Israelis cleverly wreck their rapport with the Turks.

[Michael Tee]

<<Screw Dershowitz. He is a shill, a walking Debkafile.>>

Tell me about it.  In addition to his hilarious "The U.S. blockade of Cuba had to be lawful because the State Department said it was," the lying sack of shit tells us that:  <<There was never a humanitarian crisis in Gaza, merely a shortage of certain goods that would end if the rocket attacks ended.>>  Never mind the total illegality of blockading an entire civilian population to punish them for the actions of armed groups among them, here are some real-world accounts of the actual effects of Israel's criminal blockade of Gaza's population, the majority of whom are children:
http://www.amnesty.org/en/news-and-updates/suffocating-gaza-israeli-blockades-effects-palestinians-2010-06-01
http://mlyon01.wordpress.com/2009/01/05/effects-of-israeli-blockade-of-gaza/
http://www.palestinechronicle.com/news.php?id=28d34f486ac0735c23020628f904f088&mode=details
and there are dozens more where those came from.

What could Dershowitz have hoped to gain by such a narrow, legalistic and above all obviously bullshit "defence" of the indefensible?  A bunch of crude legalistic nonsense that even if accepted could only end in discrediting not just Dershowitz but the law itself?

Because if anyone were to accept that the law permits a state power to blockade a million and a half people, mostly children, to starve them, to deny them medical attention and drugs, then people could only conclude that the law that permits this oppression is cruel and unworthy of any respect.  That those who use the law to justify such actions are conscienceless and unprincipled.  And that those who would hide behind such a law to justify their own barbarism and inhumanity are still criminals whether or not the law says about it.

At the end of the day, with all the blathering about the "thugs" who attacked the Israeli sailors - - as they conducted an illegal act of piracy in support of an illegal blockade, no less!!! - - what the world sees are humanitarian workers bringing aid to an illegally blockaded population, gunned down and killed by armed force, and the news media barred from the scene as the pirated ship is towed to a closed port.  Nine or more unarmed relief workers shot to death, dozens more wounded, and their murderers screaming that they, the killers, are the true victims.

Nobody is buying.  Not this time.

[sirs]

Tee must have missed the part where food and aide are allowed thru

[BSB]

Israel has a right to blockade any entity that harbours within it those who use, and launch from that entity, weapons of war against its, Israel's, civilian population, military, and infrastructure.  Hamas, by declaring its aim as the destruction of Israel puts itself, and the population of Gaza, in the position of being blockaded.

BSB

==============================

"Across predominantly Muslim nations, there is little enthusiasm for the extremist Islamic organizations Hamas and Hezbollah, although there are pockets of support for both groups, especially in the Middle East..."

http://pewglobal.org/2010/02/04/mixed-views-of-hamas-and-hezbollah-in-largely-muslim-nations/

[BSB]

"CAN ISRAEL IMPOSE A NAVAL BLOCKADE ON GAZA?

Yes it can, according to the law of blockade which was derived from customary international law and codified in the 1909 Declaration of London. It was updated in 1994 in a legally recognized document..."

http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE65133D20100602

[Michael Tee]

CAN ISRAEL IMPOSE A NAVAL BLOCKADE ON GAZA?

No, it can't.  Not in accordance with international law, says Kevin Jon Heller, a senior lecturer in law at the Melbourne Law School of the University of Melbourne (Australia.)

http://opiniojuris.org/author/kevinjonheller/

This kind of legalistic debate is obviously going to get mired in a "he-sez-she-sez" kind of deadlock, inevitable when both sides lawyer up and start slinging obscure Conventions, Treaties and rulings around the room.

To cut through the bullshit, let's say that I could find a law making it perfectly legal to take some kind of action that would cause enormous amounts of human suffering to innocent children (and many, if not most, of Gaza's inhabitants are, in fact, children) and I then proceeded to take that action, using my legal privileges to their fullest extent. 

Suppose then that some humanitarians attempt to relieve the human suffering that I am (legally) inflicting on the millions, by bringing food, medical supplies and building materials previously blockaded directly to the starving people and I respond by killing a dozen of the humanitarian aid workers and seizing their ships.  Naturally, I call them "terrorists."  Naturally, I complain that their real intentions had nothing to do with the relief of suffering, but were nothing less than the destruction of Israel as a Jewish state.  Naturally, I find lawyers (anyone got John Yoo's phone no. handy?) who will write legal opinions completely exonerating anything and everything that I have ever done, and condemning as criminal and illegal everything that the victims of the blockade and those who would help them have ever done..

At the end of the day, the children and families of Gaza are still deprived of food, soap, building materials to rebuild their bombed-out homes, medicine, medical equipment, etc., the people who tried to relieve the siege have been murdered by their attackers, and the killers are screaming about how they have been "victimized" by the women and children of Gaza and those who tried to relieve their plight.  Surreal?  Bizarre? 

All the legal opinions in the world are just words on paper.  They don't mean shit when all they refer to are "rights" and "obligations" and human suffering is never factored in.  Each side will pervert the meaning of the words as its interests demand, and in the end, the only "rights" that mean fuck-all are those that can be enforced or supported at the end of a loaded gun.  Right now the Jews are clearly on top.  If and when the tide turns, and what has to happen will happen, I only hope I don't hear any screaming from their side as to how "unfair!" and "unlawful!" it all is.  Because they set the standard for "unfair!" and "unlawful!"

[Xavier_Onassis]

I agree with this totally. Lawyers will ALWAYS find exceptions, and the opposing lawyers will find exceptions to the exceptions, and when they run out of exceptions, they will appeal to the courts to create new exceptions to the exceptions to the exceptions.

Dropping goons onto an unarmed ship in international waters in the dead of night is more like something that the Gestapo would do than any civilized nation.

[sirs]

Some folks just can't help themselves in trying to make reference to anything Hilter/Nazi, to anything they don't agree with.  Regardless of how asanine a leap it is     

[Xavier_Onassis]

Midnight raids were a characteristic of the Gestapo. Do you deny this?

[sirs]

Midnight raids are characteristic of those who could successfully perform them, much like the U.S. does now, with their use of night vision equipment.  That doesn't makes us Gestapo.  It makes the attempt to equate the 2, however, idiotic

[BSB]

"Suppose then that some humanitarians attempt to relieve the human suffering..."


As you would say, hilarious.

To paraphrase Jon Stewart, they were clubbing the Israelis because they thought they were frogman shaped pinatas being lowered down on a string.

[Christians4LessGvt]

since "midnight raids" have gone on for centuries
do the midnight raids before Nazi Germany need
to be called Pre-Hitler-like raids?

[Xavier_Onassis]

Forget the Gestapo part.

The asshole Israeli commandos deserved to get the crap beaten out of them. If the people on board were any good at this, they would have beaten the last turd out of each and every one of these goons.

Screw Netanyahu and screw Israel. This was wrong and stupid from any point of view. Now the Egyptian border has been opened. That is a far greater danger than all the knives and slingshots on that boat.

[sirs]

[BSB]

The only "goons" involved were the fake humanitarians with chains, clubs, and stun grenades.

[Michael Tee]

<<To paraphrase Jon Stewart, they were clubbing the Israelis because they thought they were frogman shaped pinatas being lowered down on a string.>>

The witnesses on the ship say that the Israelis were clubbed after the shooting had started.  Also that the shooting continued after the passengers were lying face down on the deck.

The Israelis released exactly one minute of videotape from the whole episode and tightly controlled the outflow of news from the eye-witnesses on board.  You heard, in effect, only the Israeli version.  And the Israelis aren't releasing any more than that one minute's worth of tape.

So it's quite possible that the Israelis sprayed the decks with gunfire, dropped down onto the deck from the helicopter and were attacked in the process, then killed more aid workers in response to the attacks.  One minute of videotape was all they released.  Then, I think later, another minute.  They took control of the story from the moment they attacked the aid ship, and then their bullshit machine went into full-force operation.