Israel – WTF?

Is there – and I ask this in all seriousness – insanity at the heart of Israel’s government?

After Israel’s deliberate act of piracy – if not war – in attacking the Gaza aid convoy this morning, before dawn, and storming the flagship, the Mavi Marmara, the official response, by Ehud Barak, Israel’s defence minister, was to launch an attack on the convoy’s organisers, claiming there was no hunger and no humanitarian crisis in Gaza, and the convoy was a political and media provocation by anti-Israeli organisations (well, doh!), and demanding the return of captured Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit. Yeah, that’ll work – if he wasn’t already dead, he probably was soon after.

I try to keep an open mind on Israel, neither pro nor anti. And while it’s true they are surrounded by enemies who would delight in Israel’s extinction, Israel never, ever passes up a chance to inflame the situation, or make even more enemies – and they can sure as hell cross Turkey off their Hanukah card list after today.

I don’t understand it – it goes way beyond pig-headed national pride, or even arrogance – the government’s response to any of their own fuck-ups  is always to stoke the fires of resentment and outrage. And this was a fuck-up par excellence.

And they are clearly as disdainful of the worldwide outrage and condemnation that this morning’s event has triggered, as they were after the Gaza invasion (over 1,300 dead Palestinians, allegedly to put an end to the rocket attacks (a justifiable aim, in itself), was surely, and quite literally, overkill). The official response was the equivalent of “Yeah, well?” The blockading of Gaza accomplishes nothing useful – it’s pure vindictiveness.

I understand the provocation, I really do, but the Israeli response is always massively disproportionate, and they, the government at least, seem incapable of understanding that (I have read that it’s official policy to massively over-react, as some sort of deterrent), just as they’re incapable of keeping their mouths shut and not making things worse. You don’t end war by creating more martyrs and more terrorists.

The events of this morning have massively damaged Israel’s credibility, what was left of it after Gaza, and the recent revelations of its willingness to sell nukes to apartheid South Africa. What the hell could they have been thinking of? If, indeed, rational thought actually played any part.

And why – when it was quite clear that they had – are they utterly incapable of admitting, or even understanding, that they’ve screwed up? Big time. Instead, they’re grandstanding, insisting that the aid convoy, in the face of zero evidence, was a threat to Israel’s security – which is the purest, triple-distilled, kosher, bullshit.

After this, I find myself wondering if there can ever be peace in the Middle East. And, you know, I seriously doubt it, or if the Israeli government really wants it. Israel stands not just accused of being an unprovoked aggressor, it has demonstrated it before the entire world.

All they had to do was wait until the ships entered Israeli waters, send out warships and arrest them. I’m not saying they should have, I’m saying that’s how it should have been done if that’s what they wanted, and it would have been legal.

There is no justification for the launch of a sea and airborne assault on civilian vessels in international waters, boarding one and mowing down its legitimate defenders**. Not even if the vessel were packed to the gunwales with armed terrorists. The writ of Israeli law does not run outside their territorial waters.

**The hard of thinking in the Guardian, are demanding to know why peaceniks would have defended themselves, seizing weapons from the attacking Israelis (the suggestion clearly being that they were not what the seemed). Why would they not defend themselves against an unprovoked, illegal, attack on the high seas? And what kind of half-arsed soldier allows his side-arm to be taken away? According to one report, 10 of the buggers did.

Had it been a ship-load of terrorists, or weapons – and no-one is suggesting it was either, so far at least – the appropriate response would have been for the Israeli navy to escort them into Israeli waters – which is where they were headed anyway – and, as I said, deal with the problem legally. And proportionately.

That, according to Israel, is what they tried to do, telling the convoy to divert to the port of Ashdod – despite having no right to do so while in international waters – all they could do, legally, was ask, not insist. Once in Israeli waters, they could impose their will, but not until.

However, according to a number of eyewitnesses, the first anyone new of Israel’s intentions was when the IDF boarded and opened fire on the passengers and crew of the Mavi Marmara.

An Israeli government spokesman, trying to justify today’s cluster-fuck  with all the crassness of the US cavalry justifying the Sand Creek Massacre, said that its troops were attacked with knives and metal pipes as they attempted to board one of the ships from a helicopter. He said that shooting started when one of the civilians made a grab for a soldier’s gun.

Well, maybe, but if soldiers hadn’t boarded illegally, that could not have happened. I don’t care if the entire crew and passengers were armed – Israeli troops had no right to be there in the first place.

The spokesman does not say why they launched an armed sea and airborne assault on the convoy, killing 9 people, with more expected to die. Presumably, that’s because there is no possible justification. At all. They actions were, unequivocally, beyond the pale.

The Israeli people have a record of electing former terrorists and/or obvious psychos to high office – if today’s events bring war, declared or otherwise, down upon their heads once more, then they, surely, must  know where the blame lies.

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