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Israel intercepts Gaza flotilla, says Hamas

j-mac said:
they do, however they are not going to allow things that could have a dual purpose as a weapon as well.


j-mac
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like macaronis, coffee, chocolate or shampoo?

bub
 
bub said:
like macaronis, coffee, chocolate or shampoo?

bub
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Israel has just allowed and transferred into Gaza the entire of the ship's humanitarian aid cargo, which, mind you, is no more than two thirds of what Israel enters into the Gaza Strip weekly.
 
Watch these videos
YouTube - Close-Up Footage of Mavi Marmara Passengers Attacking IDF Soldiers
YouTube - Demonstrators Use Violence Against Israeli Navy Soldiers Attempting to Board Ship
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z2duPV9MQIc&NR=1

These activists went a little over-board... yet it appears they were just trying to protect their ship. I can see why the Israeli soldiers felt they needed to use deadly force, but then again should they have tried to storm the ship in the first place? The blockade on Gaza sounds like it is being devastating on the area, but Hamas continues to harass Israel. Then again there are more people living in Gaza than just Hamas soldiers... what about them?

I guess I don't know enough about the situation there to have an opinion on this one.
 
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bub said:
Of course they wanted to create an incident, and they succeeded.

As for Israel offering to deliver the food...then why don't they simply end the blockade? Why do they still prevent things like pasta, shampoo, coffee or chocolate to enter Gaza? That's what they should have done: check what enters Gaza but let everything enter Gaza, except weapons.
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I don't really care why they have the blockade, as it's irrelevant to the fact that the activists on these ships did what they did in the hopes of provoking a conflict like this. This could very easily have been avoided.

Arcana XV said:
I'd appreciate if you would not put words in my mouth. I've never said anything of the sort. What I've actually said in terms of personal opinion is that so far I don't really believe any of the accounts from either side and that everyone is looking pretty bad in my eyes.
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I apologize for implying that that's what you said. I was mostly trying to explain why I thought that any such account should be looked at closely.

bub said:
According to what I've read, the people on the boats had no firearms, one of them just stole a single pistol from an IDF commando. Killing this single guy would have been justified when he started shooting at the IDF soldiers.

The ones with knives and rods could have been neutralized with shots in the knees or something like that, and the commando should have retreated immediately instead of keeping on landing on the ship while they knew that the situation was out of control (as we see on the videos)

I believed highly trained soldiers such as these commandos were taught how to neutralize people without killing them!
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1) There's a reason why police officers are not trained to shoot for knees or arms, but rather for the chest.
2) So after the first 5 or 10 commandos had dropped and the situation had gone to ****, the others should have just abandoned them there rather than continuing down in order to help them?
3) The soldiers did use plenty of non-lethal methods to subdue these people, which is why there aren't 50+ dead
4) You know that when the soldiers boarded the boat, they were armed with paintball guns and under orders not to use anything more lethal, correct?
 
bub said:
Well I just compare with the way we do handle riots in Europe.

A few years ago there were huge riots in Paris with thousands of rioters armed with clubs, they burnt 1,000 or 2,000 cars and even wounded several policemen. The French police charged several times, and I've never heard that they have killed or even wounded one of these rioters with gunfire.

That shows that you can handle these situations without killing so many people.
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Policemen are always wounded in riots.
This was no ****ing riot, it was a ****ing lynch and an attempt to kill the soldiers which was almost a success due to the soldiers' used level of force's limiting by the Israeli purity of arms.
 
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bub said:
Well I just compare with the way we do handle riots in Europe.

A few years ago there were huge riots in Paris with thousands of rioters armed with clubs, they burnt 1,000 or 2,000 cars and even wounded several policemen. The French police charged several times, and I've never heard that they have killed or even wounded one of these rioters with gunfire.

That shows that you can handle these situations without killing so many people.
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And those riots lasted days or weeks, with hundreds of police officers being hurt and hundreds of millions of euros in property damage being inflicted. They also recur every few years.

You're holding this up as a model of success?
 
alexa said:
I am in agreement that videos I have seen look like serious violent fighting. I just don't know yet why it started.
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An investigation will be important to addressing such issues.

How long is Israel allowed to hold them without trial? How will Israel be able to know that they 'clearly' lack material knowledge? When will their families be able to speak to them?
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Barring mass refusal of the detainees to cooperate, it should probably take a relatively short time before Israel has identified those who have potential material knowledge and those who engaged in or were responsible, in some part, for the violence. Mass refusal to cooperate with the investigation could delay the process. Already, the International Red Cross has been given access to the detainees.
 
RightinNYC said:
I don't really care why they have the blockade, as it's irrelevant to the fact that the activists on these ships did what they did in the hopes of provoking a conflict like this. This could very easily have been avoided.



I apologize for implying that that's what you said. I was mostly trying to explain why I thought that any such account should be looked at closely.



1) There's a reason why police officers are not trained to shoot for knees or arms, but rather for the chest.
2) So after the first 5 or 10 commandos had dropped and the situation had gone to ****, the others should have just abandoned them there rather than continuing down in order to help them?
3) The soldiers did use plenty of non-lethal methods to subdue these people, which is why there aren't 50+ dead
4) You know that when the soldiers boarded the boat, they were armed with paintball guns and under orders not to use anything more lethal, correct?
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They didn't even use the ****ing paintball guns until very late into the battle, they came there thinking they're going to easily stop a ship of some European and Turkish demonstrators and then go back home, they knew that this was an attempt to provoke an Israeli response for PR purposes and were hence instructed not to use any level of force at all unless absolutely necessary, not even their paintball guns.
One of the soldiers has only drawn his paintball gun when he broke free from a lynch (where he got his hand broken by metal rods' hits from the crowd), and even then he has aimed for the legs.
 
Ikari said:
So you're just going by assumption then eh? K.
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No. Again and I'll say it real slow for you. I'm going by your posts and your positions. No assumptions are necessary.

I've never completely defended Palestine nor said that they were 100% innocent. Maybe that's those assumptions that really throw off your mind reading skills.
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Now have you ever once admitted the Israeli side could be right in this. Again, no mind reading necessary.

There aren't as many. Try reading. I didn't say there were none. Again with your assumptions. You're not doing a great job with them.
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Then prove it. Claiming it means nothing. Back it up.

Nope, but they can't fight as well without the tremendous support they get from us. I'd rather the whole lot of them just drop this issue once and for all. But that's not going to happen any time soon. As such, my position is that we wipe our hands of the matter. No use getting drug into some dumb conflict that seemingly never ends. We have enough of that in Iraq; don't need more.
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Then you condemn them to die at the hands of their enemies. And you still want to pretend you are neutral?

The bombing of civilian targets such as hotels and apartment complexes would usually contain with it international condemnation along with appropriate sanctions. Those sanctions never occur. The seizing of property of the Palestinian people and usurpation of more and more land would come with the same consequences, yet no consequences are born out. The occupation of lands, the sequestering of soldiers in houses kicking the families out, the caging in of an entire people would all normally carry with it several negative consequences. Yet the only one's realized are those which are written condemnation. There is no actual sanction or other economic/financial punishment handed down. This is in part due to American backing and our control of several of the international bodies.
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So, you still have zero examples of Isrealis saying they can do anything they want because the US will back them which was your claim. Got it.

And there are no sanctions on the Palestinians by the UN when terrorists blow up a night club or religous center. Do you have any evidence of Israel intending civilian deaths and not targeting terrorists? Any? Any at all? Because I have dozens of examples of Palestinian terrorists targetiong speciufically Israeli citiziens.

You want to compare the Israeli army to Palestinian terrorists, be my guest.

I ran from nothing. You've merely not presented a clear enough argument or demonstrated your own position. I've explained everything to you clearly, I can't help it if you want to stick your head in the sand.[p/quote]

lol You made the claim genius. I'm still waiting for ANY example of it that you can post. And you keep ducking providing that example to back your claim.

The Axis alliance did not attack us? Japan did not bomb Pearl Harbor? Is this really going to be your defense? It's pretty pathetic if so.
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Are you incabpable of reading your own posts? YOU said we should never get involved unless someone directly attacks us. Germany did NOT attack us. Japan did. So by your warped reasoning, we should never have attacked Germany since they never attacked us.

And instead of admitting your mistake, you tried to change your argument to include attacks on allies which is humorous since Israel IS our ally.

Please read your own posts next time.

I haven't pretended that I didn't choose a side. More poor assumption on your part. You should maybe stop it.
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Still not telling the truth I see.

From your own post:

I don't support either side.
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So you went from claiming you don't support either side to now denying you never said that. Your dishonesty is just more transparent in every post.
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Zyphlin said:
Both of which come directly from your absolutely biased and completely judgemental stance of immedietely believing everything the other side is saying and thinking everything the Israeli side is saying is a lie. It is not a clear cut open and shut case in regards to the international waters thing and the boarding, as has been shown in this thread. Its not a clear cut case that it was obviously disproportionate, as simply looking at the totals does not give the full picture in any way shape or form of what happened. All of it is you coming from a starting point based on assumptions predicated off of zero save for your own biases and hatreds.
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Well then, the point of view I defend is the official point of view (it was disproportionate/unacceptable) of the following countries/organizations:

Organization of the American States
European Union
Belgium
Bulgaria
France
Germany
Greece
Ireland
Portugal
Spain
Sweden
United Kingdom
Albania
Iceland
Norway
Russia
All the Arab states (list too long to copy)
Bolivia
Brazil
Chile
India
Turkey
...

and of course, all the other countries (with the only exception of the USA) condemn the Israeli raid and ask for investigations. Many of them also ask an immediate lift of the blockade.

Glad to see you consider all these countries as "full of hate towards Israel".




All I've seen of the "illegality" of it is a suggestion that a condemnation means its illegal and that its predicated off a notion that the blockaid is being done for reasons of punishing the Gaza people rather than for national security reasons, and if it was the latter it would not be illegal, and essentially its the U.N. guessing as to Israel's purposes primarily by a large number of countries who have strong biases against the state.
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Only Israel disputes the illegality of the blockade

An occupying power is obliged to follow the 1949 Fourth Geneva Convention, which seeks to protect the civilian population.[17] The Security Council held in 1979 that the Fourth Convention applies in the territories captured by Israel in 1967, including Gaza. Israel, however, has never accepted that the convention should formally apply in the occupied territories, arguing that the conventions refer to occupied state sovereign territories. However it has said that it will be bound by their "humanitarian provisions".[17]
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2007








Oh bull**** semantics Bub, but you know that, and its why your post here is a joke. Never specifically saying "Israel lied" does not mean you've not repeatedly, and continually, implied it through continually making every comment and post in this thread from the stand point that anything and everything Israel has said about this is not true...either through ignoring what they've said or stating something opposite of what Israel is saying as if your words are facts. You show that you give nothing but lip service to your bull**** line about there being "no more reason" to believe the IDF than the German MEP becasue every post you post is coming from the assumed starting point in line with the thinking of the German MEP and acting as if the German MEP's and others accounting of what happened, why it happened, how it happened, what they were carrying, etc are what actually did happen.

You don't need to go "Israel is lying" and "the humanatarians are telling the truth" in specific, literal words to basically be saying those exact same things.
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I base my posts on what is agreed by both parts. I never said the people on board were not trying to create an incident or that they were not the ones who started using violence.
 
RightinNYC said:
And those riots lasted days or weeks, with hundreds of police officers being hurt and hundreds of millions of euros in property damage being inflicted. They also recur every few years.

You're holding this up as a model of success?
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Compared to this raid? Since there were no casualties, yes, of course it is a great success.
 
RightinNYC said:
I don't really care why they have the blockade, as it's irrelevant to the fact that the activists on these ships did what they did in the hopes of provoking a conflict like this. This could very easily have been avoided.
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What are you saying? I agree with you, they wanted to create an incident.



1) There's a reason why police officers are not trained to shoot for knees or arms, but rather for the chest.
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How many bullets does it take to kill someone if you aim at the chest? Unless you hit the heart or you use dum-dum ammunitions, I don't think you can kill someone on the spot.


2) So after the first 5 or 10 commandos had dropped and the situation had gone to ****, the others should have just abandoned them there rather than continuing down in order to help them?
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They could have jumped overboard


3) The soldiers did use plenty of non-lethal methods to subdue these people, which is why there aren't 50+ dead
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10-20 deads is still a lot


4) You know that when the soldiers boarded the boat, they were armed with paintball guns and under orders not to use anything more lethal, correct?
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Then where did the firearms come from?
 
donsutherland1 said:
From Reuters:

The other issue cited by a TV analyst is quite disturbing. If, in fact it is true, it indicates that at least some of the individuals on the ship had deadly intent.
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I dont doubt that for a second. But, it works both ways. Sending in commando's rarely means 'lets sit down and discuss the issue at hand'. So lets not paint half the picture Don.

Paul
 
texmaster said:
No. Again and I'll say it real slow for you. I'm going by your posts and your positions. No assumptions are necessary.
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There are to reach your conclusion as they cannot be logically supported by the sum total of my posts.

texmaster said:
Now have you ever once admitted the Israeli side could be right in this. Again, no mind reading necessary.
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In the overall picture, I don't think there is a right side. Each side at one point has retaliated for actions taken against it, each side at one point has made aggressive actions against the other. The entirety of the conflict which stretches back to the creation of Israel has no "right" side anymore.

texmaster said:
Then prove it. Claiming it means nothing. Back it up.
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Look at the thread, there are well more people out for the outright defense of Israel and are for the outright defense of Palestine. Basically you're trying to backtrack now because you overstated something and can't back it up.

texmaster said:
Then you condemn them to die at the hands of their enemies. And you still want to pretend you are neutral?
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I condemn them to nothing. It's their choices and their actions which led them to this spot; not mine. Don't try to pin this on me just because I don't want to pay for it anymore. My money shouldn't go to Israel, they're a big boy state and can take care of themselves.

texmaster said:
So, you still have zero examples of Isrealis saying they can do anything they want because the US will back them which was your claim. Got it.
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I've given you plenty, you just don't want to acknowledge it. But we'll really see how much of an issue this is if Israel and Turkey get into it. We don't have a mutual defense treaty with Israel, but we do with Turkey. Meaning that if Turkey is ever attacked, we are to come to its defense. We'll see what happens should Israel and Turkey get into a tiff. My prediction is that we'll not honor our treaty with Turkey and try our damnedest not to get drawn in to this specific conflict.

texmaster said:
And there are no sanctions on the Palestinians by the UN when terrorists blow up a night club or religous center. Do you have any evidence of Israel intending civilian deaths and not targeting terrorists? Any? Any at all? Because I have dozens of examples of Palestinian terrorists targetiong speciufically Israeli citiziens.

You want to compare the Israeli army to Palestinian terrorists, be my guest.
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What are you going to sanction against? Palestine is already suffering greatly. They have little materials to sustain life, they're penned into areas, constantly watched and policed by another country, their land is continually threatened and occasionally taken. What more is there? We can levy sanction after sanction, but they'll do no good as they are already suffering greater than any sanction could do because of the actions of Israel. Actions Israel is not held responsible for.

texmaster said:
lol You made the claim genius. I'm still waiting for ANY example of it that you can post. And you keep ducking providing that example to back your claim.
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You've gotten them and more.

texmaster said:
Are you incabpable of reading your own posts? YOU said we should never get involved unless someone directly attacks us. Germany did NOT attack us. Japan did. So by your warped reasoning, we should never have attacked Germany since they never attacked us.

And instead of admitting your mistake, you tried to change your argument to include attacks on allies which is humorous since Israel IS our ally.

Please read your own posts next time.
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Everything I wrote was true. We should try to stay out of conflicts which do not concern us. However, in WW II in order for us to have entered the war, the Axis powers directly attacked us which drew us into conflict with the Axis. That's the reality of history. You can like it or not, but it doesn't change what happened.

texmaster said:
Still not telling the truth I see.

From your own post:



So you went from claiming you don't support either side to now denying you never said that. Your dishonesty is just more transparent in every post.
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Those two do not contradict each other, you're just scraping for dirt instead of entering into debate. I haven't pretended that I didn't choose a side, that is true. I do not support either side. It's a simple statement any human should be able to understand.
 
bub said:
Compared to this raid? Since there were no casualties, yes, of course it is a great success.
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I strongly disagree. First, there were some casualties. Second, you're saying that despite the fact that those riots caused millions of euros in damage, injured hundreds of police officers (and many more rioters), and are repeated almost every year, the government policy is a success simply because there are only a small handful of people who are actually killed? If I were someone whose car got torched and father got put into a coma, I'm pretty sure I'd be kind of pissed despite the fact that nobody I knew was actually killed.

bub said:
What are you saying? I agree with you, they wanted to create an incident.
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Which is why I have little sympathy for them. If you try to kick a tiger in the balls because you think it's being mean to a gazelle, you've got a pretty good chance of getting your ass chewed up.

How many bullets does it take to kill someone if you aim at the chest? Unless you hit the heart or you use dum-dum ammunitions, I don't think you can kill someone on the spot.
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Yes you can, but I'm still not sure how that's relevant. Police officers are always trained to shoot for the chest rather than the extremities because shooting for an extremity is incredibly risky and unlikely to serve the actual purpose, which is to stop the attack.

They could have jumped overboard
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I think that our views on what's reasonable are too far apart to be reconciled. I can't imagine anyone looking at their colleague getting stomped by a crowd and saying "well, I better not go down there and help. They can probably just make it to the edge and jump in the ocean and we'll all go on our merry way."

10-20 deads is still a lot
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And a lot less than there would have been had the military not used restraint.

Then where did the firearms come from?
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The soldiers were equipped with paintball guns, which they were told to use if necessary. They also had sidearms, but were instructed not to use them unless fired upon. According to reports, they were not used until an activist stole one away from a soldier in a pile and started firing at the soldiers.
 
gunner said:
I dont doubt that for a second. But, it works both ways. Sending in commando's rarely means 'lets sit down and discuss the issue at hand'. So lets not paint half the picture Don.

Paul
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Sending in commandos with painball guns and flash grenades doesn't demonstrate deadly intent either.

There were exactly zero fatalities on the other five boats.
 
donsutherland1 said:
An investigation will be important to addressing such issues.
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Not necessarily. It depends on it's orientation.


donsutherland1 said:
Barring mass refusal of the detainees to cooperate, it should probably take a relatively short time before Israel has identified those who have potential material knowledge and those who engaged in or were responsible, in some part, for the violence. .
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You come from the belief that Israel is in the right and some of the passengers are in the wrong.

I believe that most of the passengers will be highly traumatised and that it is in no way to be expected they will trust or wish to speak to the Israeli's. I wish some third party was dealing with this. Are you saying that Israel can keep our people indefinitely without trial?

The US kept one of our men in Guantanimo for several years. They could get no information from him because he was completely innocent. Eventually they let him go because they believed he worked for MI5 and he was so well trained it was impossible to get any information from him.

Given what these people have been through, I would prefer they were with family and friends. I certainly will be writing to my MP soon if there is any likelihood of keeping British people indefinitely.
 
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RightinNYC said:
Sending in commandos with painball guns and flash grenades doesn't demonstrate deadly intent either.

There were exactly zero fatalities on the other five boats.
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But people have complained about being 'roughed up' on them when they tried passive resistence.
 
alexa said:
You come from the belief that Israel is in the right and some of the passengers are in the wrong.
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Alexa,

From what I can gather, it is clear that some of the people on the ship engaged in violence. We'll see what additional facts are revealed.

Are you saying that Israel can keep our people indefinitely without trial?
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I don't know Israel's law, so I cannot speculate. I do believe that if there is a mass effort to refuse to cooperate, the investigative process can be delayed, as it will take longer to gather evidence needed to assess whom should be investigated further/prospecuted and whom should be released.

In principle, I do not support indefinite detention in the absence of trial. I believe there comes a time when one either has sufficient evidence to try and convict a suspect or one doesn't and the suspect should be released.
 
When captured and shipped to Israel, they are givin the choice to be jailed in Israel, or to be shipped off to their respectable nations..
I guess the ones that want to stay will be facing court, which will prob end up with them serving time.
 
CrazyMcCool said:
When captured and shipped to Israel, they are givin the choice to be jailed in Israel, or to be shipped off to their respectable nations..
I guess the ones that want to stay will be facing court, which will prob end up with them serving time.
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And the ones who are facing court will not be jailed, if the other Nations are calling for everyone too be realsed
 
donsutherland1 said:
Alexa,

From what I can gather, it is clear that some of the people on the ship engaged in violence. We'll see what additional facts are revealed.
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You know I have also agreed with this. The problem is that the other people involved were Israeli's. It is not impossible their actions produced the reaction of violence and that no one is really all that much to blame. It is simply something which went desperately wrong. That is one possibility.

It is also possible that the actions of Israel scared the hell out of the people, they believed they were under attack. To some extent that is Israel's fault but I cannot see her admitting to that. Indeed to some extent I can understand why she would be reluctant to, given the response of the world.



donsutherland1 said:
I don't know Israel's law, so I cannot speculate. I do believe that if there is a mass effort to refuse to cooperate, the investigative process can be delayed, as it will take longer to gather evidence needed to assess whom should be investigated further/prospecuted and whom should be released.

In principle, I do not support indefinite detention in the absence of trial. I believe there comes a time when one either has sufficient evidence to try and convict a suspect or one doesn't and the suspect should be released.
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I think this has now been answered by CrazyMcCool. If it is their choice, I am all right with it.
 
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CrazyMcCool said:
When captured and shipped to Israel, they are givin the choice to be jailed in Israel, or to be shipped off to their respectable nations..
I guess the ones that want to stay will be facing court, which will prob end up with them serving time.
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Right, that is what I heard on our news this morning. Some of them were choosing jail rather than deportation. It is a protest.
 
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