News of the Restless

Orthodox Jews aren’t all created alike. There are some who are strongly anti-Zionist, and who recognize that modern-day Israel’s origins (in the terrorist violence of the Stern Gang and Irgun), and its exceptionalist myth of being a lone and persecuted bastion democracy in the Middle East, just aren’t kosher. This gentleman (whose name is, unfortunately, not mentioned) is one of them. He may seem like an odd duck to some, but his points are well taken, and their theological basis is sound: If you are true to the Torah, you stand up for human rights for everyone. You cannot, in good conscience, approve the displacement of Palestinian families from their homes, much less the barricading and starving-out of those in Gaza and the West Bank. It is your duty to stand up against such things. This is not a “rights for me, but none for thee” situation. To save a life, no matter whose, is to save a world.

First the song, by an Israeli TV channel. (Warning: VERY lame!)

Ah. That was “lovely”. And also an interesting projection of Israel’s own no-longer-hidden motives, no? They conned the world, and the crapaganda is still a-flowing, just like BP’s uncapped blowout in the Gulf is still going bloob, bloob, bloob. Only, to be honest, I’d rather listen to the gurglings of that well…

Here comes the dance–starting with another video, this one less melodious, but equally malodorous:

This was faithfully aired by the Jerusalem Post, a little schlong-sucker to the Likudniks formerly owned by Conrad Black (no doubt as a nod to his wingnut wife, Barbara Amiel, who is only Jewish when she needs a victim card to play). This was a big sensation for them. Unfortunately, this video has been doctored more times than Babs’s bosom. The nasty-wasty “Auschwitz” comment (which is surprisingly clear for a radio transmission, no?) was uttered in a very un-Arabic accent (sounds Yiddish, actually), and the “going against the US” one sounds like it came from some southern US yokel–the last sort of person one would expect to find on the Freedom Flotilla (those guys are more like “Yee-haw, let’s kill us some raghaids for Jeebus! [chawin’ tobaccy spit]”). Furthermore, it’s very unlikely that an image-conscious flotilla radioman would let something like that slip over the airwaves. With the whole world watching, that kind of talk would be a major no-no, even if the Israelis had done more to provoke it.

But wait! That was just Step 1; the dance gets more complicated. Here’s Step 2, courtesy of the IDF’s paid crapaganda troll “Spokesperson”:

Unfortunately, that doesn’t lay anyone’s doubts to rest; the fake insults (which sound no more believable in “context” than they did in the abbreviated form) are still inserted. Not only that, but the IDF man’s voice is apparently on a loop–we hear him say the exact same phrases in the exact same intonation, more than once, claiming that the flotilla is breaking the law and will suffer consequences. The pictures have all been stripped, since it would have been clear that the footage is tampered whether they used stills or live action. It is still a doctored audio.

Not only are the fake comments in there, but some other interesting stuff, as noted by Jared Malsin at the Palestine Note:

However, the release of the new “unedited audio” raises further questions. In the “unedited tape,” the Israeli officer is heard radioing the “Defne Y”, another of the Turkish-owned ships, not the Mavi Marmara.

In the new audio released on Saturday, a man’s voice comes over the radio at 1:56 saying “Yeah go ahead, navy.” Oddly, the same voice reappears at 2:24 saying the same thing. The intonation of his voice is the same in both places.

The Israeli military also did not explain the discrepancy between the video released on June 4th, and the one it released on May 31st, which depicts the same Israeli soldier apparently contacting the Mavi Marmara over the radio, in which the “Auschwitz” and 9/11 comments do not appear.

Malsin helpfully appends this video, which is (presumably) the real unedited one originally put out by the IDF:

Note that there are no hostile voices coming over the radio, only the following from the Mavi Marmara: “Negative, negative. Our destination is Gaza. Our destination is Gaza.”

Ooooo, scary. So threatening!

And that was the dance. Now, the seltzer, courtesy of none other than the prime minister of Turkey:

Foooooosh! Looks like Israel’s all wet now.

I knew nothing about this man before, but he’s my newest hero.

I also want to include a bit on Henning Mankell, the Swedish writer, who was on board. Not only is he accusing Israel of high-seas crime, he also has a firsthand account of his own experiences up at the Daily Beast. Go read.

Caskets of some of the Mavi Marmara’s dead at a public ceremony in Istanbul, Turkey. Autopsies on these victims reveal some interesting things, according to this CNN report:

Autopsy results by forensics experts in Istanbul revealed that all nine of the men killed by Israeli commandoes aboard the humanitarian convoy that had planned to dock in Gaza died of gunshot wounds.

The autopsy results give clues about how the violence unfolded after Israeli commandoes stormed the Turkish ship Mavi Marmara in the pre-dawn hours on Monday.

Five of the men died with bullet wounds to the head, said Dr. Haluk Ince, the director of Istanbul’s Medical Examination Institute, said Friday.

One casualty, a 19-year-old dual national Turkish-American citizen named Furkan Dogan, was found to have bullet wounds in his head and multiple bullets in his body, Ince said.

According to the U.S. State department, Dogan was born in Troy, New York and had been living in Turkey. American diplomats have been extending consular services to the deceased’s family.

In one case, Ince said, a gunshot victim had been shot at at extremely close range.

“From the analysis of the bullet distance on one of the bodies,” Dr. Ince said, “the gun was fired between 2 and 14 centimeters’ distance from the victim’s head.”

Shot point-blank? Execution-style? Color me not surprised. There are already suspicions that this raid was in fact a targeted strike, not self-defence. And the head of the Turkish charity that organized the flotilla gives voice to some of the reasons for that:

Bulent Yildirim, chairman of the Foundation for Human Rights and Freedoms and Humanitarian Relief (IHH), denied Israeli accounts of events on board the Mavi Maramara after Israeli commandos stormed the ship on Monday in an operation that resulted in at least nine people being killed.

“We were handed 9 dead bodies, but we have a longer list of missing people,” Yildirim said at Istanbul airport after returning from Israel, where he said he had been kept in custody and questioned for three days.

Meaning, the nine mentioned by CNN are probably not the only dead; they’re just the only ones whose bodies have been released thus far.

Yildirim has other interesting things to say, too:

Yildirim, who was on board the vessel, said some of the activists had grabbed guns off 10 soldiers in self-defence.

“Yes, we took their guns. It would be self defence even if we fired their guns,” Yildirim said, adding that people shouted to them not to use the weapons.

“We told our friends on board: “We will die, become martyrs, but never let us be shown… as the ones who used guns,” Yildirim said on Thursday.

“By this decision, our friends accepted death, and we threw all the guns we took from them into the sea.”

They threw away the weapons, rather than firing on the Israeli pirates? Things that make you go hmmm.

And that’s not the only interesting thing he said:

Yildirim said the Israeli commandos fired rubber bullets from close range before switching to live ammunition, after some activists on board had attacked them with chairs and bats.

“The Israelis published videos of the bats used on the ship, but they damaged their “strong Israeli army” image, as the world saw that a bunch of volunteers can neutralize them,” Yildirim said.

Describing the dead as martyrs, Yilirim said his charity would continue to organise aid convoys until Israel was forced to end the blockade of 1.5 million Palestinians in Gaza.

Yildirim said an Indonesian doctor was shot in the stomach as he helped a wounded Israeli soldier.

“As the clash was going on upstairs on the deck, we were taking care of Israelis downstairs, as we gave them water, we were informed that our friends died there,” Yildirim said.

“We told the Indonesian doctor to take the soldier back. He took his patient back, and as he was going back, they shot him 5 times in the stomach,” he said.

He also described how a photographer was shot in the forehead from a distance of a metre, though it was unclear whether he witnessed it personally.

Another activist was shot as he was surrendering, he said.

“I took off my shirt and waved it, as a white flag. We thought they would stop after seeing the white flag, but they continued killing people,” Yildirim said.

“A friend of ours saw two dead bodies in a toilet,” he added.

So, the volunteers on the ship basically fought back rag-tag? They defended themselves with what little was to hand? At least one doctor on the ship tried to help an injured Israeli before being shot? One victim was shot while surrendering?

And the Israeli army, which fired live ammo, paints THEM as the thugs?

Yildirim’s Israeli interrogators told him that the soldiers were given permission to use live ammunition only 35 minutes into the operation. The charity chief said some activists had already been wounded by casing from the shock blast and gas bombs used in the initial assault.

Of course, we know Yildirim’s interrogators lied. Live fire was flying from the Israeli ships hours before the white flags were raised and the boarding began. Once more, with feeling, here’s that raw video taken by Al-Jazeera before the Israelis jammed the network’s signal:

So we can see Yildirim wasn’t lying when he said that there were already wounded (and two dead) before the Israelis stormed the ship.

And if anyone thinks the IDF must have gotten their orders wrong, Max Blumenthal has bad news for you:

Statements by senior Israeli military commanders made in the Hebrew media days before the massacre revealed that the raid was planned over a week in advance by the Israeli military and was personally approved by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Minister of Defense Ehud Barak. The elite Israeli commando unit known as Unit 13 was tasked with carrying out the mission and its role was known by the Israeli public well before the raid took place. Details of the plan show that the use of deadly force was authorized and calculated. The massacre of activists should not have been unexpected.

On May 28, three days before the raid, top Israeli military officials revealed details of their strategy to Maariv, Israel’s most widely circulated paper. The caption of the Maariv article reflected the military command’s plan to use force: “On the way to violence; one of the boats is on its way.”

Read the entire article at the link. Blumenthal’s analysis is spot on; it will raise your hackles.

Other hackle-raising stuff, well worth your time:

British activist Ismael Patel reports that the Israelis were shooting his comrades at the rate of “one a minute”. He adds that shots were fired from the helicopter that brought the commandos (who rappelled down onto the ship), and that the co
mmandos had a shoot-to-kill policy already in place. Patel’s account also confirms that the Marmara was being fired upon long before the commandos came aboard, as well as that the activists had surrendered, but the shooting still went on.

Canadian activist Kevin Neish, who was also on board the Marmara, is back on home soil and telling his story. CBC showed snippets of their interview with him last night, but a longer and more penetrating one is that of Rabble.ca, who got there first. Part one is here, part two here.

At Hybrid States, Yaniv Reich notes that the Israeli authorities keep changing their story. Be sure to pop your Dramamine before reading or viewing anything they put out, as all the spinning and flippity-flopping will make you dizzy. Nausea and vomiting may result.

Arab-Israeli parliamentarian Yanin Zoabi (also spelled Yaneen Zoubi) has a harrowing account of the Mavi Marmara ordeal up at Rabble. She was assaulted after her safe return in the Knesset by rabid right-wing members (see video, which I’ve posted here, along with an English translation of what happened.)

Meanwhile, Margaret Atwood has had some sober second thoughts on Israeli apartheid, which she earlier dismissed as extremist browbeating or some such. Took her long enough. Well, welcome back to the land of the living, Peggy. Glad to see you again.

Art student and pro-Palestinian activist Emily Henochowicz, of Maryland, injured in the face by a tear-gas canister. A Palestinian friend is at her side, crying for help. The 21-year-old later underwent surgery to remove the irreparably damaged eye. The incident took place at the Qalandiya checkpoint between Ramallah (West Bank) and Jerusalem, on the same day as the raid on the Freedom Flotilla. Emily was protesting against the assault. She personifies the courage of those who, like Rachel Corrie, put their bodies between Palestinians and their would-be oppressors. It’s clear from the news report (see the link) that Emily’s assailants meant to make an intimidating example of her, as they did with Rachel.

Former US ambassador Edward Peck on Democracy Now, saying what we all know–that Israel is lying about the killings on board the Freedom Flotilla. The numbers given are low; they claim only nine were killed, and four of them were Turks. In fact, nine Turks were killed out of a probable 19 fatal victims. Lawrence of Cyberia has the names and faces of those nine.

The first fatal victim on Lawrence’s list is 61-year-old Ibrahim Bilgen, an electrical engineer, who is himself at the centre of an intriguing, as yet unanswered question. According to Ali Abunimah, Bilgen bears a passing resemblance to a prominent Arab-Israeli religious leader who was on the same vessel. That man is Sheikh Raed Salah, an outspoken pro-Palestinian activist whom the Israeli armed forces are said to have been trying to kill. Might the Sheikh have been the real reason (or one of the real reasons) behind the raid? Obviously they couldn’t kill him on Israeli soil, or it would have raised all kinds of incriminating flags. Salah himself believes that Bilgen was shot by mistake for himself, and that the only reason he’s still alive is because some IDF soldier could not tell two Muslims apart. Ali Abunimah notes that it is not far-fetched to suppose that this may have been an assassination attempt gone wrong; the Mossad-committed murder of another Palestinian leader in Dubai earlier this year being a prime example of how Israel prefers to deal with inconvenient Palestinians.

So far these are still just questions, but they are provocative ones. The answer may be awhile in coming, as we still don’t even know who all the dead are, or just how much truth (if any) is in the Israeli version of the story.