The violent takeover dealt yet another blow to Israel’s international image, already tarnished by war crimes accusations in Gaza and its 3-year-old blockade of the impoverished Palestinian territory.
Israel’s regional allies froze military ties as angry protests erupted over the storming of aid ships bound for Gaza, while Muslim leaders demanded swift UN action to punish the "criminal" assault. In the midst of the international uproar, Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu canceled a much-anticipated meeting with President Barack Obama in Washington on Tuesday and, from Canada, announced he was rushing home.
Netanyahu has endorsed Israeli commandos' operation to turn back a flotilla from Gaza. Obama's choice now will be to react as he did to the last incredibly ill-timed news — the settlement construction during the Biden visit — and criticize the Israeli action, a move which might upend his recent charm offensive with Jewish groups; or he can, even by remaining silent, tacitly endorse it, and disappoint Arab allies who see the friction with Israel as a sign of progress.
Here in the US, hundreds of New Yorkers and Washingtonians were expected to take to the streets on Monday evening and again on Tuesday to respond to Sunday night's attack on civilian aide boats by the Israeli Army.
"The story of hope has turned to tragedy and outrage," organizer Felice Gelman told Arab News from New York.
Gelman, who works with Adalah New York, an organization which focuses on boycotts, investments and sanctions against Israel’s occupation of Palestine, and the Gaza Freedom Coalition, said the Monday demonstrations may be marred by the 3-day holiday, “It’s Memorial Day, and a lot of people are away. But I think that the nature of this unbelievable Israeli attack on unarmed civilians will bring a number of people of out. I’m already getting a lot of phone calls from people who want to attend.
“People are outraged that Israel would murder nine unarmed civilians,” Gelman said, adding she is in contact with people involved with the flotilla and “the US media is not reporting a significant fact, which is the passengers were not carrying weapons."
“When they boarded went under an airport-like screening, there were no weapons on the ships. The organizers wanted to make sure that there would be no violence.” Gelman said that so far Israel has refused to release the names of the people who were killed or injured. “The 700 people who were on board these ships have no idea about the details or who was killed.” She emphasized the similarity of a previous Israeli attack against Americans: “In 1968, Israel attacked the USS Liberty not too far from where it attacked these ships. I’m hoping that the US government will not be afraid to respond to the attack on its citizens this time. There were 13 Americans on the five ships,” said Gelman.
“I was told this morning, that all of the ships, with the exception of the Turkish ship, have been taken to shore, and all of the ships were hijacked by Israeli commanders in international waters.” Gelman said the Israelis have released their version of what happened to the world media defending their actions, “but the coordinates of the ships were recorded live at the time – those ships were recorded at being 70 miles out in the Mediterranean before the Israelis were able to jam all communications and cut off the live media feed on the ships.” Additionally, she said the organizers of the flotilla received some warning that the Israelis were preparing to attack them. “They changed their course to go further out into the Mediterranean, because they didn’t want a confrontation as they didn’t want to suffer the dangers of a nighttime attack. So the Israelis hijacked the ships while they were heading out further away from the shoreline.”
Obama, who has been pushing for a jump start of the peace process has a meeting scheduled here June 9 with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas.
In a statement last week, the White House said that Obama and Abbas planned to discuss the ongoing Israeli-Palestinian proximity talks and ways the US can work with both parties to move into direct talks. They also will discuss US efforts to support the establishment of a Palestinian state.
