Jerusalem – Opinion: Israel Had No Obligation to Allow The Ships to Reach Gaza, But Surely There Was a Smarter Way to Stop Them

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    The Israeli Navy during the take over of the Gaza-bound Flottila aid ships from Turkey. Photo by Moti Milrod/Pool/Flash90. Jerusalem – Israel’s actions in boarding the flotilla of ships bound for the Gaza Strip were entirely justified and perhaps even unavoidable. Unfortunately they turned into a tactical and strategic fiasco that does further damage to the Jewish State’s tattered international reputation.

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    The so-called Gaza flotilla, comprising eight ships and roughly 800 participants, was not put together by peace-loving humanitarians primarily worried about relieving the suffering of Gaza residents. The people of Gaza already have access to food, medicine and other relief supplies provided by both Egypt and Israel. But both countries have sought to limit the importation of military equipment or dual-use materiel that can be employed for military purposes by Hamas. That terrorist organization controls the Gaza Strip and is unabashedly dedicated to Israel’s eradication. It is also closely linked with the Muslim Brotherhood, which is dedicated to the overthrow of secular dictator Hosni Mubarak and the creation of a theocratic regime in Egypt.

    The flotilla was organized by the Turkish group Insani Yardim Vakfi (Humanitarian Relief Foundation), which bills itself as a philanthropic organization. But both the Danish Institute for International Studies and the Israeli Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center have documented copious links between Insani Yardim Vakfi and the global jihadist terrorist movements including al Qaeda. One of Insani Yardom Vakfi’s activists, Izza Shahin, was arrested by Israeli forces in the West Bank recently and expelled on charges of transferring tens of thousands of dollars to Hamas-controlled “charities.”

    Other members of the flotilla came from such organizations as the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood. Al Jazeera quoted one woman aboard the flotilla saying “Right now we face one of two happy endings: either Martyrdom or reaching Gaza.”

    From Israel’s vantage point this was a no-win situation. Allow the ships to dock in Gaza and they would unload supplies that might be used to arm Hamas. Stop the ships and you risk a public relations disaster, which is exactly what happened.

    First the ships ignored repeated warnings from the Israeli navy to turn back or to put into the Israeli port of Ashdod where the supplies could be off-loaded, inspected, and, if purely humanitarian, sent on to the Gaza Strip. They kept on sailing even after Israel publicly warned that its commandos would board the vessels.

    Most of the boardings, with commandos rappelling down ropes from helicopters, went smoothly. But aboard the largest vessel, the Turkish-flagged ferry Mavi Marmara, the passengers and crew put up a violent resistance. The Israeli Defense Forces have released video showing a commando being hurled from the top deck. Other commandos were confronted by an angry crowd armed with metal poles, knives, even reportedly firearms and firebombs.

    The details are still confusing, but it’s clear Israeli commandos were wounded in the melee and were in danger of being killed. They had hoped to avoid violence and were armed with paintball guns, but the boarding team felt compelled to open fire to prevent themselves from being overrun.

    It is hard to second-guess the actions of men in combat who feel their lives are in danger, but that won’t prevent the whole world from trying. Turkey’s Islamist prime minister, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, described the incident as “state terrorism” and called his ambassador home from Israel. Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas called the incident “a massacre.”

    Non-Arab leaders didn’t go that far but French President Nicolas Sarkozy did call the use of force “disproportionate”—the favorite epithet applied nowadays to all Israeli military actions, even those (like the assassination in Dubai of Hamas official Mahmoud al-Mabhouh) that only kill well-known terrorists.

    Israeli officials are right to say the operation was justified and that the blood was on the hands of the pro-Hamas activists. Right, but irrelevant.

    As it does too often, Israel took a narrow military operational approach to what is a broader strategic problem. Hamas, Hezbollah and other terrorist groups are conducting a skillful “information war” that is making Israel a pariah state in the international community. Israel, like the United States and other democratic nations, is at a severe disadvantage trying to combat a ruthless foe willing to sacrifice its own people to score propaganda points.

    There are no perfect counter-tactics available, but whenever Israel does use military force it needs to be more aware of the political ramifications. That awareness appeared to be lacking during the botched 2006 war against Hezbollah—and in the boarding of the Gaza flotilla.

    One wonders if it wouldn’t have been possible for Israeli agents to sabotage the ships before they left port so that this incident would never have occurred? Or failing that, to allow the ships to be off-loaded in Gaza and then disable them so as to prevent any further trips.

    That is only speculation from afar. Neither I nor any other outsider can know all the factors that went into Israeli planning. But, whatever the intent, the outcome was a fiasco that Israel doesn’t need when its relations with the United States, its most important (and virtually sole) ally, are already at a low point.

    Mr. Boot is a senior fellow in National Security Studies at the Council on Foreign Relations.


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    37 Comments
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    Anonymous
    Anonymous
    13 years ago

    The WSJ has always been one of EY’s strongest supporters in the media and even more so now that it is under Murdoch’s ownership. Their position is the same as many of us have been saying all day. Stopping these ships was strategically necessary but was done without any regard for the political consequences. Blindly assuming that hashem will protect EY against all enemies without regard to world opinion is a formula for disaster.

    Milhouse
    Milhouse
    13 years ago

    The only mistake Israel made is in being so apologetic, and adopting such ridiculous ROE. The stance from the beginning should have been that running the blockade is an act of war, and will be treated as such. And then follow up on it.

    Also, they could have sunk the boats quietly in the middle of the night, and then said “who, us?”.

    Oy Gevald
    Oy Gevald
    13 years ago

    There’s always going to be another attempt. I assume Israel will respond to each attempt using stronger tactics than the previous attempt until they just place mines in the ocean and allow the arabs to blow themselves up without having Israel board the ships. Now why didn’t they do that now?

    Loshon Hora
    Loshon Hora
    13 years ago

    They should have torpidoed the ship 10 miles B4 shore.

    Anonymous
    Anonymous
    13 years ago

    Israel was perfectly within their rights in this action. The San Remo memorandum states, specifically 67A, that if you have a boat that is charging a blockaded area you are allowed to intercept even prior to it reaching the blockaded area if you’ve warned them in advance, and Israel did that a number of times and the flotilla had a stated goal which they openly expressed, of breaking the blockade.

    However, even though they were perfectly within their rights, it would probably have been a better idea to wait till they were within territorial waters.

    Columbus
    Columbus
    13 years ago

    Since Golda Meir left office, Israel has been one big public relations fiasco. They grab every opportunity to make themselves look bad and fail to cease every opportunity, no matter how it’s handed to them, to make themselves look good.
    The Arabs have become masters of the P.R. war while the Israelis have lost it.
    The Israelis may lose the war in the press as the U.S. did in Vietnam and the result will be the same as it was for the U.S.; they will also lose the real war. Unlike the U.S., if Israel loses the real war Israel will cease to exist.
    Example: Today Israel debated the unimportant PR part, who shot first. Globally that a minute point. They should have announced that the boat was supported by those who raised funds for the Taliban that tried to bomb Times Square. They should have of accused Turkey of siding with those, IHH and Hamas, that want to destroy the West and Western Culture which is in direct contravention of what NATO is about and should be forced out of NATO. By doing that they might have shifted the thrust of the public discourse away from Israel and onto Turkey.
    At this rate it will soon be “Bye bye Israel; it wa snice while it lasted.

    Avi
    Avi
    13 years ago

    I don’t know how feasible this would be but the idea that came to my mind was to somehow scatter miles of half inch thick cable in the path of the ships with the intention of having the cable get tangled in the propellers.

    They’d be stuck in the middle of nowhere and pray for the Israelis to come rescue them.

    mm
    mm
    13 years ago

    And if Israel would sabatoge the ship, that wouldn’t make a political fiasco??? No matter, what Israel always gets blamed, TOO bad on the world

    Anonymous
    Anonymous
    13 years ago

    I side with those that say (with 20-20 hindsight) that all the boats in the flotilla should have been sunk. Tsk tsk.

    Anonymous
    Anonymous
    13 years ago

    Im in favor of employing something called Top Kill. Namely, to pour millions of gallons of Mud, Dirt, & Maneur onto the illegal vessels, and their occupants until they go back home from whence they came

    Babishka
    Member
    Babishka
    13 years ago

    This was a lose-lose situation for Israel from the get-go. If they allowed the boats to go through, then they can’t stop boats from Iran and Syria carrying heavy weapons. If they stopped the boats, even with minimal force, the blockade runners were determined to provoke violence.

    Anonymous
    Anonymous
    13 years ago

    NO ONE SHOULD FLY TURKISH AIRLINES TO ISRAEL AND CALL THE JEWISH PRESS 718 330 1100 TELL THEM NOT TO ACCEPT ADS FROM TURKISH AIRLINES

    Chaver
    Chaver
    13 years ago

    Dr. Abd Al-Fatah Nu-man (Gaza based Yemeni Professor of Islamic Law on Al-Aqsa TV (Gaza-Hamas) said: “These are people who wish to be martyred for the sake of Allah. As much as they want to reach Gaza, the other option is more desirable to them. We pray to Allah that they be awarded both good things: That they reach the shore of Gaza safe and sound, and that they be granted martyrdom along with us”

    So tell me, do you think it makes a difference what Israel did or should have done?

    Anonymous
    Anonymous
    13 years ago

    While stopping the ships was the correct decision, the operation was poorly thought out and again israel may be “right” to do what it did but it will lose the propaganda war, will be dragged through the UN and lose whatever little bit of support it may have had. I fear that even the U.S. will not veto the inevitable resolution condemning this whole fiasco.

    Anonymous
    Anonymous
    13 years ago

    Why is it OK for a goy to say” but surely there was a smarter way to stop them”. But when frum Yiden Chassidim say but there surely was a way to build a hospital without digging up graves, NO then its traif. Chutzpa. You are talking against our country. The Wall Street Journal article is basically saying the exact same words as the chareidis. Hold your horses. You don’t have to be spiteful every step of the way.

    lizansker
    lizansker
    13 years ago

    You send in some scuba divers overnight, when the boats are anchored and you dismantle or disconnect the boats propeller. End of boat.

    pr disaster
    pr disaster
    13 years ago

    Israel is always on the PR defensive. They never think that the most important here is PR. They need to launch a major PR offensive

    Anonymous
    Anonymous
    13 years ago

    Hashem is no longer there for the medine. He gave it as many chances as He could – even after it kivyochol gave Him the finger after the nissim of 1967. Now it is on its own, no more siyata deshmaya, as we see again and again. And that is how it will be until it either shapes up (stands up for being Jewish) or ships out (is sacrificed by the US in exchange for the US’s own safety and prosperity).

    No one needs the medine anymore. Jews are safe everywhere, and in fact the only threat to Jews abroad comes from those who take out their frustrations on local Jews because they are rightfully angry at the shlimazel state that cannot either win a decisive war or make decisive peace.

    Anonymous
    Anonymous
    13 years ago

    Why should Israel always have to think of different or unorthodox methods in order to appease PR? Why is it ok for other nations to do this the normal way, i.e… Obama sending drones in Afghanistan that kill innocent people also? Why should Israel be forced to think and use alternative methods? It wouldn’t matter to the Jew-haters anyway, would it?

    David Cameron
    David Cameron
    13 years ago

    This is a well written article and contains vital details which other media agencencies appear to have left out. it should be circulated and printed in all newspapers worldwide.

    anonymous
    anonymous
    13 years ago

    I am amazed of the number of military staff college graduates posting on this website.
    I am now as versed in military strategy as many others making comments therefore I have a question by disabling the ships mechanically how would these strategy experts dealt with those on board. I guess disable them to with chewing gum. The U.S. delegation to the UN protected the derrier of Israel by rejecting an open condemnation. I would suggest instead of sitting in Boro Park or Long Island many of you should pack up and fly to Israel and take over military planning for the IDF.That soneh yisroel Obama certainly must have known how the U.S. delegation shall vote.

    Anonymous
    Anonymous
    13 years ago

    The bottom line…. how many people from around the world would sacrifice their comfort for Israel in a similar fashion to these Turks? Very few!

    Israel is neither connected with the Charedim or the Chilonim in a passionate way – the world feels it and everybody can trample on Israel but nobody will do anything about it.

    How many readers here would get on a boat and sacrifice for Israel….

    Heilige Heimisher
    Heilige Heimisher
    13 years ago

    What is critical is that Israel put out a full court press and tell the world that the ship deserved to be invaded. All too often, israel is meek in the face of world outrage. Let us show the world the Jewish Pride that made Israel a force to be reckoned with now and until bias goel tzedek bba