Gaza.

Freedom Flotilla Raises the White Flag - 5 Things You Need To Know

Sometimes, the thing which our heart most desires, our mind knows will be difficult to achieve.  So it is with the Freedom Flotilla which was surrounded and attacked by Israeli armed forces.  

As always in the heat of the moment there is a lot of confusion - some of it it perhaps being deliberately perpetrated - but even through the confusion there are a number of things that stand out.

The ship upon which the violence took place was the Mavi Marmara which was carrying 500 civilians.  The other ships left in flotilla were taken without violence.

1) The flotilla was attacked in international waters

Having spent time getting a legal minion to discuss how the maritime blockade of Gaza is legal (but only if Israel admits it is in a state of war with Gaza) and how Israel is perfectly within it’s rights to stop the flotilla reaching Gaza, Israel then attacks the flotilla in international waters - nowhere near the actual blockade. This was a clear ploy to gain an element of surprise rather than letting the flotilla actually reach the blockade before taking any military action.

All that talk about advertising the blockade through the proper maritime channels and insistence on the legality of it is now so much chaff in the wind.

This is the fact that is first and foremost in any discussion of this event.  Israel committed an act of piracy in international waters and this is not being disputed by anybody - even Israel as they are clearly focusing upon the violence of the activists rather than their illegal attack upon the ship which was the cause of the activists resistance.

2 ) The Israelis blocked and targeted communications from the ships and now control information about the attack

There were reports of Israelis jamming communications from the ship and what is now clear is that that the early video footage that we saw from the activists has been quickly replaced as Israel itself is furnishing the media with it’s own footage showing how IDF ‘commandos’ (we use the term loosely in this instance for reasons we’ll get to later) were attacked as they boarded the ship from a hovering helicopter, how the activists on board had weapons which apparently consisted of knives, slingshots and iron rods.

Now Israel is controlling the details of what is known about the attack and imposing its own narrative. The UK media seems to have settled on the figure of nine deaths, though you have to go to Israeli sources to hear that 46 civilians from the ship have been hospitalised, 9 of whom are in a serious condition.

It is telling that the stories of the activists involved in the attack have yet to be given airtime.  It will be no surprise when the activists do not corroborate the version of events that Israel would have us believe - in fact, it is unlikely that activists will be given much airtime once the initial flurry of media attention has died down.  Israeli spin-merchants know this to be the case which is why they are continuing to hold them illegally.

3) The Israeli ‘commandos’ were clearly ill prepared

The early activist feed from the Mavi Marmara indicated that the ship was surrounded on all sides by Israeli naval forces, and that tear gas and stun grenades had already been used against them perhaps before the ‘commandos’ stormed the boat from a hovering helicopter.

According to Captain Aria Shaliker the IDF initially boarded with paintball weapons in an attempt to disperse the crowd only then switching to from paint ball to live ammunition.  But his story is discredited by the official IDF Spokesperson website which claims that:

IDF forces apprehended two violent activists holding pistols. The violent activists took these pistols from IDF forces and apparently opened fire on the soldiers as evident by the empty pistol magazines.

What is critical here is the timing of events.  If the IDF so-called ‘commandos’ were armed only with paintball weapons, how could the activists have taken pistols from them which contained live ammunition?

But there is something here even more worrying, for the Israeli government at least. How could it be that a heavily armed and apparently fully prepared and briefed fighting force were outmanoeuvred by a bunch of civilians.  There were quite clearly major flaws in whatever plan they were executing and the ‘commandos’ were caught off guard. There are a number of points to note:-

• Was the entire military plan really to send 3 or 4 soldiers abseiling from a helicopter directly into a crowd of people armed only with paintball guns?  We should note that the 5 other ships had already succumbed to these tactics, but given that the people on board the Mavi Marmara numbered 600 - far more then the other ships, given that they must have known that they were the last ship, and the last hope of success for the flotilla, the psychology of the people on board would have been different from that of people on board a boat with 30 or 40 individuals.  Did the IDF really not expect any resistance?
• Capt. Aria Shaliker tells us that the IDF went straight from paintball weapons to live ammunition, but we have heard that tear gas and stun grenades had been used.  Let us suppose that Aria Shaliker is telling the truth.  That IDF ‘commandos’ had been armed only with paintball weapons.  Why was tear gas not used to create a space for the ‘commandos’ to land?  
• Why did the commandos not board the ship at a point from which it would be more difficult to attack them, rather than dropping down directly on to the top deck into a crowd of people?
• Why was surrender of the ship not negotiated before the ‘commandos’ boarded? If surrender could not be negotiated then the ‘commandos’ could expect to meet resistance.
• In Israeli footage (in fact, in this footage, what appear to be paintball guns can clearly be discerned), the ‘commandos’ can be seen clearly to board the ship almost one by one. They are not co-ordinated in any way, shape or form.  The first ‘commando’ down appears to have been thrown overboard before the 5th or 6th ‘commando’ hits the deck - though it is hard to say what the actual sequence of events was without access to unedited footage. Have the Israeli navy and IDF really not trained for boarding ships in such a way as to ensure the safety of the first man down…
• … In fact Maj. Gen. Marom specifically stated that his soldiers would not be “dragged into provocations”. And yet, they clearly were.  He apparently staged a series of exercises which consisted of stopping the flotilla, gaining control of the ships, and taking them to Israel. Did these military exercises assume no resistance to their actions?
• Why was the death toll so high?  Why did the IDF soldiers not shoot to injure rather than shoot to kill?  The official version of events states that activists took pistols with live ammunition from IDF soldiers and then used those pistols against the IDF, and yet there are no reports of IDF soldiers with actual bullet wounds, but only that they are in critical condition after being beaten.  There is no reason to expect a civilian to shoot a pistol in a professional way and actually hit anything, however, a trained soldier should be expected to not aim to specifically kill even an armed civilian but to aim to disarm or incapacitate them without mortal injury. Why was this not the priority given that the IDF knew that the eyes of the world would be upon them?

The above is a damaging list of strategic errors not befitting a professional navy and army.  You would not see this from the SAS for instance, who adhere very strictly to the 7 Ps.

4) There are apparently plans to prosecute those involved in attacking soldiers

Reuters reports that Israel is gathering evidence to prosecute activists who attacked the IDF soldiers.  It will be interesting to see under which law the prosecutions are brought given that Israel attacked the ship in international waters.  One wonders if those soldiers involved in shooting and killing 9 activists on behalf of Israel in international waters will be held to account under the same laws.

5) The legality of the authorisation of the attack is actually in question within the Israeli government

The legal authority of the authorisation of the attack is in question as Haaretz reports:

Senior ministers have been sharply critical of the fact that the decision to seize control of the flotilla to Gaza was made after two meetings of the forum of seven senior ministers but without official deliberation by the inner cabinet, the body that has the authority to approve military actions of this scale.

Of the 2 sessions held by the government to discuss the flotilla, much of the second session:-

…was devoted not to the military operation but rather to media and public relations issues surrounding the issue.

A government concerned more with style than substance is not likely to impress the need for a safe and professional execution of the mission upon it’s commanders.

The Political Fallout

It is quite surprising that so many things happened so quickly.  A meeting of the UN Security Council, a scheduled meeting of the UN Human Rights Council, an emergency meeting of NATO.  Ambassadors have been recalled, and all the right noises are being made…. but what will concrete action will result from this flurry of diplomatic endeavour - in particular Turkey is being very active against Israel - is far from certain.

IDF Propoganda 101

Apparently, the IDF and Israeli Navy will “act with judgement and accomplish the mission”.

According to the decision made by the Israeli government, the IDF and the Israeli Navy are getting prepared to prevent the flotilla from reaching the shores of Gaza. The flotilla’s passengers will be given the opportunity to turn back at any stage of their trip or to give up the control of their ships.

From the moment of their departure, the ships will receive formal warnings at various stages of their journey, requesting them to stop their trip to Gaza’s shores.

 Should the passengers decide to continue the journey and not take the Israeli Navy’s warning into consideration, they will be arrested, brought to Israel’s shores and transferred to the Ministry of Interior and the immigration authorities so they can be sent back to their country of origin.

The security forces will grab hold of the aid expected to be brought to Gaza by the flotilla, and after a security check of the goods, they will be transferred into the Gaza Strip.

Read more directly from the IDF.  Of course, the IDF fail to mention that boarding unarmed civilian ships in international waters and arresting peaceful activists amounts to piracy and false imprisonment. As usual, the mass media is quiet on this issue.

UPDATE (28 May 2010):

IDF admitting it will commit illegal piracy during briefing?

Israel allows goods in… but they are ruined and worthless

Ma’an — Gaza merchants were relieved last week when Israeli officials announced stocks relegated to storage units in Ashdod since 2007 were finally set to be transferred in, easing a three-year ban on clothing imports. 

However, when merchants recieved the goods on Thursday, they were damaged beyond repair.

Merchants who gained permission to import goods into Gaza were forced to pay to store the goods in shipping containers in the Israeli port of Ashdod, only to discover that their wares were not on the list of the less than 50 items permitted into the coastal enclave under Israel’s blockade.

Khan Younis clothing retailer Khaled Abu Sahlul said he was devastated when he unpacked a container of jeans stored in Ashdod since 2007. “I was shocked when I opened the containers, the jeans had been left out in the rain for days, months, maybe even years and were damaged beyond repair.” 

Abu Sahlul estimated that 80% of his order was not fit for sale, “What am I going to do with 35,000 pairs of soiled jeans?” he asked.

Read more…