10 Reported Killed as Israel Attacks Boats Headed to Gaza

[Cees Binkhorst]

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Ben benieuwd of Obama het tersprake brengt bij Netanyahu.

Groet / Cees

May 31, 2010
10 Reported Killed as Israel Attacks Boats Headed to Gaza
By ISABEL KERSHNER

JERUSALEM — The Israeli Navy attacked a flotilla carrying thousands of
tons of supplies for Gaza on Monday morning, killing at least 10 people,
according to the Israeli military and activists traveling with the
flotilla. The Israeli Defense Forces said naval personnel boarding the
six ships in the flotilla met with “live fire and light weaponry
including knives and clubs.”

“As a result of this life-threatening and violent activity, naval forces
employed riot dispersal means, including live fire,” the I.D.F. said in
a statement, adding that four sailors had been injured.

The clash occurred as Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyhu prepared to meet
President Obama in Washington on Tuesday for talks on the Middle East
peace process.

The warships first intercepted the aid convoy shortly before midnight on
Sunday, surprising the boats in international waters, according to
activists on one vessel. Israel had vowed not to let the flotilla reach
the shores of Gaza, where the Islamic militant group Hamas holds sway.

Named the Freedom Flotilla, and led by the pro-Palestinian Free Gaza
Movement and a Turkish organization, Insani Yardim Vakfi, the convoy of
cargo and passenger boats is the most ambitious attempt yet to break
Israel’s three-year blockade of Gaza.

About 600 passengers were said to be aboard the vessels, including the
1976 Nobel Peace Prize laureate, Mairead Corrigan-Maguire of Northern
Ireland, and a Holocaust survivor, Hedy Epstein, 85.

Channel 10, a private station in Israel, quoted the Israeli Trade
Minister, Binyamin Ben-Eliezer, as saying between 14 and 16 people had
been killed. He said on Israeli Army Radio that commandos boarded the
ships by sliding down on ropes from a hovering helicopter and were then
struck by passengers with “batons and tools.”

“The moment someone tries to snatch your weapon, to steal your weapons,
that’s where you begin to lose control,” Mr. Ben-Eliezer said, quoted by
Reuters.

Three Israeli Navy missile boats had left the Haifa naval base in
northern Israel a few minutes after 9 p.m. local time on Sunday,
planning to intercept the flotilla. After asking the captains of the
boats to identify themselves, the navy told them they were approaching a
blockaded area and asked them either to proceed to the Israeli port of
Ashdod, north of Gaza, or to return to their countries of origin.

The activists responded that they would continue toward their
destination, Gaza.

Speaking by satellite phone from the Challenger 1 boat, which has
foreign legislators and other high-profile figures on board, a Free Gaza
Movement leader, Huwaida Arraf, said: “We communicated to them clearly
that we are unarmed civilians. We asked them not to use violence.”

Earlier Sunday, Ms. Arraf said the boats would keep trying to move
forward “until they either disable our boats or jump on board.”

The Israeli Defense Forces said in an earlier statement that if the
flotilla members ignored warnings to stop and continued toward Gaza
“they will be arrested, brought to Israel’s shores and transferred to
the Ministry of Interior and the immigration authorities so they can be
sent back to their country of origin.”

“The security forces will take possession of the aid expected to be on
board the flotilla,” the statement said, “and following a security check
of the goods, the items will be transferred into the Gaza Strip.”

In Ankara, the Turkish capital, local TV stations showed angry
protesters confronting police officers outside the Israeli consulate on
Monday morning.

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