Wonder why they didn't get commandos to storm the ship and murder them?

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Israel deports Jewish boat activists

THREE Jewish activists who tried to bust Israel's blockade on Gaza were on their way out of Israel today and a fourth was awaiting deportation, their lawyer said.

Israeli warships yesterday intercepted the boat named Irene 20 nautical miles off the coast of the Gaza Strip, and took it the port of Ashdod in southern Israel.

The boat was carrying seven Jewish activists from Israel, Britain, Germany and the United States, and two journalists, one of whom is an Israeli.

Lawyer Smadar Ben-Natan said "two English and an American" were at Tel Aviv's Ben Gurion airport awaiting flights and the other, a woman, was in being kept in custody overnight.

"We shall only be able to see her tomorrow," she said, without identifying the foreigners or saying why one was still being detained.

She said five Israeli nationals who sailed with the four foreigners on the Irene had been released without being charged pending further inquiries.



Police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld also said no charges had been filed against them.

Ms Ben-Natan said one of the Israelis, former combat pilot Yonatan Shapira, had been subdued with a stun gun as he passively resisted attempts to separate him from his brother Itamar after the Israeli navy boarded the British-flagged catamaran.

"An Israeli naval officer gave him an electric shock," she said. "He wasn't resisting arrest, (the brothers) were hugging one another so they wouldn't be separated."

The organisers, London-based Jews for Justice for Palestinians, said Mr Shapira had recovered from the shock and was in good health, as was 82-year-old Holocaust survivor Reuven Moskovitz, an Israeli with a heart condition.

The military said "there was no violence of any sort" during the operation.

Army footage of the incident filmed from the air showed two navy corvettes coming alongside the boat, and commandos scrambling on board and taking control. There were no signs of violence.

Describing the boat's attempt to reach Gaza as a "provocation", the military said the captain had ignored repeated warnings and had entered a closed naval zone, prompting the interception.

Organisers confirmed the activists had surrendered without a struggle.

"They surrendered because they were surrounded. They had no choice," said Amjad al-Shawa, a Gaza-based organiser.

Also overnight, Irish Nobel laureate and peace activist Mairead Maguire was prevented from entering Israel because of her participation in an earlier attempt to run the blockade on Gaza, a rights group and Israeli officials said.

Ahead of the Irene takeover, Mr Shapira said by satellite telephone the navy had contacted the boat and ordered it to change course.

"They said we were approaching an area under naval blockade and told us to change course," he said.

It had a cargo of symbolic aid, including children's toys, musical instruments, textbooks, fishing nets and prosthetic limbs. In the past, Israel has allowed humanitarian goods to enter the enclave by land after undergoing a security check.

In May, Israeli forces intercepted a six-ship flotilla heading for Gaza but the raid went badly wrong and nine Turkish activists - including one with US citizenship - were killed, prompting a wave of international condemnation.

Israel said its troops resorted to force only after they were attacked while rappelling onto the deck of the lead ship. Pro-Palestinian activists on board said the soldiers opened fire as soon as they landed.

Prominent British supporters of Jews for Justice for Palestinians listed on its website include humourist and actor Stephen Fry and Marion Kozak, the mother of newly-elected Labour Party leader Ed Miliband and of former foreign minister David Miliband.

Israel and Egypt sealed Gaza's borders after militants there captured an Israeli soldier in June 2006 and tightened the blockade a year later when the Islamist Hamas movement seized power, allowing in only humanitarian aid.

Israel eased the closures to allow in all purely civilian goods in the aftermath of the deadly flotilla raid, but still restricts dual-use items such as construction materials that could be used to build militant fortifications.

Source: The Australian

The other boat was boarded in the middle of the night and the passengers were gunned down in cold blood.

How precisely did they "attack"? Did they try to defend themselves against the terrorists who'd boarded their boat? Perhaps. Is that an "attack"? Certainly not.

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On which Israeli ship was this "attack" carried out sorry?

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Possibly, yet according to their reports, they were still brutalised by the terrorist IDF thugs.

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Jewish Gaza-bound activists: IDF used excessive force in naval raid

Activists aboard Gaza-bound ship 'Irene' counter IDF version that the vessel was taken over in a peaceful manner.
By Yanir Yagna

Israel Defense Forces soldiers used excessive force while taking over a Gaza-bound aid ship organized by Jewish and Israeli activists, the boat's passengers said Tuesday, countering the military's official version claiming that the takeover had been uneventful.

A boat with 9 Jewish activists aboard sets sail from Famagusta harbor in the Turkish-occupied north of ethnically divided Cyprus in a bid to breach Israel's blockade of Gaza, Sept. 26, 2010

Photo by: AP
Earlier Tuesday the IDF reported that Israeli naval commandos peacefully boarded the Jewish aid boat attempting to break a naval blockade on Gaza, saying "IDF naval forces recently boarded the yacht 'Irene', and it is currently being led to the Ashdod seaport along with its passengers."

However, testimonies by passengers who were released from police questioning later in the day seemed to counter the IDF's claims, with Israeli activist and former Israel Air Force pilot Yonatan Shapira saying that there were "no words to describe what we went through during the takeover."

Shapira said the activists, who he said displayed no violence, were met with extreme IDF brutality, adding that the soldiers "just jumped us, and hit us. I was hit with a taser gun."

"Some of the soldiers treated us atrociously," Shapira said, adding that he felt there was a "huge gap between what the IDF spokesman is saying happened and what really happened."

The former IAF pilot said he and his fellow activists were "proud of the mission," saying it was organized "for the sake of a statement – that the siege on Gaza is a crime, that it's immoral, un-Jewish, and we have a moral obligation to speak out. Anyone who stays silent as this crime is being committed is an accessory to a crime."

Eli Usharov, a reporter for Israel's Channel 10 affirmed Shapira's version of the events, telling Haaretz that the takeover was executed with unnecessary brutality.

"They used a taser gun against Yonatan. He screamed and was dragged to the military boat," Usharov said, adding that both Yonatan and his brother Itamar were handcuffed.

The Channel 10 reporter also said that the activists managed to have a serious heart-to-heart conversation with the troops once they were all placed on board the military vessel, and that "overall the atmosphere was good."

Reuben Moscowitz, a Holocaust survivor who took part in the mission, expressed his disbelief that "Israeli soldiers would treat nine Jews this way. They just hit people."

"I as a Holocaust survivor cannot live with the fact that the State of Israel is imprisoning an entire people behind fences," Moscowitz said, adding that "it's just immoral."

"What happened to me in the Holocaust wakes me up every night and I hope we don't do the same thing to our neighbors," Moscowitz said, adding that he was comparing "what I went through during the Holocaust to what the besieged Palestinian children are going through."

Source: Haaretz

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What did happen?

Terrorist IDF scum attacked a civilian ship in International waters...

An act declared illegal by international law.

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We're talking about a holocaust survivor and an ex-IAF pilot... Funny that you don't seem to have any sympathy for them?