1 June 2010
Yet Another Massacre of the Innocents
[Via VOA]
"The Massacre of the Innocents (after Poussin)", Euan Uglow, 1979-81, oil on canvas laid on panel.
Turkey’s prime minister says Israel should be punished for its deadly assault on a convoy of ships carrying aid to the Gaza Strip.
In a passionate speech before lawmakers Tuesday, Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan called the raid a “bloody massacre” and an act of “state terror.” He said the assault went against international law and damaged world peace.
Mr. Erdogan urged Israel to lift its blockade of Gaza, calling it “inhumane,” and warned the country not to test Turkey’s patience.
"Massacre of the Innocents", Guido Reni, 1611, Oil on canvas.
He called on the international community to take further action to condemn Israel and said he would speak with U.S. President Barack Obama about the incident later in the day.
The Turkish prime minister’s speech came just hours after the United Nations Security Council reached an agreement calling for an impartial investigation of the raid. Russia and the European Union also issued a joint call Tuesday for an impartial probe.
On Monday, tens of thousands of people rallied in cities around the world to denounce the Israeli commando operation.
The largest demonstrations were in the Middle East and Europe, particularly in Turkey and Sweden, whose citizens were aboard the ships boarded by Israeli troops.
Nearly 10,000 Turks marched in Istanbul, and police in Stockholm said 7,000 protesters joined a march in the Swedish capital.
U.S. officials said President Barack Obama spoke by telephone with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, urging him to gather all available information about the deadly action.
"The Massacre of the Innocents", Pieter Bruegel the Elder, 1565-7, Oil on panel.
Mr. Netanyahu had been scheduled to visit Mr. Obama at the White House Tuesday, but canceled the trip and returned home to Israel from Canada Monday.
Mr. Obama expressed deep regret at the loss of life in the raid, and said it was important to learn as much as possible about what happened.
Why is it up to civilians to deliver aid? Try as they might, they cannot defend themselves from heavily armed Israeli commandos with sticks and kitchen knives.
Why isn’t our Canadian government organizing an air-lift for the people under Israeli siege? A well armed Canadian humanitarian force could deliver the aid, and could defend against any of these Israeli thugs that try to stop them.
June 1st, 2010 at 9:11 amUm… Canadian aid forces versus one of the best armies in the world on its home soil? I don’t see that working out so well.
June 2nd, 2010 at 6:30 pmGood point… better stay off Israeli home soil, and just go straight to Palestine with the aid…
June 2nd, 2010 at 8:07 pmAh, yes, NOW I remember… THAT is exactly what this Turkish-lead convoy was trying to do.
Alas, they ran into, not one of the best armies in the world, but rather, quite demonstrably, one of the absolute WORST.
June 3rd, 2010 at 2:29 amIsrael is as militarized as it is because one neighbor or another has been threatening to destroy it since its inception, and separatist Palestinian factions have for that entire time been acting as military proxies for Egypt, Lebanon, or Syria, and now probably Saudi Arabia and Iran as well.
Liberals spent decades rationalizing Palestinian acts of terror that make this latest disgusting incident look like a church brunch, and now seem to be of the mind that if Israel would only rescind territories lost in 1967 by neighbors who were amassing hostile troops there by the tens of thousands in preparation for an attack, and deaccession half of Jerusalem for good measure, peace would reign. In fact, the original problem was deep-seated race hatred, religiously motivated political mandates, and water rights.
There is no political solution. I recommend to anyone exercised about the matter to invest in research into cheap, fast desalinization of ocean water.
June 3rd, 2010 at 6:44 amSo THAT’S what a church brunch looks like!
June 3rd, 2010 at 6:54 amI wouldn’t know… I try to avoid religious gatherings.
Here’s one Conservative Prime Minister with a functioning moral compass and a pair of balls on this issue.
Too bad (but, no surprise) he’s not ours.
June 3rd, 2010 at 7:00 amAnd HERE’S Robert Fisk with a reality check (singling out the “rabid Canadian National Post” for criticism, to boot).
June 5th, 2010 at 7:20 amAnd HERE is a good description of the “church brunch” in question.
June 5th, 2010 at 7:36 amYou should see Hitch’s brilliant analysis of this.
June 7th, 2010 at 6:19 pmAh, Hitch! Yes, that of course is what the surviving “so-called humanitarians” should be asked about their ordeal: “ARE YOU AN ANTI-SEMITE?”.
I bet some of the people with bits of their friends’ brains on them do harbour some anti-Israeli feelings… Let’s ask this guy.
June 8th, 2010 at 12:25 amYou can bet that those anti-Israeli feelings were firmly in place when they boarded a vessel whose mission was to violate a blockade that wouldn’t be necessary if munitions were not being shipped to Hamas under the guise of relief efforts. And why violate the blockade on principle? Here’s your answer.
Speaking of bits of brains, I have a friend who has a three-inch scar on her scalp from when the objects of pity of this boatload of alleged innocents blew up the bus she was riding in Tel Aviv. Those aboard the Mavi Marmara did not deserve to die for taking part in a cynical political exercise, even if they were anti-semites. But neither do Israelis deserve to die by fire by the millions, which is the only possible result of the policies that world opinion would have them adopt.
June 8th, 2010 at 10:43 amIf “Anti-Israeli” means profoundly disagreeing with the specific nature and details of the blockade, then yes, that would go without saying about the entire flotilla; clearly, this alone doesn’t rise to the level of “anti-semitism”. If the flotilla had no Jewish supporters, that accusation might have more credibility, but that is not the case.
June 8th, 2010 at 3:56 pmForgive me: I’m going to skip the Krauthammer link, as he is a known crazy-person (I can’t help but notice, at times like these, the craziest nut-job far-right pundits, who are considered largely ridiculous on all other occasions, suddenly become sources of mainstream wisdom in the US media).
That’s how it looks from where I sit, and from what I’ve read and seen, anyway. I imagine some of those in the flotilla have the children of Gaza in mind as the objects of their pity (surely not responsible for your friend’s injury), whom they recognize as obviously ill-served by all the “grown-ups” around them, and in desperate need of help.
But, maybe they’re not so desperate, and perhaps they should help in another way. At one end of the scale, we might have a sea-caravan of anti-Semites engaged in a cynical political exercise who were unjustifiably killed; and on the other end of the scale, we have well meaning lovers of Jews and Arabs alike doing noble and necessary work, who were unjustifiably killed. Either way, it doesn’t work out in anybody’s favour.
Hamas has a charter calling for the obliteration of Israel, launched thousands of mortar attacks on civilian targets, and philosophically embraces The Protocols of the Elders of Zion as a historical document. They are the duly chosen leaders of the Palestinians in Gaza. The ending of the blockade would allow them to re-arm at will. Mere critique of the blockade doesn’t rise to the level of antisemitism, but the perverse externalities of Palestinian aid abet it anyway.
I commend the link to you anyway; if it were crazy talk (to which Krauthammer is occasionally prone) I wouldn’t trouble you with it. His military analysis in this case is above reproach.
June 8th, 2010 at 7:52 pmSorry, Franklin, I did read the Krazy Krauthammer link. I didn’t mean to imply I was unwilling to read it, but just that I was going to pass on discussing it. Most US press coverage I’ve seen, naturally, sounds identical to NewsCorp media, that WaPo article included.
June 8th, 2010 at 8:07 pmI just read an interesting recent article from Noam Chomsky, on “The Iranian Threat”, and these clear-headed lines seemed appropriate to note here:
“Hamas resists Israel’s military occupation and its illegal and violent actions in the occupied territories. It is accused of refusing to recognize Israel (political parties do not recognize states). In contrast, the U.S. and Israel not only do not recognize Palestine, but have been acting relentlessly and decisively for decades to ensure that it can never come into existence in any meaningful form. The governing party in Israel, in its 1999 campaign platform, bars the existence of any Palestinian state—a step towards accommodation beyond the official positions of the U.S. and Israel a decade earlier, which held that there cannot be “an additional Palestinian state” between Israel and Jordan, the latter a “Palestinian state” by U.S.-Israeli fiat whatever its benighted inhabitants and government might believe.
Hamas is charged with rocketing Israeli settlements on the border, criminal acts no doubt, though a fraction of Israel’s violence in Gaza, let alone elsewhere. It is important to bear in mind, in this connection, that the U.S. and Israel know exactly how to terminate the terror that they deplore with such passion. Israel officially concedes that there were no Hamas rockets as long as Israel partially observed a truce with Hamas in 2008. Israel rejected Hamas’s offer to renew the truce, preferring to launch the murderous and destructive Operation Cast Lead against Gaza in December 2008, with full U.S. backing, an exploit of murderous aggression without the slightest credible pretext on either legal or moral grounds.“
July 18th, 2010 at 8:17 amAnd then, of course, there’s this recent revelation, which likely surprises no one:
A newly revealed tape shows Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu once openly discussed his intent to attack the Palestinian government, undermine the Oslo peace accords, and manipulate the United States to ensure its approval. The 2001 recording shows Netanyahu meeting with Israeli settlers in the occupied West Bank. Netanyahu was then out of government after serving his first stint in office. Apparently unaware he was being recorded, Netanyahu talks openly of a “broad attack” on the Palestinian government, saying, “The main thing, first of all, is to hit them. Not just one blow, but blows that are so painful that the price will be too heavy to be borne.” Netanyahu also outlines how he would undermine the 1993 Oslo accords, he said, which established the basis for Israeli-Palestinian peace talks, by declaring any West Bank land that Israel wants to retain as “military” and “security zones.” Addressing potential US opposition to Israeli expansionism, Netanyahu says, “I know what America is. America is a thing you can move very easily, move it in the right direction. They won’t get in the way.”
One can only assume, off camera, he added, “MUUUAAAAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!”, for effect.
July 19th, 2010 at 8:10 amThen, there’s this, today, in the NYT…
July 27th, 2010 at 7:28 am