The Gaza Flotilla: Facts and Official Reactions

Dr. Manfred Gerstenfeld
jcpa.org
Institute for Global Jewish Affairs
No. 102
15 September '10

The Gaza flotilla was a well-thought-out provocation against Israel. The flotilla was falsely presented as an enterprise of humanitarian aid to a needy population. If that were indeed the case the organizers would have accepted Israel's offer to dock the flotilla at the port of Ashdod. The main ship, the Turkish Mavi Marmara and two others, transported people only and no aid. Part of the aid, such as camouflage netting, was clearly meant for Hamas's military purposes. Some samples of the aid, such as medicines, were past their sell-by date. One of the undeclared aims of the main organizers was to support the Hamas regime that rules Gaza. In its charter Hamas promotes genocide of Jews.

The main organizers of the Gaza flotilla were the Turkish IHH, a body for which there are strong indications of having terrorist links. There were also others on board with terrorist links. Several of the participants on the Mavi Marmara were prepared for violence with weapons and attacked the Israeli soldiers. The weapons found were far from normal for a ship purporting to be bringing humanitarian aid. Seven of the nine dead had expressed their wish to die as martyrs before they departed on the journey.

Negative opinions about Israel were hastily expressed by senior officials of various countries and international bodies. They did not care to wait until a reasonable amount of facts were known. Today if one analyzes their statements one finds many fallacies in them. In view of many other far more violent actions by some Western countries on various occasions, the claims about disproportionality of the Israeli interception of the flotilla convey double standards.

The German response to the flotilla affair merits special investigation. On 2 July the German parliament issued a unanimous resolution with an anti-Israeli bias. Never in its history has the Bundestag issued a resolution against any rogue state. The Jewish Central Council in Germany adopted a statement saying that the Parliament's resolution was based on incomplete information and a mixture of half-truths and prejudices.

I. Introduction: The Flotilla

On 30 May 2010, a flotilla of six ships left Northern Cyprus heading to Gaza, carrying 718 people from thirty-seven countries and up to ten thousand tons of what the organizers called humanitarian aid for the Gaza Strip.[1] The proclaimed intention of the flotilla organizers was to deliver humanitarian aid to Gaza and break the blockade on the territory, which Israel imposed in 2007 to prevent arms from reaching Hamas, the Islamist terror organization that rules the Strip.[2] It later became clear that three of the ships were not for freight and were not carrying any humanitarian aid. Among these was the largest one, the Turkish Mavi Marmara. The other two were the Challenger 1 and the Sfendonh.[3]

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