Mr. Friedman who is normally very clever tried to attack critics for playing politics by getting upset over Israel's brutality and pointed out that the so called critics were disproportionate in their criticism of Israel when compared with "Islamist" terrorist.

That argument, to any normal educated person is the crap that only Americans will believe. Within release of the international condemnation, the net was filled with people talking about how the ships were filled with Al-Qaeda operatives heading to help the nasty terrorist in Gaza and would destroy Israel.

What half these people fail to understand is that this doesn't detract from the main point. The Israeli military attacked an unarmed ship in international waters. The Israeli commandos bordered a ship and fired indiscriminately on the crew. They later claimed that this was all done in self-defense because they were attacked by the crew with knives and fist. In short, three commandos were punched so it's perfectly legal for them to shoot people.

Seriously, I'm not an American and so I don't have to believe this nonsense. Let's start with some basic facts:

a - The ship was in international waters when the Israelis attacked. I may be wrong here but as far as I know, when a ship gets bordered against the will of the crew in INTERNATIONAL WATERS, the correct term is PIRACY. As such didn't the crew have the right of self-defense and therefore the right to use whatever means was at their disposal? If they had stopped the ship in Israeli waters, the Netanyahu administration might be able to call this "Self-Defense," but that did not happen. This happned in INTERNATIONAL WATERS and so isn't Israel in violation of international law?

b - Then there was the issue of why the hell Israeli commandos needed to board the ship in the first place. Israel's navy is armed with decent enough ships to protect her maritime interest and nobody can believe that Israel's navy could not have sent enough armed ships to "guide" the ship away from Gaza. It doesn't take much military imagination to see how a few armed frigates with air support could have diverted unarmed ships to wherever they chose. We are talking about the most advanced military in the region not being able to turn away unarmed ships?

Then of course there is the argument on the justification of the siege of Gaza. Israelis themselves understand that the only group that's benefiting from the continued siege of Gaza is the HR department of the most militant groups in Gaza. The main section of Hamas has remained quiet — they may not recognize the "Right of Israel to Exist" but they have recognized "The Reality of Israel." They have held the truce and not fired shots. Yet they're supposed to allow Israel to crap all over them with the Western world clapping away — "Yes, _ em, they're just a bunch of Ayrabs." Pity the Ayrabs have this mentality of fighting back when they're having the crap kicked out of them.

But let's leave that aside and focus on the main facts. The State of Israel is guilty of committing a crime in international waters and the only people who think this is acceptable are Americans and that really is a blot on the kind heart of American people. Face it, there was no need for the State of Israel to do what it did. Telling Mr. Netanyahu that his actions are morally reprehensible is not anti-Jewish — if anything, describing criticism of Mr. Netanyahu as being "anti-Jewish" is an act of "anti-semetism" in itself.