Opinion Forum

Israeli Faces Hit Palestinian Fists: Israel Censured

June 15th, 2010

Israel faced international condemnation last week after an incident in which nine people were shot on board a “Freedom Flotilla” which had been sent to deliver food, medical supplies, knives and PR slingshots to the Gaza strip.

The flotilla was organized in order to help the starving Gazans feed their families, because as one Hamas official said, “Gaza and the West Bank may be the largest per-capita recipients of international aid in the world, but clothes and food just aren’t enough when what one really needs are some missiles for the kids.” It was launched by the organizations IHH and Free Gaza, which have been lauded by the international community for their attempts to ram the Gaza blockade, provide aid to the beleaguered Hamas, and con the world (watch the video!) into thinking that the Jews have become the new Nazis.

The Israelis offered to allow the ships to dock at the Israeli port of Ashdod, where the ships would be investigated for contraband and the legitimate aid transported to Gaza, but were turned down. Egypt’s offer to do the same was also ignored. Miraculously, Egypt was also ignored when it came time to censure the Israelis for their irrational desire to “collectively punish” the Gazans through their implementation of the blockade, even though the Egyptians had been doing the exact same thing by helping Israel to enforce it. The Arab world also miraculously managed to escape censure for its collective economic boycott of Israel, which it maintained from roughly 1945 to 1995 without garnering any international criticism whatsoever.

When the Israeli navy informed the Freedom Flotilla that the ships were traveling to an area under a shipping blockade and must travel to the Israeli port of Ashdod in order to be inspected for weapons before its cargo could be delivered to Gaza, one of the peace activists responded with the injunction to “go back to Auschwitz.” At first a few in the media irrationally seized upon this as evidence of hostile intentions and anti-Semitism, but once the Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC) and the American Center for American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) again assured the world that “Islam is a religion of peace,” the world remembered that when it comes to Islam it’s words that count, not deeds, and went back to the usual party line. They similarly informed the media that videotapes of the activists singing “[Remember] Khaibar, Khaibar, oh Jews! The army of Muhammad will return!” did not indicate that anyone on the ship might be less than peaceful, and that one activist’s statement that, “Either the Israelis let us reach Gaza, or they can stop us …. We can also die as martyrs and never return, which is okay with us,” was absolutely not an indicator that the activists’ actions had anything to do with terrorism or jihad.

When questioned about the events on the other five ships that made up the flotilla, the activists replied that they were trying to keep their voices down about how many ships there had actually been, since the fact that there were no casualties on any ship but the one on which the IDF soldiers were attacked with knives, metal pipes, and their own guns might bring into question the idea that the IDF reacted to the situation with disproportionate force.

Once the cargo had been inspected by the IDF, Israel offered to deliver those parts of the cargo which had been legitimate aid to the Gaza strip, but Hamas refused. “After all,” one Hamas spokesman commented anonymously, “how would we maintain that we were being oppressed by Israel if the world ever actually noticed how much of our humanitarian aid comes through Israeli checkpoints and ports?”

Amid the nearly universal condemnations of Israel were cries for an impartial investigation, to be spearheaded by the same fair and objective international community which had immediately seized upon the Gaza incident to censure Israel. Israel was then censured again when it irrationally resisted these calls in favor of an internal investigation, which was immediately condemned by the UN as “certain to be unfair and biased.”

Finally, in response to what it called Israel’s “shocking human rights violations and complete disregard for the well-being of the people of Palestine,” Iran has launched a flotilla of its own. When the Israeli government was asked what they were planning to do in order to stop the ships from entering Gaza, government officials declined to comment, but a source in the Knesset replied anonymously, “Truthfully, we’re seriously considering just blowing the ships up and then denying involvement. After all, it worked for Kim Jong-Il.”

Articles written by Brianna Aubin
Tags: anti-semitism, flotilla, Gaza, Israel, Palestinians, satire, terrorism, UN
Categories: History, News, Politics | Comments (3) | Home

3 Responses to “Israeli Faces Hit Palestinian Fists: Israel Censured”

Dan Miller | June 15th, 2010 at 7:33 am

Excellent article, Brianna.

Here is a quote I posted in a different context elsewhere, but on second thought the context is not all that different:

According to that famous author Anon, “Every time history repeats itself the price goes up.”

During a debate at the House of Commons in 1934 on Britain’s inadequate air defenses, Churchill recalled but refrained from reciting some lines remembered from you youth about a railway accident:

Who is in charge of the clattering train?
The axles creak and the couplings strain;
And the pace is hot, and the points are near,
And Sleep has deadened the driver’s ear;
And the signals flash through the night in vain,
For Death is in charge of the clattering train.

I think there is, or at least should be, a legitimate concern that we are passengers on the train.

larry ennis | June 15th, 2010 at 7:39 am

Brianna
Very well done!

Tom Carter | June 19th, 2010 at 3:34 pm

Great article, interesting links, Brianna. The way things are going, it’s hard to see how Israel will survive without defending themselves with as much violence as necessary. We may be seeing another step in that direction with the possibility, if not the likelihood, that they will bomb Iranian nuclear facilities. At some point a regional war is going to erupt, and then the U.S. will have to pick sides in a very serious sense. We’ll end up supporting Israel because, for a lot of complex reasons, we don’t have any other viable option. It’s just a shame that we haven’t been and aren’t doing more to support them before all that happens.