Posted on Wednesday, 18 August, 2010 By yours truly | TOOLS:Talk or Share
Those tuning in to Monday night’s Panorama on BBC may have finished the episode under the impression that a Turkish ship had attacked a group of Israeli pleasure boaters somewhere off the coast of Tel Aviv. In fact, it was meant to be an exposé on the Israeli military’s deadly attack on a civilian vessel flying under a Turkish flag in international waters carrying an international crew and passengers and aid shipments bound to Gaza in an attempt to break a siege there that defies international law. See how easy that was? The show’s lead reporter, Jane Corbin wasn’t able to actually explore that in any depth the entire half-hour slot she had.
Corbin is a member of the Panorama documentary team and a self-styled “renowned expert on the al-Qaeda network and Islamist threat” that faces us all. I know this because it’s how she advertises herself. She even wrote a book on it.
Corbin ostensibly set out in Monday’s docu-drama to answer the question of what happened on the ship Mavi Marmara that led to the deaths of nine of its passengers by the guns of the Israeli commandos that stormed it. Spoiler alert: After a half an hour, the viewer is none the wiser. 80% of the program was devoted to commandos who killed 9 civilians while, at the most, 20% was devoted to all other comments. Her lengthy, fawning interviews with Israeli Navy flacks and TV-approved commandos failed to provide a definitive answer. The scant time dedicated to eye witnesses who had been aboard the Mavi Marmara on the night of May 31 also apparently failed to suit her narrative of choice. As a result, what we the TV audience received was pure propaganda.
Posted on Friday, 11 June, 2010 By yours truly | TOOLS:Talk or Share
Delegitimize.com is a new media library project by Nigel Parry that plans to publish a series of both topic-specific and current event-focused archive websites, with the help of the pro-Palestinian community and beyond.
The Gaza Flotilla archiveis a freely-available research resource on the events that took place in international waters off the coast of Gaza on 31 May 2010.
Posted on Thursday, 3 June, 2010 By yours truly | TOOLS:Talk or Share
IMEU has a great synopsis with regardss to the various laws that Israel’s attacks on the Free Gaza flotilla are in violation of, as well as the legal status of the Gaza blockade and occupation…
Some of the participants of the humanitarian flotilla. (Maan Images)
Israel exercises “effective control” over Gaza and as such remains an occupying power. Under international law Israel’s blockade of Gaza is illegal. Its attack on the humanitarian aid flotilla – meant to enforce an illegal blockade – is illegal as well.
Posted on Tuesday, 1 June, 2010 By yours truly | TOOLS:Talk or Share
Note: The IHH website is currently under a DOS attack. IHH was the human rights organisation out of Turkey that organised the shipment of 10,000 tonnes of aid to Gaza.
What follows are some decent statements on the Israel’s attack on humanitarian ships in international waters:
“Hillary Clinton on North Korea: ‘I think it’s important to send a clear message to North Korea that provocative actions [sinking a war ship] have consequences. We cannot allow the attack on South Korea to go unanswered by the international community.’ … Hillary Clinton on Israel’s attack on a humanitarian aid convoy: Silence.” – Diana Buttu
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“If an armed group of Somali pirates had yesterday boarded six vessels on the high seas, killing at least 10 passengers and injuring many more, a Nato taskforce would today be heading for the Somali coast. What happened yesterday in international waters off the coast of Gaza was the work of Israeli commandos, not pirates, and no Nato warships will in fact be heading for Israel. Perhaps they should be.” – The Guardian editorial
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“It is unclear how anyone could credibly adopt an Israeli narrative of ‘self-defense’ when Israel had carried out an unprovoked armed assault on civilian ships in international waters. Surely any right of self-defense would belong to the passengers on the ship. Nevertheless, the Freedom Flotilla organizers had clearly and loudly proclaimed their ships to be unarmed civilian vessels on a humanitarian mission.” – Electronic Intifada
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“If we needed any evidence of the degree to which Western TV journalists are simply stenographers to power, the BBC, CNN and others are amply proving it. Mark Regev, Israel’s propagandist-in-chief, has the airwaves largely to himself.” – Jonathan Cook
Posted on Monday, 31 May, 2010 By yours truly | TOOLS:Talk or Share
Israeli ships have fired on ships in international waters carrying humanitarian supplies to Gaza. According to various media reports between 10 and 16 people have been killed. The ships, flying under Turkish flags on high seas, having been inspected before departure, were delivering food, medical supplies and volunteer human rights activists to Gaza ports.
We could spend some time here talking about the various laws being broken under this action involving international waters, but that seems a bit aside the point right now. People once again have been killed for supporting the reconstruction and right to existence in Gaza.
The Free Gaza ships were part of a humanitarian project that seeks not just to deliver medical and food for the basic subsistence of people in Gaza, but also sought to bring visitors to its ports and assert the rights of people in Gaza to have control over their own sea space. That its neighbor Israel should not have control over what goes in and out if it is in fact not an occupying power.
The fact is that Israel still does occupy Gaza, still considers it part of the Greater Project and is simply using different means to keep it unsustainable than it did before the settlements were removed. Those in the Free Gaza flotilla went knowing that there would be resistance from Israeli ship illegally occupying international waters.
The Free Gaza movement remains an inspiring, and fantastic endeavor on behalf, in support of, and with Palestinian participation. The movement has non-profit status in the U.S. and charitable status in the UK. Please donate now. The cost of freedom is apparently higher for some than it is for others.
Update:Ali Abunimah writes: ” I received the following message from a member of the Belfast Palestine Solidarity Committee which has received word from the Free Gaza Movement that those aboard the Irish vessel “Rachel Corrie” have decided to proceed to Gaza. A full press release is expected shortly.”
I’m worried that students will take their obedient place in society and look to become successful cogs in the wheel – let the wheel spin them around as it wants without taking a look at what they’re doing. I’m concerned that students not become passive acceptors of the official doctrine that’s handed down to them from the White House, the media, textbooks, teachers and preachers. — Howard Zinn
D3 distributed
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Those tuning in to Monday night’s Panorama on BBC may have finished the episode under the impression that a Turkish ship had attacked a group of Israeli pleasure boaters somewhere off the coast of Tel Aviv. In fact, it was meant to be an exposé on the Israeli military’s deadly attack on a civilian vessel flying under a Turkish flag in international waters carrying an international crew and passengers and aid shipments bound to Gaza in an attempt to break a siege there that defies international law. See how easy that was? The show’s lead reporter, Jane Corbin wasn’t able to actually explore that in any depth the entire half-hour slot she had. 
I’m worried that students will take their obedient place in society and look to become successful cogs in the wheel – let the wheel spin them around as it wants without taking a look at what they’re doing. I’m concerned that students not become passive acceptors of the official doctrine that’s handed down to them from the White House, the media, textbooks, teachers and preachers.
