edit: in internationAL waters. Damn these forums for not allowing title edits.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/06/01/world/middleeast/01flotilla.html?ref=global-home

That's totally going to go over well.

Isreal need a massive kick in the balls, and removal of all support from US and Europe.

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http://www.haaretz.com/news/diplomacy-defense/israel-navy-commandos-gaza-flotilla-activists-tried-to-lynch-us-1.293089

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2010/05/31/israeli_commandos_attacked_with_knives_clubs__gunfire_by_aid_ship.html

What are they supposed to do when they're attacked?

It's not clear who got violent first. Both sides claim the other side started the violence (as your article points out).

However, Israel has not business seizing the flotilla in international waters.

hahahahah

Not board goddamn civilian ships in the first place?

There was a blockade in place in order to prevent arms smuggling. Shouldn't a civilian ship know the risk?

lmao

It's the Ministry of Truth!

This country is going down the drain. The public is stuck in a fear-driven self-righteousness frenzy, happily fed by the government and the media. Non-conformist opinions are persecuted, democracy is stifled, human rights trampled. And the few remaining sane people out there are totally helpless to do anything about it.

Are you talking about Israel?

Isreal has every right to prevent potential arms and aid entering the Gaza strip to their Palestinian enemies. They gave weeks of warning that those ships would be met with force. When the ships didn't comply with those warnings, violence ensued. It's cut and dry. Civilian ships or not, they rolled the dice and lost. Good on Isreal.

Nothing is more cut and dry than killing humanitarian workers

Except Israel violated international law.

International law is a joke.

If it were just an instance of them shooting down the civilians I'd side with you. But it isn't. They definitely fought, it's just a matter of who went first.

Not really. Even if we ignore the competing claims about who kicked off the violence, what the heck are Israeli troops doing boarding a civilian vessel in international waters?

I agree with this.



Han shot first.

Assuming for the moment that we believe the account of this incident most favorable to Israel, which part of this do you believe violates international law? I'm not disagreeing with you, I'm just honestly not sure; the law of maritime conflict isn't exactly one of our required first-year classes, and I don't want to spend the time to analyze every possible issue if someone else can tell me where to start.

It's no answer to say simply that they killed humanitarian workers, of course. If they actually attacked the soldiers first, the title of humanitarian worker isn't a license to commit violence.

I agree. Israel should be allowed to do whatever they want and be accountable to absolutely no-one, because the Germans killed a lot of their distant relatives.

Hopefully next time they go in with with real weapons and take care of business.

Same thing everyone else does when they board a civilian vessel in international waters?

Yeah man, that's definitely what Yecti meant.

Not only did the flotilla know this, but the goal was to defy the blockade due to it amounting to "collective punishment" for Gaza.



If Israel doesn't respect international law, then why should the "international activist community" respect Israeli law that only serves to make Gaza suffer?

Ironically, Jack Sparrow didn't actually commit an act of piracy in any of the movies.

The ill fated HMS Interceptor would like a word with you.

The Interceptor was not on the high seas, thus it cannot be piracy. See :

http://www.vincentchow.net/wp-content/uploads/2008/09/piracy.png

I don't know about international law, but something bad is happening (and has been happening for a while) in Israeli society. I know because I live in it.

You can't blame the soldiers. The soldiers were sent aboard ill-equiped and lacking intel, and faced with an angry mob there weren't many other possible outcomes. It is, however, Israel's fault, its government and its media. It's the governments fault for refusing to own up to its own failure with the Gaza siege - Gilad Shalit is still in captivity, Hamas is stronger and more stable than ever, a million people are living in misery - and it's the media's fault for nurturing the public climate that supports the government's (especially the Security Cabinet's) reckless and sometimes criminal policies. The government is made up of politicians entangled in an unholy mess of parliamentary bargaining deals, while the media is made up of moguls who exploit nationalist sentiments to make a profit while convincing themselves that they are the true guardians of the Israeli national ethos and identity.

****. That was a mouthful.

High Seas weren't really internationally agreed in the late 17th century.

The Interceptor was in port. That is not the 'high seas', it is the low to middling seas at best.

Technically what Captain Jack Sparrow did was not an act of Maritime piracy. He committed Grand Theft Ocean vessel.

I'm going to agree with JM on this one...

So we're having a debate on whether Jack Sparrow committed any actual piracy or not from what we saw, in a thread about a real-life incident involving Israel?

Awesome.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0LulDJh4fWI

If I was one of the soldiers, I'd probably have gotten violent too

The soldiers weren't supposed to attack or blockade the ship. It was just full of food and medical supplies. What you're saying is that a car thief can shoot the guy who is driving the car he want to steal, because the driver is attacking the thief. Israel just went too far.

However: In general, the conflict is really complicated. Basically the origin of this conflict lies in the decision of the allied forces after the world war to let the Jews live there. Right now we're one generation further and most of the youth is driven insane by propaganda and stories of their parents and grand-parents. Only a small part of the youth and the young adults is able to pierce through the layer of propaganda and false media and have dreams of living in peace. The rest of them just want to kill each other.

This is completely false.

Oh **** someone upset JonC

face it, everyone's views, with the possible exception of Fardreamer cos he actually has 1st hand experience, are invalid, since we only get our information from the MEDIA.

Have u heard? the media are biased, they dont tell the whole truth, and usually warp it to suit their views. Oh my god really? yeah really.
So.... safest position to hold here is:

Everyone is a dick.

Isreal, Palestine, US, UK, UN, we're aaaaalll dicks, and we're all to blame.
Nice n easy.

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Why Fardreamer? Is he a journalist?