Perilous Times
Israel's Blockade of Gaza Strip to Continue, Official Says
Published June 01, 2010
AP
A Palestinian swims while holding a Palestinian flag during a protest
against Israel's interception of Gaza-bound ships at Gaza's seaport in
Gaza City, Monday, May 31, 2010. Israeli naval commandos stormed a
flotilla of ships in Mediterranean international waters, carrying aid
and pro-Palestinian activists towards the blockaded Gaza Strip on
Monday, killing at least 10 passengers in the predawn raid.
Despite growing international condemnation, Israel's blockade of the
Gaza Strip will continue due to fears that Hamas will ship rockets and
other weapons into the area, Israeli officials say.
Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak spoke to his Turkish counterpart as
well as the country's chief of staff on Monday and they agreed that the
raid on an aid flotilla that ended with Israeli soldiers killing nine
activists wouldn't affect weapons deals, defense officials said who
spoke on condition of anonymity.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's spokesman, Mark Regev,
indicated Israel consider ways to ease the blockade to allow more goods
into Gaza -- a policy quietly under way for months.
"We have been expanding the assistance that has been going into the
Gaza Strip -- both the volume and the variety of goods -- and we have
ongoing dialogue with the international community," said Regev, who
added that Israel could not end the blockade, fearing that Hamas would
ship rockets and other weapons into the area.
"We cannot have unfettered naval cargo going into the Gaza Strip," he
said.
Monday's raid led to ferocious international condemnation of Israel,
raised questions at home, and appeared likely to increase pressure to
end the blockade that has deepened the poverty of the 1.5 million
Palestinians in the strip. The U.N. Security Council called early
Tuesday for an "impartial" investigation of Israel's deadly raid and
condemned the "acts," while pro-Palestinian activists sent another boat
to challenge Israel's blockade of the Gaza Strip on Tuesday and Egypt
declared it was temporarily opening a crossing into the Palestinian
territory.
Turkey, which unofficially supported the flotilla, has led the
criticism, calling the Israeli raid a "bloody massacre" and demanding
that Washington condemn the raid. The White House has reacted
cautiously, calling for disclosure of all the facts.
There were signs, however, that the long-term strategic partnership
between Israel and its most important Muslim ally would endure: Turkey
canceled three joint land and sea exercises, but appeared to be
otherwise maintaining deep military ties that include the planned
delivery of $183 million in Israeli drones this summer.
Amid the tensions, the Israeli military said it carried out an
airstrike in Gaza on Tuesday, and an Islamic militant group said three
of its members were killed after firing rockets into southern Israel.
Israeli authorities say the rockets landed in open areas and caused no
injuries.
Two militants infiltrating into Israel from Gaza were killed in a
separate incident Tuesday, the military said.
In other violence, Israeli hospital officials said an American woman
lost her eye during a demonstration Monday in Jerusalem against the
naval raid. Emily Henochowicz of Maryland was in intensive care after
undergoing surgery, said hospital spokeswoman Yael Bossem-Levy.
Witnesses said Henochowicz, 21, was hit by a tear gas canister in the
face while Palestinian youths were throwing rocks, although she was
standing at a distance.
The pro-Palestinian flotilla had been headed to Gaza with tens of
thousands of tons of aid that Israel bans from Gaza. After days of
warnings, Israel intercepted the flotilla under the cover of darkness
early Monday, setting off a violent melee that left nine activists dead
and dozens of people, including seven soldiers, wounded. Most of the
dead were believed to be Turks.
Israel said 679 people were arrested, and about 50 of those had left
the country voluntarily. Hundreds who refused to cooperate remained
jailed and subject to deportation.
Israel says the Gaza blockade is needed to prevent the Iranian-backed
Hamas, which has fired thousands of rockets into the Jewish state, from
building up its arsenal. It also wants to pressure Hamas to free an
Israeli soldier it has held for four years.
Critics say the blockade has failed to weaken Hamas but further
strapped an already impoverished economy. It also has prevented Gaza
from rebuilding after a devastating Israeli military offensive early
last year.
Egypt, which has enforced the blockade with Israel since Hamas
militants seized control of Gaza in 2007, said it was opening the
border for several days to allow aid into the area as a humanitarian
gesture. It was unclear, however, when the frontier would open.
Several thousand Gazans -- some in cars with suitcases piled on the
roof, others on foot -- rushed to the Egyptian border, hoping to take
advantage of a rare chance to escape the blockaded territory.
The Hamas Interior Ministry said authorities were not prepared to open
the crossing and noted that government employees were on strike to
mourn those killed in Monday's raid. Large crowds of people milled
about the crossing, occasionally shouting at border guards, but there
was no unrest.
Dozens of Hamas police with automatic weapons patrolled the area to
maintain order.
"We are working to help residents take advantage of this opportunity,"
said Hamas Interior Ministry spokesman Ihab Ghussein. "We hope it will
be open all the time, not just as a response to yesterday's events."
Greta Berlin said the Free Gaza Movement, which organized the flotilla,
would not be deterred and that another cargo boat was off the coast of
Italy en route to Gaza. A second boat carrying about three dozen
passengers is expected to join it, Berlin said. She said the two boats
would arrive in the region this week or early next week.
"This initiative is not going to stop," she said from the group's base
in Cyprus. "We think eventually Israel will get some kind of common
sense. They're going to have to stop the blockade of Gaza, and one of
the ways to do this is for us to continue to send the boats."
The Israeli military refused to say how it would respond to the arrival
of new Gaza-bound ships. But Israeli Foreign Ministry spokesman Yigal
Palmor said, "there is no change in policy" and urged activists to send
the aid into Gaza through current, authorized means.
"We have no intention to use violence and there is no need for this to
end violently," Palmor said. "If they want the aid to get to Gaza, they
can send through the regular peaceful channels. I think they understand
that seeking confrontation will not do them any good."
Protests erupted in a number of Muslim countries, including Turkey,
which unofficially supported the flotilla, Indonesia and Malaysia,
where a Palestinian man slashed himself outside the U.S. Embassy.
Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, an outspoken critic of Israel,
told lawmakers the Israeli raid was an attack "on international law,
the conscience of humanity and world peace."
"This bloody massacre by Israel on ships that were taking humanitarian
aid to Gaza deserves every kind of curse," he said, demanding that
Israel immediately halt its "inhumane" blockade of Gaza.
Turkey's Foreign Ministry said four Turkish citizens were confirmed
slain by Israeli commandos and another five also were believed to be
Turks. Israeli authorities were still trying to confirm their
nationalities.
Thousands of pro-Islamic and nationalist Turks have poured into the
streets in Istanbul and Ankara since the report of the Israeli raid.
Protesters with Palestinian and Turkish flags shouted "Down with
Israel!" outside Israeli diplomatic missions.
Within Israel, the raid sparked intense debate over why the military
operation went awry.
Israel sent commandos onto the six ships carrying nearly 700 activists
after mission organizers ignored the government's call to bring the
cargo to an Israeli port, where it would be inspected and transferred
to Gaza. In most cases, the passengers quickly surrendered. But on the
largest ship, the Turkish-flagged Mavi Marmara, the forces encountered
resistance.
Israeli commandos rappelled on ropes from a helicopter and army videos
showed them being attacked by angry activists with metal rods and one
soldier being thrown off the ship. Others jumped overboard to escape
the angry mob. Israeli authorities said they were attacked by knives,
clubs and live fire from two pistols wrested from soldiers. The
soldiers then opened fire, killing nine.
Israeli military analysts said it was a mistake to send commandos to
board the Marmara and the military could have used nonlethal weapons
such as tear gas. They also said the intelligence-gathering was faulty.
Retired Gen. Shlomo Brom asked why the ships' engines weren't sabotaged
instead.
"There were certain objectives to this operation. One was not to let
the vessels get to Gaza, but the other objective was to do it without
any damage to Israel's image," Brom told The Associated Press.
"Certainly it failed."
The daily Maariv, in a front-page headline, called the raid a "debacle."
Sabine Haddad, spokeswoman for the Israeli Interior Ministry, said 679
people were arrested and handed deportation orders. By midafternoon
Tuesday, some 50 people had left the country voluntarily. But hundreds
refused to cooperate and were jailed.
"The rest said they wanted to go to jail and are at Beersheba jail
going through a process of deportation," she said. She said judges were
hearing the cases and that almost everyone would be expelled within the
next few days.
She said more than half of those arrested were from Turkey, with others
coming from more than 30 other countries, including Britain, Algeria,
Jordan, Kuwait, Germany and the U.S. Israeli police said four Arab
Israeli citizens would face criminal charges.
Israel did not allow access to the activists, but a handful who were
deported arrived home Tuesday, including a Turkish woman and her
1-year-old son, six Greeks and three German lawmakers.
"There was a massacre on board," said the woman, Nilufer Cetin, whose
husband, Ekrem, is the Marmara's engineer and was still in Israeli
custody. "The ship turned into a lake of blood."
Norman Paech, a former member of Germany's Left Party who was aboard
the Marmara, said he only saw three activists resisting.
"They had no knives, no axes, only sticks that they used to defend
themselves," Paech said at a news conference in Berlin after he and
four other Germans returned from Tel Aviv. He added, however, that he
could "not rule out" that others used weapons somewhere else on the
boat.
Turkey said it was sending three ambulance planes to Israel to return
20 Turkish activists injured in the operation and had other aircraft
ready to get other activists. About 400 Turks took part in the flotilla.
The flotilla was the ninth attempt by sea to breach the blockade Israel
and Egypt imposed after Hamas violently seized the territory. Israel
allowed five seaborne aid shipments through but snapped the blockade
shut after its 2009 war in Gaza.
There was little call in Israel to end the blockade. Israelis have
little sympathy for Gaza, which sent thousands of rockets and mortar
rounds crashing into Israel for years before last year's war.
The Israeli-Gaza border was tense following the naval raid.
The Iranian-backed Islamic Jihad said three of its fighters were killed
Tuesday shortly after firing rockets into southern Israel. Israeli
authorities say the rockets landed in open areas and caused no injuries.
The Israeli military confirmed its airstrike, and Gaza's chief medical
examiner also said there were three deaths.
On Tuesday morning, the Israeli military said Gaza militants
infiltrated Israel and exchanged fire with troops. Israeli rescue
services said two militants were killed, but the military would not
immediately confirm that.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.