Israel on Trial

P. David Hornik
frontpagemag.com
21 June '10

Israel is trying hard to contain the damage from the Gaza flotilla incident. But it doesn’t seem to be working.

In addition to an announcement on Sunday that all nonmilitary goods can now enter Gaza, the incident is now under no less than three investigations within Israel. In the military sphere, a commission headed by Maj.-Gen. Giora Eiland, a former national security adviser, is investigating the conduct of the army top brass in the affair including Chief of Staff Gabi Ashkenazi. The existence of the Eiland Commission is not controversial in Israel. People want to know—to the extent that the military echelon was responsible for the foul-up—why naval commandos were sent inadequately armed into a trap, and almost killed, aboard the Mavi Marmara, and whether faulty intelligence, judgment, tactics, or some combination of those played a part.

Legal dimensions of the affair—like the naval blockade of Gaza and the interdiction of the flotilla in international waters—are being looked into by the Terkel Commission headed by retired Supreme Court judge Yaakov Terkel. Along with two other Israeli jurists it includes two foreign observers, Northern Irish politician David Trimble and former Canadian military judge-advocate-general Ken Watkin.

The Terkel Commission is already intensely controversial both domestically and abroad. In Israel, the Left charges that it doesn’t have enough teeth and will whitewash the political level; the Right says the inclusion of the two foreign observers is a grave capitulation to international pressure. Abroad, it’s charged that Trimble is too friendly toward Israel and that the commission lacks sufficient independence from the government.

Complaints that the Terkel Commission won’t probe the government have led the Israeli state comptroller, Micha Lindenstrauss, to launch yet another investigation focusing on the political echelon’s role in the flotilla incident—both in the decision-making leading up to it and in the alleged defective PR after it. Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Ehud Barak have already been accused, including from within the government, of deciding on the interdiction exclusively by themselves and failing to consult with other bodies like the cabinet and the National Security Council.

Three separate probes of one incident, then, including one—the Terkel Commission with its two foreign participants—that was set up under intense pressure from the Obama administration to ward off, or so it was believed, an international investigation and get the issue off the international agenda.

(Read full article)

If you enjoy "Love of the Land", please be a subscriber. Just put your email address in the "Subscribe" box on the upper right-hand corner of the page.
.