June 3, 2010

On The Gaza Flotilla Kerfuffle

Hard Astarboard is a pro-Israel blog.

We view the Jewish State as a staunch ally and friend of the United States, and the only real free country/democracy in the Middle East. We view those entities such as European countries, third world cesspools and the U.N. who support Palestinian terrorism to be lower than dirt, and yes, we do not for a second believe that countries like France or orgs like the U.N., or Barack Obama and his pastor Rev. Wright, for that matter are and among others are, despite any protestations to the contrary, spineless scumbags who endorse anything, no matter how abominable, that Hamas, Islamic Jihad and the rest of those cowardly murderers of women and children do to the Israelis.

That said, what happened a few days ago aboard the Mavi Marmara, the circumstances surrounding the events and the subsequent “outrage” directed toward Israel have all been typical in that once again, Israel’s actions of self defense have been translated as acts of monstrous aggression against innocent “victims”.

Right.

A couple of videos of what actually transpired are here and here.

These so-called “peace” activists attempting to run the Gaza naval blockade under the transparent guise of ferrying in humanitarian supplies, actually came equipped with bats and other blunt instruments to use in assaulting Israeli military personnel when they boarded the ship, Mavi Maramara, to inspect her cargo, and assault them they did.

The Israelis acted in pure self defense and with great restraint and there people on both sides were tossed in the hurt locker, some terminally so, and as is forever the case the corrupt, left wing world smelly body known as the United Nations and the rest of the usual suspects made victims of the aggressors.

Protests were held throughout the Middle East and Europe on Monday in reaction to Israel’s commando raid on a Turkish ship ferrying supplies to Palestinians that left at least nine people dead.

Israel defended the raid and posted video on the Internet showing Israeli soldiers during the raid being attacked with metal pipes and knives by the Turkish ship’s crew.

The incident prompted Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to cancel a planned visit to Washington for a meeting with President Obama set for Tuesday.

In New York, the U.N. Security Council, prompted by Arab governments, convened a special session to discuss the incident, which took place in international waters near Gaza. The Palestinians and Arabs, backed by a number of council members including Turkey, also called for Israel to lift the blockade on Gaza, immediately release the ships and humanitarian activists, and allow them to deliver their goods.

Assistant Secretary-General Oscar Fernandez-Taranco said in his briefing to the U.N.’s most powerful body that the early-morning bloodshed would have been avoided “if repeated calls on Israel to end the counterproductive and unacceptable blockade of Gaza had been heeded.”

The White House issued a statement saying it regretted the loss of life. “The president also expressed the importance of learning all the facts and circumstances around this morning’s tragic events as soon as possible,” it said.

At the State Department, spokesman P.J. Crowley, said, “We are working to ascertain the facts, and expect that the Israeli government will conduct a full and credible investigation.”

Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak telephoned Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton and National Security Adviser James L. Jones to explain the raid. In a statement from Mr. Barak’s office, the minister said the raid was within maritime law. “The passengers on the Marmara beat our soldiers with every object they had and wounded some of them,” the statement quoted Mr. Barak as saying. “The soldiers defended themselves.”

Not, of course, that that makes any difference, and being of one mind with their fellow leftists in the U.S. Justice Department, such as Attorney General Eric Holder who condemned the recently passed Arizona anti-illegal immigration bill without first reading the ten page document, the U.N. Security Council was quick to condemn Israel without first investigating the chain of events involved in the flotilla incident.

From CNS News:

The rapid condemnation of Israel by the United Nations Security Council (UNSC), made without a full knowledge of the facts, makes the international body look “ridiculous,” says a leading Middle East expert.

“It makes the United Nations look ridiculous when it comes to solving world problems,” Michael Rubin, a Middle East scholar at the conservative American Enterprise Institute, told CNSNews.com. “After all, the United Nations reacted much more swiftly and with much more fervor to this than they did with regard to the North Korean sinking of the South Korean boat, which could precipitate a war that could kill millions.”

The U.N. is ridiculous when it comes to anything it does, in a tragic sort of way.

The UNSC statement, issued May 31, “condemns” Israel’s actions in boarding a fleet carrying pro-Hamas activists, an operation in which activists aboard one of the vessels attacked Israeli sailors who had boarded the boat. Ten of the so-called activists were killed when the Israeli sailors returned fire in what Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu called self-defense.

However, the UNSC condemnation repeatedly admits that the Security Council has no “independent information” and no idea as to the actual chain of events.

According to the statement, U.N. Assistant Secretary General for Political Affairs Oscar Fernandez-Taranco, who briefed the Security Council on the incident, nonetheless “[made] clear the United Nations has no ‘independent information on what transpired.’”

Fernandez-Taranco also told the council that “it is not possible to state definitively the sequence or details of what happened.”

Nevertheless, the council condemned Israel, citing the loss of civilian life and saying, “The Council, in this context, condemns those acts which resulted in the loss of at least 10 civilians and many wounded, and expresses its condolences to their families.”

The UNSC condemnation does not offer condolences or express its regret for the six Israeli sailors who were injured after being attacked by activists with knives, stun grenades, and guns.

…does not offer condolences or express its regret for the six Israeli sailors who were injured after being attacked by activists with knives, stun grenades, and guns.

Why would they do that, when it is their unwritten policy to support anti-Israeli terrorism and anything that supports the terrorists?

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu

…hotly rejected calls to lift a blockade on Hamas-ruled Gaza on Wednesday, insisting the ban prevents missile attacks on Israel and labeling worldwide criticism of his navy’s bloody raid on a pro-Palestinian flotilla as “hypocrisy.”

“This was not the ‘Love Boat,’” Netanyahu said in an address to the nation, referring to the vessel boarded by commandos, setting off clashes that led to the deaths of nine activists. “It was a hate boat.”

Shortly after his address, planes carrying hundreds of activists detained after the raid on the six-boat flotilla started leaving for Turkey and Greece. Turkey has been pressuring Israel to release the detainees, most of whom are Turkish. Also on the planes were the bodies of the nine dead.

While Israeli officials spent most of the day trying to contain the flood of diplomatic condemnation of the raid, Netanyahu was anything but conciliatory in his first nationally broadcast comments since Monday’s military action.

“Israel is facing an attack of international hypocrisy,” he said, asserting that the Jewish state is the victim of an Iran-backed campaign to arm the Hamas rulers of Gaza with missiles that could hit Tel Aviv and Jerusalem.

Netanyahu said the aim of the flotilla was to break the blockade, not to bring aid to Gaza. If the blockade ended, he warned, hundreds of ships would bring in thousands of missiles from Iran, to be aimed at Israel and beyond.

The result, he said, would be an Iranian port on the Mediterranean. “The same countries that are criticizing us today should know that they would be targeted tomorrow,” Netanyahu said.

Which sums things up nicely, I would say.

Thank GOd Netaniahu won the last election. Had the bribe taking, far left Ehud Olmert or his equally treasonous minion, Tzippi Livni still been in charge over there, they’d probably (assuming, of course, that there would even have been a blockade for the international criminals to run) have smooched U.N. and Palestinian butt and ceded all of Jerusalem to the Arabs to “make amends”.

Here, Lawrence J. Haas weighs in with Surprise! Violence erupts, Israel condemned.

And from Wesley Pruden, a favorite columnist of Hard Astarboard’s, in its entirety:

When the going gets tough, the not-so-tough call in the cliches. The world’s “leaders” are shocked! — shocked! — when Israel defends itself. Actually, they’re about as “shocked” as Claude Raines, the police inspector in “Casablanca,” who was shocked to learn that gambling was going on in the casino at Rick’s Cafe.

Ban Ki-moon, the secretary-general of the United Nations who rarely sees third-world evil, shocking or otherwise, says he was “shocked” by the Israeli navy’s stopping a convoy attempting to break through the blockade of Islamist terrorists in Gaza. The governments of Sweden, Greece and Jordan were so “shocked” they recalled their ambassadors to Israel to get the inside dope to fuel further “shock.” Tony Blair, who is some sort of “peacemaker”-at-large in the Middle East, was “shocked,” too. If he is, it’s only because he hasn’t been in the Middle East long enough to unpack his Gladstone. France was not just a little bit “shocked,” but “profoundly shocked.” There was so much “shock” in the air that the mourning became electric.

The convoy of six ships not only carried thousands of tons of supplies, but hundreds of “activists” and when the smoke cleared nine or so “activists” — the count varied through the day — had been rendered “inactivists,” and capable of no further mischief. The European Union demanded an official inquiry, so profound was its “shock.” The United Nations went into emergency session to recover from “shock.”

The usual suspects went riding off in several directions even before they could mount their horses, but an investigation, official or otherwise, is not really necessary. Verdict now, facts later. The Associated Press, which once took pride in its reporting but is awash now in activists and pundits, set out the early story line: “Dozens of activists and six Israeli soldiers were wounded in the bloody predawn confrontation in international waters. The violent takeover dealt yet another blow to Israel’s international image, already tarnished by war crimes accusations in Gaza and its 3-year-old blockade of the impoverished Palestinian territory.”

The account of the Israeli commandos tells a different story. The Mava Marmara, the lead ship in the flotilla, was told to change course and not land in Gaza. When it ignored the warning Israeli marines and commandos boarded the ship, some by rope ladders from helicopters. A fierce fight erupted on deck and only after taking severe casualties and fearing for their lives the commandos, armed only with pistols and paint ball rifles because they were expecting genuine peace activists and not trained street fighters, fired back, trying to aim first at the feet of the “peace activists.”

Israel is at war, fighting for its very existence, surrounded by hostile Islamic regimes, some more hostile than others. Not all the hostile regimes approve, or so they say, of the Islamist campaign of extinction of Israel by attrition (until Iran gets a working nuclear bomb). None of these hostile regimes, so in love with peace, will do anything to persuade or compel the Palestinians to give up the dream of destroying Israel in a second Holocaust. This is the reality in the Middle East and the cowering milklegs in Washington, London, Paris and the other capitals of the West know it. Who could be shocked when the Israelis do what they must do to survive?

The facts on ground and sea are, as usual, ignored in the bang and clang of rioting in the streets and the din of diplomatic argle-bargle, with the media peddling the usual story: The flotilla of “peace” ships was only intended to relieve the suffering of women, children and maybe even an occasional cute kitten or adorable puppy. But the “activist” account is bunk.

Adequate supplies of food, medicine and other necessary goods are regularly delivered to Palestinians in Gaza — and by the Israelis. The government in Jerusalem invited reporters to the Kerem Shalom crossing to see, and photograph, the convoys of trucks delivering these goods to Gaza. The Israelis even offered to transfer the goods from the flotilla as soon as the ships could be unloaded and inspected. The sponsor of the flotilla, the Turkish Humanitarian Relief Foundation, is regarded by Israel as a radical Islamist organization, part of a global fund-raising operation of Hamas. If the Israelis allow such flotillas to deliver supplies to Gaza, other ships will follow, not with rice and beans but with explosives, rifles and long-range Iranian Fajr-5 missiles.

But the attack of the “peace” ships was intended for a larger and more important purpose — to undermine Israeli determination to continue the struggle against the radical Muslims who are determined to kill Jews. The Israelis are determined there won’t be a second Holocaust. This shouldn’t shock anyone who’s been paying attention.

******UPDATE******

This article, of the aftermath and some background on Hamas and Gaza by Steven Emerson is a must read.

by @ 1:58 pm. Filed under Israel and the Palestinians, Terrorism, The United Nations
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6 Responses to “On The Gaza Flotilla Kerfuffle”

  1. Simeon Says:

    Okay, so how about the fact that the land the Israelis and Arabs are fighting over was stolen from the Palestinians, and that the Palestinians are being treated like the blacks were treated by the whites in South Africa?

    Don’t get me wrong, here, Chuck. I don’t condone terrorism and I certainly don’t endorse what Hamas has been doing in Gaza, as described in the “Update” Emerson column, but aside from the way they’re going about trying to take back their country, don’t you believe it’s their right to do so?

  2. Harry Says:

    Great post, Chuck.

    The UN and those other a$$#ol&$ are obviously the types who’d have no proholding someone’s arms behind his back while a couple of other people work him over. That’s what they’re trying to do to the Israelis.

    Obama’s doing much the same while trying to conceal it behind what to any reasonably perceptive individual would be a glass barrier.

    Come on, Simeon, what instrument do you think with, anyway? Is it above your shoulders, or below them?

  3. Simeon Says:

    Harry, I hate to break this incredible news to you, but Obama’s trying to get a handle on the Israeli-Palestinian situation just the same as past U.S. presidents have attempted to do.

    He’s made it inordinately obvious that he wants to see peace in the Middle East as much as anyone else, but he’s also perceptive enough to see that a peace initiative is a bipartisan affair, not just a job for one side.

    The Israelis have to cooperate as much as the Palestinians have to cooperate.

  4. Harry Says:

    Simeon, Simeon

    To address your last point first, the Israelis have been bending over backwards to accommodate the Palestinians.

    In the course of the last several peace accords, they’ve released hundreds of imprisoned terrorists, uprooted hundreds of Jewish settlers from the West Bank and about given the whole WB to the Pals, cleared every Jew out of Gaza and given the Pals that, as well.

    Without the prompting of peace agreements or other treaties, they have allowed Arabs seats in their parliament (the Knesset), given Pals every right of an Israeli citizen, given them free educations, housing projects where needed, etc.

    When the Palestinians were given Gaza, the first thing they did was trash all the infrastructure and blame the Israelis for lack of same, so the Israelis, at the expense of their taxpayers, went ahead and provided all the infrastructural services for free.

    No matter that the Israelis have also always kept their end of every bargain they’ve made with the Pals, the Pals have not honored any of their own obligations, and here we’re talking decades of agreements.

    In fact, the more the Israelis cede to them, the more they increase the terrorism. Look at Gaza: The Israelis give it to them, and Hamas uses it as a firebase to launch missiles into Israeli cities and towns, raining death and destruction down on innocent people and their property.

    So who’s not cooperating!?

    To address your first point second, ARE YOU JOKING!!?

    Obama’s been treating Netaniahu and the Israelis like dirt ever since he was inaugurated, and supporting the Palestinians 100%.

    Where do you get your information, from Al Jazeera?

  5. Chuck Says:

    Simeon,

    I can’t think of too much to add to Harry’s last comment. Just look back upon all the peace agreements, here’s a good start:

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Middle_East_peace_proposals

    And with all those attempts attributed to Israel and the Palestinians, every one in which Israel made concessions was either accompanied (if the Palestinians were too impatient to wait) by or followed by increases in terrorism.

    How much does Israel have to take?

    The apartheid bit is pure bullsh-t, the Palestinians have the same rights in Israel as the Jews do.

    As far as the “occupation” B.S., well, are you willing to see us give the U.S. back to the Indians, or the southwest back to the Mexicans? Do you think either group could maintain the standards of productivity and accustomed lifestyle now present, or keep any semblance of economic balance?

    Harry,

    The U.N. is no friend of any country that values true liberty. It is corrupt, incompetent and power hungry. Then again, so is the EU as a collective, only their mega-socialism prevents them from becoming anywhere near omnipotent.

  6. Chuck Says:

    Simeon,

    Here’s a very good column by Greg Crosby on both the flotilla affair, the idiocy of international community “opinion” and the Hamas domination of the Gaza Strip.

    http://www.jewishworldreview.com/cols/crosby060410.php