"We will see by the actions of the Israeli military and government what type of leadership and accountability they have."
We already know what kind of accountability and leadership they have: corrupt, brutal, illegal.
It seems very doubtful at best that the U. S. government will do anything positive to address this theft, or that Israel will cooperate with any investigation of the flotilla murders.
There is something that U. S. and global citizens can do, however. They can join the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement to pressure Israel into halting apartheid in Palestine and to work toward a peaceful solution (and not with a sham series of peace talks brokered by the USA, the main instigator of violence in the Middle East).
Here in Port Townsend, Washington, a local BDS group has undertaken a campaign to start a boycott of Israeli products sold in the store. One other co-op in the state (in Olympia) has already formally instituted a boycott; that boycott made the front page in Israeli newspapers. Other co-ops across the country are considering BDS actions. It is a movement that is gathering momentum.
BDS provides people a strong, nonviolent tool to help bring about justice in Israel-Palestine. We don't need to pretend that our elected officials will represent us and do the right thing. They don't, and they don't. We can effect change directly and nonviolently, as happened in South Africa (and Archbishop Desmond Tutu endorsed the Olympia food co-op boycott).
Please visit our Port Townsend BDS page and consider writing a letter of support for the boycott proposal to our co-op board of directors.
Thanks.
Port Townsend (Jefferson County, Wash.) BDS:
http://jeffcowabds.wordpress.com/
Olympia, Wash. BDS:
http://www.olympiabds.org/
The Global Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions Movement:
http://www.bdsmovement.net/
Why the surprise? The Israelis have been stealing Palestinian land for decades. Thieves are thieves. They are war criminals, for christ sake! No atrocity they commit should surprise anyone with a brain!
captain kidds waxed shylocks!
'Steal a little and they throw you in jail
Steal a lot and they make you king' - Bob Dylan
The politicians & the arms dealers & the phonies across the globe have kept this Mafia disguised as a country of victims in business for 62 years . . . they'll hardly blink at the pilfering of some electronics & other personal effects . . .
Are we surprised?
How do you know when an Israeli official is lying?
Their lips move.
Sorry, an old joke. I couldn't resist.
A bit like "We are not using white phosphorus. We are not using white phosphorus. We are not using white phosphorus. We are not using white phosphorus. Oh, yes we are actually using white phosphorous in a city, but it's fine, really."
Or "We don't use civilians as human shields. We don't use civilians as human shields. We don't use civilians as human shields. We don't use civilians as human shields. Oh, sorry apart from all those times. I didn't think you meant the Neighbour procedure."
It's clear that lying is the first act of the information war. Lie until the truth comes out & you can't sustain it. But by then your lie is out there.
Actually the version I would hear is:
"We are not using white phosphorus. We are not using white phosphorus. We are not using white phosphorus...."... 3 months later: "Oh, yes we used white phosphorous on civilians, but that is such old news. We need to more forward, not dwell on the past."
No, that's what I meant.
Lie like a rug.
I will ask the manager of my local supermarket whether they sell anything which originates in any part of Israel. I will explain to him that a growing number of his more educated and civilized customers will find any collaboration with the likes of Israel to be conduct which should be criminalized as conduct aiding and abetting genocide, murder, kidnapping, torture, massive theft, to name a few entries from Israel's decades old record of virulence against all standards of human decency. I intend to duplicate this conduct with every other retailer with whom I consider doing business. And will refuse to do business with Zionist sympathizers and enablers.
In the name of decency, may I implore you to do the same. Make certain you are clear as to why you are taking the action you are. Use the opportunity of shopping to do something noble and worthwhile, to erase indecency from the earth.
Drain the Israeli sewer before it brings the entire human race down.
"Use the opportunity of shopping to do something noble and worthwhile..."
I don't think this is what junior had in mind when he urged Americans to "keep on shoppin'."
Yours is a worthy idea.
What was the $750,000 for?
were they going to buy souvineers for the nieces and nephews perhaps
Or pay for their hotel bills. $1000 per person would just about pay for a weeks tourist excursion in Europe. Maybe they expected to be there longer, in any case it's a pretty minimal figure, bet there were people carrying more to NGO's and relatives.
Zionists have been stealing Palestinian land and resources for over 60 years, why should we expect them to behave any differently when it comes to anyone else's personal possessions?