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
It’s actually very simple. Men with guns descend from helicopters onto boats in international water. Civilian passengers on boats killed. Done. Another vessel in the Free Gaza movement, The MV Rachel Corrie is set to arrive in Gazan waters soon. Israel has threatened to attack this legal shipment of humanitarian aid as well with similar deadly violence. What follows are some facts of the case with sources provided.
Products (source: the Israeli human rights organization Gisha) barred from Gaza by the Israeli occupation. Graphic by that bastion of the radical left, The Economist
“UN statistics show that around 70% of Gazans live on less than $1 a day, 75% rely on food aid and 60% have no daily access to water. Humanitarian aid is in theory allowed in, but UN agencies and charities claim that the Israelis have banned any items that are humanitarian in nature but could be put to alternative use. Items said to face delays getting into Gaza include shelter kits, health and paediatric hygiene kits, bedding, kitchen utensils, school textbooks and stationery. The World Bank estimates that 80% of Gaza’s imports are smuggled in by tunnel. The goods, which are taxed by Hamas, attract inflated prices that are out of the reach of most ordinary residents.” — The Guardian
freegaza.org
The embargo on goods to Gaza is illegal under international law. The United Nations Security Council has called for it to be lifted. — UN Security Council Resolution 1860
The Israeli embargo meets the definition of “collective punishment,” a war crime under the Fourth Geneva Convention. “Art. 33. No protected person may be punished for an offence he or she has not personally committed. Collective penalties and likewise all measures of intimidation or of terrorism are prohibited.” — ICRC
No foreign power, even an occupying power, has the authority to restrict delivery of Humanitarian aid under any circumstances according to the Fourth Geneva Convention. — ICRC
“Israel has no right to control Gaza’s sea as its own territorial waters and to stop aid convoys arriving that way. In doing so, it proves that it is still in belligerent occupation of the enclave and its 1.5 million inhabitants. And if it is occupying Gaza, then under international law Israel is responsible for the welfare of the Strip’s inhabitants. Given that the blockade has put Palestinians there on a starvation diet for the past four years, Israel should long ago have been in the dock for committing a crime against humanity.” — Jonathan Cook
A ship delivering humanitarian aid to Gaza was flying under the Turkish flag when it was attacked by Israeli commandos last night leading to a still unknown number of civilian deaths. Turkey is a member of NATO. Article 5 of the NATO charter declares that armed attacks against any NATO member in Europe or North America will be considered an attack against all of them, with each taking action. Article 6 lists the Mediterranean Sea as one location where an attack will bring about a response. — NATO
The Law of the Sea also applies to the attack on the Turkish vessel, and the U.S. was wrong to suggest in the UN that Israel should lead (or even take part) in any investigation of the incident. In international waters, the applicable laws are those of the country whose flag the ship where the altercation took place was flying. It was a Turkish ship, hence it’s Turkish territory and Turkish laws and jurisdiction apply. — The Law of the Sea
Unless…
Because the action took place on open waters, one of two scenarios currently exists provided by Craig Murray (citation link at bottom):
” Possibility one is that the Israeli commandos were acting on behalf of the government of Israel in killing the activists on the ships. In that case Israel is in a position of war with Turkey, and the act falls under international jurisdiction as a war crime.”
“Possibility two is that, if the killings were not authorised Israeli military action, they were acts of murder under Turkish jurisdiction. If Israel does not consider itself in a position of war with Turkey, then it must hand over the commandos involved for trial in Turkey under Turkish law.”
So, if Israel isn’t at war with Turkey then it should turn over any suspects to Turkish authorities. If Israel claims it has the authority, it’s an act of war. — Craig Murray, former British Ambassador and an Honorary Research Fellow at the University of Lancaster School of Law
Taking all this into account, you’d think the MV Rachel Corrie would find some smooth sailing into the Port of Gaza. But then you’d be thinking about a government that was behaving in a rational manner. Think again.
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.”
Wikilieaks released the above classified military footage on April 5, shot from an Apache helicopter gun-site. Amongst the small group of what looks to be civilians killed and injred were two children and two Reuters journalists.
Posted on Tuesday, 16 March, 2010 By yours truly | TOOLS:Talk or Share
Rachel Corrie was killed today seven years ago as she stood as a human rights activist with the International Solidarity Movement to protect the illegal destruction of a Palestinian home in Gaza by Israeli occupation forces. My friend Dave Reed has recently unveiled the new design for the Rachel Corrie Foundation website, which is a fantastic new version of the site. Today I urge you to visit it and consider donating to help continue the foundation’s efforts of working on projects in the spirit of the foundation’s namesake.
Rachel Corrie
1979 – 2003
On this, the seventh anniversary of Rachel Corrie’s death in Rafah, Palestine, the Corrie family and the Rachel Corrie Foundation for Peace & Justice call for a renewed commitment to create a better, more peaceful, and just world.
It’s absolutely deplorable that this country treats ideology and intellectual debate the way it does. But: we owe to this its ironies. Its tolerance. Its decision not to take too seriously what in other countries have proved fatal challenges. It is my conviction that had the infinite rhetorical genius of Adolf Hitler been tested on Hyde Park Corner, people would have said, ‘Ah, come off it,’ and walked away. — George Steiner
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It’s absolutely deplorable that this country treats ideology and intellectual debate the way it does. But: we owe to this its ironies. Its tolerance. Its decision not to take too seriously what in other countries have proved fatal challenges. It is my conviction that had the infinite rhetorical genius of Adolf Hitler been tested on Hyde Park Corner, people would have said, ‘Ah, come off it,’ and walked away.
