爱:

Dis is truly madness Y should the international community tolerate this i cant believe wat i am seeing on Al jazeera. Israel should be punished for for its excesses ,

4 Play:

Why didn't these ''activists'' ship the goods to Ashdod and then have it transported to Gaza by land instead of attacking the soldiers? They are more interested in staging a publicity stunt than the actual mechanics of bringing aid into Gaza. Can they please stage the same operation for Darfur, people are actually starving in African conflicts.

The aim of the fleet was to highlight the three-year Israeli and Egyptian blockade of Gaza, imposed after the Islamist movement Hamas fought a bloody civil war for control of the coastal enclave with its secular rivals Fatah.

ElRazur:

By the way boarding of a ship in international waters amount to piracy

ElRazur:

Have stated before Piracy may not be applicable to here. I am not legal eagle, however I do share this point. UK patrols board ships and intercept them before the even reach UK waters. Should that be piracy? Russsia do the same is that Piracy too? Iran have boarded suspect boat in international waters [and with very good reason too].

Ikomi:

Now lets even imagine that there was to be a check which was practically unnecesary as they were informed this convoy would be coming through, they could as well have warned that they would like to come on board to do a check.

But to kill 20 unarmed men is just sending a clear message that Isreal would not tolerate any aid for Gaza citizens.

ElRazur:

From the way it stands, the use of weapons on "unarmed" civilians is bad. Very bad. However, one can make a point that if proper channels was followed - i.e not trying to undermine the routine in which aids are let in - it could have possibly prevented this?

The deaths would be investigated, and like I have said before. It is early days and more news will be coming out. So far, it looks very bad for Israel.

By the way, the killing of 20 people, do not in my opinion suggest they do not want aid in. After all, aids was getting in all along, but slowly. I instead, see it as "do not confront us and follow the right channels" but then this is my view and my view only.

ElRazur:

Another thing I was just thinking is that those known peace protesters on board, may not be aware of the whole situation. For example, they may have been assured no weapons were on board etc. But reports coming out, says other wise.

They may have lend their names and what not in good faith, but like I said the motives of the whole aid convoy looks suspicious from where I stand. Like someone said before, let them do this kind of thing to say Dafur - and perhaps they would not have followed the proper channels?

Just a thought.

Ikomi:

Dont try to make things up, one of the occupants on the ship is just speaking on BBC, she said they were expecting Isreali soldiers to board and do a peaceful check but from the air dropping from there helicopters they opened fire.

ElRazur dont try to make things up.

Ikomi:

I answered that question above if you were reading and not biased.

Here it is again:

I just hope you guys that want to always side with evil dont  allow what you preach descend on you. If you agree its bad there is no argument round it. At what point do we start mending fences, must we always relate to what has passed and that because of this or that then innocent people have to be killed.  

ElRazur:

Again, it is bad. I cannot stress that enough. Once again, we need to look at the bigger picture. How do you propose fences can be mend?

For example, these problems goes deeper than the incident reported here, but as it stand focus is mainly on the incident at hand. We have done this before and am not sure it's got us no where. I.e a comprehensive approach is needed as for every reaction, there was something that led to that in the first place.

Once again I have stated that I regret the loss of lives, and the whole situation as it stand looks bad, but one cannot just say that without looking at the various background issue to it.

Ikomi:

And all am trying to make you undestand is that there is practically no background issue, including those we know and those we dont know that is only known to Mr ElRazur that justifies the killing of innocent citizens on international waters.

What would have been the reaction if it was the other way round lets imagine it was Iran that carried out this atrocity would we be looking at background issues?

Ikomi:

Let me tell you, you and your Isrealis better get ready to kill more innocent citizens cause the move now would be to send all aid in from many nations, lets see how many background issues you can come up with.

Ikomi:

Let me tell you, you and your Isrealis better get ready to kill more innocent citizens cause the move now would be to send all aid in from many nations, lets see how many background issues you can come up with.

ElRazur:

Israel did ask them to go through proper channels, but as to why this was not heeded is something that is there for people to make their own mind on. The vessel setting sail do not just happen in a day, things have to be uploaded, logistics made etc. And in the meantime, talks going on to avert this sort of mess.

JERUSALEM — The Israeli Navy raided a flotilla carrying thousands of tons of supplies for Gaza in international waters on Monday morning, killing at least 10 people, according to the Israeli military and activists traveling with the flotilla. Some Israeli media reports put the death toll higher.

The incident drew widespread international condemnation, with Israeli envoys summoned to explain their country’s actions in several European countries.

The criticism offered a propaganda coup to Israel’s foes, particularly the Hamas group that holds sway in Gaza, and damaged its ties to Turkey, one of its most important Muslim partners and the unofficial sponsor of the Gaza-bound convoy. Ankara recalled its ambassador to Israel and Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan cut short a visit to Latin America to return.

The killings also coincided with preparations for a planned visit to Washington on Tuesday by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

The Israeli Defense Forces said more than 10 people were killed when naval personnel boarding the six ships in the aid convoy met with “live fire and light weaponry including knives and clubs.” The naval forces then “employed riot dispersal means, including live fire,” the military said in a statement.

“That is a lie,” said Greta Berlin, a leader of the pro-Palestinian Free Gaza Movement, speaking by telephone from Cyprus. She said it was inconceivable that the civilian passengers on board would have been “waiting up to fire on the Israeli military, with all its might.”

“We never thought there would be any violence,” she said.

At least four Israeli soldiers were injured in the operation, some from gunfire, according to the military.

A military statement said two activists were later found with pistols they had taken from Israeli commandos. The activists, the military said, had apparently opened fire “as evident by the empty pistol magazines.”

The warships first intercepted the convoy of cargo and passenger boats shortly before midnight on Sunday, according to activists on one vessel. Israel had vowed not to let the flotilla reach the shores of Gaza, where the Islamic militant group Hamas holds sway.

Named the Freedom Flotilla, and led by the Free Gaza Movement and a Turkish organization, Insani Yardim Vakfi, the convoy was the most ambitious attempt yet to break Israel’s three-year blockade of Gaza.

About 600 passengers were said to be aboard the vessels, including the 1976 Nobel Peace Prize laureate, Mairead Corrigan-Maguire of Northern Ireland, and a Holocaust survivor, Hedy Epstein, 85.

“What we have seen this morning is a war crime,” said Saeb Erakat, the chief Palestinian negotiator. “These were civilian ships carrying civilians and civilian goods — medicine, wheelchairs, food, construction materials.”

“What Israel does in Gaza is appalling,” he added. “No informed and decent human can say otherwise.”

At a press conference on Monday in Jerusalem, Israeli deputy foreign minister, Danny Ayalon said the flotilla’s intent was “not to transfer humanitarian things to Gaza” but to break the Israeli blockade.

“This blockade is legal,” he said, “and aimed at preventing the infiltration of terror and terrorists into Gaza.”

Ms. Berlin, of the Free Gaza Movement, said, “They attacked us this morning in international waters. According to the coordinates, we were 70 miles off the Israeli coast.”

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had been scheduled to meet President Obama in Washington on Tuesday for talks on the Middle East peace process. Some media reports from Jerusalem said that Mr. Netanyahu might delay his visit.

Within hours, diplomatic repercussions began to spread from the Mediterranean to Europe where Catherine Ashton, the European Union’s high representative for foreign affairs, called for a full inquiry into the incident and the immediate lifting of the Israeli blockade of Gaza.

A joint statement from Robert Serry and Filippo Grandi, two senior United Nations officials involved in the Middle East peace process and humanitarian aid to Gaza, condemned the raid, which they said was “apparently in international waters.”

“We wish to make clear that such tragedies are entirely avoidable if Israel heeds the repeated calls of the international community to end its counterproductive and unacceptable blockade of Gaza,” the officials said.

President Nicolas Sarkozy of France called Israel’s use of force “disproportionate,” while William Hague, the British foreign secretary, said he deplored the loss of life.

Turkey strongly condemned the Israeli military action.

“Regardless of any reasoning, such actions against civilians engaged in only peaceful activities are unacceptable,” said a statement on the Foreign Ministry’s Web site on Monday. “Israel will be required to face the consequences of this act that involves violation of the international law.”

“Israel launched this operation in international waters and to a ship flagged white, which is unacceptable under any clause of the international law,” the head of the Turkish Grand National Assembly’s Foreign Affairs Commission, Murat Mercan, said on the Turkish station NTV.

“We are going to see in the following days whether Israel has done it as a display of decisiveness or to commit political suicide.”

Thousands of protesters gathered in Istanbul’s busy Taksim Square, chanting anti-Israeli slogans and repeating Islamic verses while government officials called for calm and urged demonstrators to avoid retaliation against Israeli nationals.

Protesters met in front of the Israeli Consulate earlier and marched toward the square carrying a banner that read, “Zionist Embassy Should Close down,” and chanting slogans including “Damn Israel,” and “Long Live Global Intifada.”

Crowds also gathered outside the Ankara residence of Gabi Levi, the Israeli ambassador, who was summoned to the Foreign Ministry.

Ban Ki-moon, the United Nations secretary general, said Israel should provide a full explanation of what happened. News reports said the authorities in Egypt and Jordan, two Arab neighbors which have peace treaties with Israel, had summoned Israeli envoys to protest the action.

The outcry from Muslim leaders was strong and immediate. Mahmoud Abbas, the Palestinian president, called the incident “a massacre,” according to the official Wafa news agency. Mr. Abbas is to meet with President Obama in Washington next week.

Saad Hariri, the Lebanese prime minister, denounced the raid as “a dangerous and crazy step that will exacerbate tensions in the region,” while the president of Iran, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, said it was “inhuman.”

Channel 10, a private television station in Israel, quoted the Israeli trade minister, Binyamin Ben-Eliezer, as saying between 14 and 16 people had been killed. He said on Israeli Army Radio that commandos boarded the ships by sliding down on ropes from a hovering helicopter and were then struck by passengers with “batons and tools.”

“The moment someone tries to snatch your weapon, to steal your weapons, that’s where you begin to lose control,” Mr. Ben-Eliezer said, quoted by Reuters.

Jamal El Shayyal, a reporter from the television broadcaster Al Jazeera, was on board the Mavi Marmara, the largest of the six ships, during the assault. He said in a video report that dozens of civilians had been injured in the fighting.

The I.D.F. said the ships from the convoy would be taken to the Israeli port of Ashdod, north of Gaza, where “naval forces will perform security checks in order to identify the people on board the ships and their equipment.”

On Sunday, three Israeli Navy missile boats had left the Haifa naval base in northern Israel a few minutes after 9 p.m. local time, planning to intercept the flotilla. After asking the captains of the boats to identify themselves, the navy told them they were approaching a blockaded area and asked them either to proceed to Ashdod or return to their countries of origin.

The activists responded that they would continue toward their destination, Gaza.

Speaking by satellite phone from the Challenger 1 boat, which has foreign legislators and other high-profile figures on board, a Free Gaza Movement leader, Huwaida Arraf, said: “We communicated to them clearly that we are unarmed civilians. We asked them not to use violence.”

Earlier Sunday, Ms. Arraf said the boats would keep trying to move forward “until they either disable our boats or jump on board.”

Ikomi:

Look there are two things I want to make you understand:

1. There is no background issue that justifies killing of innocent citizens on international waters.

2. Isreal imposed an illegal blockade on Gaza, and truly has no right to tell any harmless individual how to get to Gaza. That is the point this convoy is trying to make and somehow they have succeded.

If you agree with those two points, then truly as you said we have no argument here.

Ikomi:

Look there are two things I want to make you understand:

1. There is no background issue that justifies killing of innocent citizens on international waters.

2. Isreal imposed an illegal blockade on Gaza, and truly has no right to tell any harmless individual how to get to Gaza. That is the point this convoy is trying to make and somehow they have succeded.

If you agree with those two points, then truly as you said we have no argument here.

Palasteine point of view - We are suffering, we are caged in etc.

Israeli point of view - We gave back what we could and now they allow their people to fire on us. etc

joeycrack:



For those talking about Israel giving Gaza back, yes Israel did give most of Gaza back but built walls around it. In a prison most of the land is for the prisoners but we know who still control it. If Israel was serious about a two state solution it would have stopped its settlement expansion and wouldn't be denying that there is a humanitarian crisis as Talya Lador-Fresher consistently does.

ElRazur:

That is not taking sides or welcoming the death or "unarmed" civilians, but being objective, non-bias. That is my point, that you so far have refused to recognise.

I do not support the killing of innocent civilians on international waters, however there are background issues which brought this incident about.

ElRazur:

This is where we see things different am afraid.

Let me make a few things clear. No where in my post is any form of justification. I cannot be clear enough on that.

Secondly, if you say there is no background issue, but then make a point in the same breathe about of of the background issues leading to the over all problem, then it shows you are missing the point, and only want to push across your view without being objective or non-biased.

Go back to my post, I have stated the view in which a Palestine see the issue and how an Israeli probably seen the issue too. Yet, you seem hell bent on just seeing one side.

Here is a quote of what I said previously
I also stated that both sides have a valid point, but they are not doing enough to change my view that one need out-weighs the other. Hence why I stated that background issues must be sorted.

Until the issue of Gaza, land control/ownership is sorted and other complications, it will forever be a springboard for incident like this.

That is not taking sides or welcoming the death or "unarmed" civilians, but being objective, non-bias. That is my point, that you so far have refused to recognise.

4 Play:

There are walls demarcating Israel from Gaza, which Israel is fully entitled to build. Claiming that Israel built a wall ''around'' Gaza is a pathetic lie.

Humanitarian crises my foot, if that is a humanitarian crises, what would you call most of Africa?

Ikomi:

I wonder why you always put a smile at the end of your post possibly your view sounds good to you and you alone.

Let me in one sentence tell you what you are saying:

I am making it clear to you, background issues or not, the killing is unjustified, and am afraid your just bent on standing on a fence and putting your ear to the ground, which is somewhat an impossible task.

You cannot claim to be un-biased while not totally condemning an act of piracy and murder, as the investigation will soon declare.

I am not ready for another fruitless effort of round tripping. Good day.