Israel confronts the Gaza Freedom Flotilla (Ongoing Roundup)

NOTE: This roundup will be continuously updated with further information

This past Memorial Day weekend, "Israel boarded a Gaza-bound 'Freedom Flotilla' and killed an indeterminate number of innocent bystanders as they attempted to take control international waters."

Well, at least that's the take of Henry Karlson of Vox Nova -- who appears to be taking his talking points from Egyptian passenger Hazem Farouq:

"It was hell on the sea. I saw Israeli soldiers killing activists in cold blood and then walking on their bodies ... The Israeli soldiers sprayed bullets as if they were a mafia in an American film."

Unfortunately, as with such accounts of Israel's actions, the facts tend to get in the way. Let's examine the various claims of this Catholic blog regarding what happened this weekend ...

Tantamount to Piracy?

[Henry Karlson @ Vox Nova] Israel is claiming the massacre is justified because their soldiers were attacked. They fail to point out they were attacked when they were boarding a vessel they had no lawful authority to board, acting like pirates who think they control the seas.

For what it's worth, the Israel Ministry of Foreign Affairs provides a page explaining the legal background behind the Gaza flotilla and the maritime blockade of Gaza:

A maritime blockade is in effect off the coast of Gaza. Such blockade has been imposed, as Israel is currently in a state of armed conflict with the Hamas regime that controls Gaza, which has repeatedly bombed civilian targets in Israel with weapons that have been smuggled into Gaza via the sea. [...]

[I]t should be noted that Israel publicized the existence of the blockade and the precise coordinates of such by means of the accepted international professional maritime channels. Israel also provided appropriate notification to the affected governments and to the organizers of the Gaza protest flotilla. Moreover, in real time, the ships participating in the protest flotilla were warned repeatedly that a maritime blockade is in effect. [...]

Given the protesters explicit intention to violate the naval blockade, Israel exercised its right under international law to enforce the blockade. It should be noted that prior to undertaking enforcement measures, explicit warnings were relayed directly to the captains of the vessels, expressing Israel's intent to exercise its right to enforce the blockade.

Not only did Israel convey explicit warnings against breaking the blockade, but the interception came after numerous appeals to governments, organizations, and flotilla organizers ahead of their departures, and also during their journeys towards the Gaza shore [to convey the humanitarian supplies by another route]:

In these appeals, it was clarified to the flotilla organizers that they would be able to anchor in the Ashdod port, unload their equipment and transfer it over to the Gaza Strip in an organized manner after it would undergo accepted security checks. When flotilla organizers made it clear that they had no intention of cooperating and accepting the invitation to the Ashdod port, it was decided to intercept the boats and to bring them to the Ashdod port.

Consequently, Israel believed it was well within its rights to enforce a declared blockade. See also Israel, the Flotilla and International Waters (discussion with Yaakov @ Newsvine.com).

Update

Ed Morgan, a professor of international law at the University of Toronto, offers a helpful primer on the "Law of the Sea", by which we can judge the flotilla incident:

A naval blockade is defined in Article 7.71 of the U.S. Naval Handbook as “a belligerent operation to prevent vessels and/or aircraft of all nations, enemy as well as neutral, from entering or exiting specified ports, airfields, or coastal areas belonging to, occupied by, or under the control of an enemy nation.” It is designed to stop ships from crossing a cordon separating the enemy’s coast from the high seas. It is therefore often enforced in what would otherwise be international waters approaching, but not necessarily inside, the territorial sea of the blockaded party. [...]

A maritime blockade is for security purposes only, and must allow humanitarian assistance to the civilian population. Since the ships sailing for Gaza were on a declared humanitarian mission, those on board had the right to expect that any humanitarian goods would ultimately find their way to their intended recipients. On the other hand, having announced its blockade, Israel had no obligation to take the ships’ crew at their word as to the nature of the cargo. The blockading party has the right to fashion the arrangements, including search at a nearby port, under which passage of humanitarian goods is permitted. San Remo specifies that this inspection should include supervision by a neutral party to prevent the unwarranted seizure of humanitarian supplies and the abuse of humanitarian assistance by the blockaded party.

Finally, the rule of proportionate force, applicable to all armed conflict, applies equally to a naval blockade. Blockading navies are obliged to arrest a ship rather than simply fire on it, and once its soldiers are on board an arrested ship their actions must be proportionate to the threat that they meet. While Israel appears to have met the other criteria eliminating a macro offence, here the facts will have to be gathered from witnesses and videos to determine what level of force was truly needed at the spot where the paintballs met the hammers.

A disproportionate or justified use of armed force?

[Henry Karlson @ Vox Nova] Probably those who attacked the soldiers were acting reflexively without thinking. Let alone the moral question, in all practicality, this was not the wisest thing to do, because the soldiers were heavily armed and could take control of the ship without difficulty.

(Elder of Ziyon notes), these would be the same "peace activists" who attacked the IDF commandoes with chains and iron rods, throwing them over railings, stabbing them, and calling for a repeat of Mohammed's massacre of Jews at Khaybar. By contrast, the soldiers by their account were not "heavily armed" but rather were woefully unprepared -- armed with equipped with paintball rifles used to disperse minor protests, and handguns as a last resort in life-threatening situations (as reported by Yediot Ahronot).

Here's how one IDF soldier described the incident:

"We went down with our bare hands and met passengers with glass bottles and clubs," said one fighter squadron participated in the operation.

"We were lynched," testified one of the fighters in the hospital. "For every person that came down, three or four people beat him. They were all with metal batons, knives, glass bottles. At one point there was live fire."

"In fact I got there last," said a fighter squadron in an interview with Channel 2 News. "I saw the guys scattered on the deck surrounded each of them with about four people beating him."

"Trying to defend myself I probably broke my hand . All who got on board had no weapons in hand, but their bare hands," explained the soldier. "We came to work things out, but they came for war - the gun was absolutely our last resort."

According to Army Radio reporter Gal Lev-Rom, "the soldiers said they were truly not prepared to face violence of this nature":

“The activists had many things ready for an attack on the soldiers,” Lev-Rom said, “including, for instance, a box of 20-30 slingshots with metal balls; these can kill. There were also all sorts of knives and many similar things. These are what they call ‘cold’ weapons, as opposed to live fire. It was quite clear that a lynch had been prepared.”

Lev-Rom said, however, that it appears the army, “even though it prepared for many different scenarios, was not ready for this one. The army seems not to have known what type of people were there and what type of weapons they had. It was hard for Israel to conceive that the ship, sponsored by the country of Turkey, would have such weapons. Israel was prepared to deal with anarchists, and instead had to deal with terrorists – that’s the feeling here.”

A Reuters cameraman on the Israel Navy ship Kidon, sailing close to the convoy, said IDF commanders monitoring the operation were surprised by the strong resistance (Haaretz):

One of the commandos said some of the soldiers were stripped of their helmets and equipment and a several were tossed from the top deck to a lower deck, forcing them to jump into the sea to escape.

"They jumped me, hit me with clubs and bottles and stole my rifle," one of the commandos said. "I pulled out my pistol and had no choice but to shoot."

The soldiers said they were forced to open fire after the activists struck one of their comrades in the head and trampled on him. A senior IDF field commander ordered the soldiers then to respond with fire, a decision which the commandos said received full backing the military echelon.

The IDF said its rules of engagement allowed troops to open fire in what it called a "life-threatening situation".

Update!

According to Free Gaza's account of the events, "Under darkness of night, Israeli commandoes dropped from a helicopter onto the Turkish passenger ship, Mavi Marmara, and began to shoot the moment their feet hit the deck. They fired directly into the crowd of civilians asleep."

However, a Turkish paper published pictures of Israeli commandos taken hostage during the initial moments of the flotilla raid, which reveals Free Gaza's claim to be a complete fabrication. The blog Elder of Ziyon comments:

The Turkish newspaper that published the pictures of the IDF soldiers today does not use the meme of ruthless IDF soldiers shooting from the helicopter and murdering civilians within seconds of landing on deck - nor do the pictures support that narrative in the least. Rather, they prove Israel's version of events completely. Yet the Turkish press, as we had seen Friday from some of the Arabic press, instead say how weak and ineffectual the IDF soldiers were, all but mocking them for not using lethal force initially.

The newspaper notes, with glee, the fear in the soldiers' faces captured in the photos. It discusses how the brave "humanitarians" fought the mighty IDF with sacks of onions. The article calls the soldiers "amateurish" and "incompetent."

To the supporters of the IHH and its partners, the IDF's reticence in using lethal force is a clear sign of weakness, not a sign of caring about human life.

"We had no choice" - "They had murder in their eyes". The Jerusalem Post gives an eyewitness account of the commando who killed six of the attackers:

The 15th and last naval commando from Flotilla 13 (the Shayetet) to rappel down onto the ship from the helicopter, S. said on Thursday that he was immediately attacked by what the IDF has called “the mob of mercenaries” aboard the vessel, just like the soldiers who had boarded just before him.

Looking to his side, he saw three of his commanders lying wounded – one with a gunshot wound to the stomach and another with a gunshot wound to the knee. A third was lying unconscious; his skull was fractured by a devastating blow with a metal bar.

As the next in the chain of command, S., who has been in the Shayetet for three and a half years, immediately took charge.

He pushed the wounded soldiers up against the wall of the upper deck and created a perimeter of soldiers around them to begin treating their wounds, he said. He then arranged his men to form a second perimeter, and pulled out his 9 mm. Glock pistol to stave off the charging attackers and to protect his wounded comrades.

The attackers had already seized two pistols from the commandos, and fired repeatedly at them. Facing more than a dozen of the mercenaries, and convinced their lives were in danger, he and his colleagues opened fire, he said. S. singlehandedly killed six men. His colleagues killed another three.

Video Footage:

• A soldier that took part in boarding the Mavi Marmara describes the violent confrontation that awaited on it's decks
• Video taken by IDF naval boat shows the passengers of the Mavi Marmara, one of the ships in the 'Free Gaza' Flotilla, violently attacking IDF soldiers with metal poles and chairs.
• IDF soldier being stabbed by Mavi Marmara "peace activist"
• Video of Turkish "peace activists" on Mavi Marmara ambushing and beating soldiers
• In footage captured on the Mavi Marmara, activists are seen attacking the soldiers with a stun grenade, a box of plates, and water hoses as the soldiers attempt to board the ship.

Humanitarians and "Peace activists"

Henry Karlson (Vox Nova) moves on to describe the convoy itself and it's "humanitarian mission":

"The Freedom Flotilla carries more than 10,000 tons of relief and developmental aid to Gaza, along with roughly 700 participants from more than 30 countries, among them volunteers from Canada, South Africa, Algeria, Turkey, Macedonia, Pakistan, Yemin, Kosovo, the UK and US and Kuwait – and an exiled former Archbishop of Jerusalem who currently lives in the Vatican."

Here we see the situation involves not just Muslim nations, but many of the nations of the West, such as the United States. We also see that the retired Archbishop of Jerusalem is on board the ship, indicating the active role the Church has had in this humanitarian aid.

The archbishop in question would be Father Hilarion Capucci

... the archbishop of Jerusalem during the 1960s and early 1970s, was arrested by Israeli security forces in 1974 for material support of a terrorist organization. According to Paul Merkley, a historian and author of the book Christian Attitudes Towards the State of Israel, Capucci used his official limousine and "the cover of his priestly office to personally smuggle explosives, submachine guns, and even katyusha rockets into Israel, which were then used in PLO terrorist actions accounting for the loss of many lives."

The Muslim Brotherhood issued a statement on its English language website this week, announcing the priest's participation in the flotilla and claiming that "the Israeli occupation exiled father Capucci from Palestine because of his honorable national stands."

Sentenced to fifty-seven years in an Israeli prison, the gunrunning clergyman was granted a reprieve in 1977 after direct intervention from the Vatican. The Catholic Church called for Capucci's release on the grounds that his incarceration only served to "aggravate tension."

The Church promised Israeli authorities that Capucci would cease all involvement in political issues regarding the state of Israel. Since that time Capucci has positioned himself as a prominent anti-Zionist activist. In 2009 he was arrested and transferred to Syria by Israeli security forces after attempting to illegally enter Gaza by sea. The former terrorist is also active in promoting the right of return for those Arabs who fled during the 1948 invasion of the newly declared state of Israel.

According to the former archbishop, the founder of his religion was "the first Fedayeen" and he was merely "following his example."

So much for the "Church's involvement" -- what about the rest of the occupants?

As Jonathan Schanzer (Weekly Standard) points out, the convoy of ships allegedly trying to bring aid to the Gaza Strip was organized by a group belonging to an officially designated terrorist organization:

The Turkish IHH (Islan Haklary Ve Hurriyetleri Vakfi in Turkish) was founded in 1992, and reportedly popped up on the CIA's radar in 1996 for its radical Islamist leanings. Like many other Islamist charities, the IHH has a record of providing relief to areas where disaster has struck in the Muslim world.

However, the organization is not a force for good. The Turkish nonprofit belongs to a Saudi-based umbrella organization known to finance terrorism called the Union of Good (Ittilaf al-Kheir in Arabic). Notably, the Union is chaired by Sheikh Yusuf Qaradawi, who is known best for his religious ruling that encourages suicide attacks against Israeli civilians. According to one report, Qardawi personally transferred millions of dollars to the Union in an effort to provide financial support to Hamas.

In 2008, the Israelis banned IHH, along with 35 other Islamist charities worldwide, for its ties to the Union of Good. This was a follow-on designation; Israelis first blocked the Union of Good from operating in the West Bank and Gaza in 2002. [Read the rest]

See also: IHH's support and finance of radical Islamic terror networks - a report by The Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center, according to which it's pretty clear that the activists aboard the Flotilla were hoping to provoke a confrontation with Israel:

On April 7, 2010, IHH head Bülent Yildirim told a press conference in Istanbul that the flotilla would be a “test” for Israel. He said that should Israel oppose the flotilla it would be considered “a declaration of war” on the countries whose activists arrived on board the ships (IHH website, April 7, 2010). In a fiery speech given at the launching of the Mavi Marmaris on May 23, he said to Israel, “Handle this crisis well. If you prevent [the flotilla from reaching the Gaza Strip] you will remain isolated in the world and harm yourselves” (IHH website in Turkish, May 23, 2010). On May 21 Muhammad Kaya, head of IHH’s branch office in the Gaza Strip, said there was a plan to send flotillas to the Gaza Strip every month (Al-Jazeera-Info website, arabianawareness.com, May 21, 2010).

Violence and possibly "martyrdom" against Israel was not only anticipated, but sought after according to Dr. Abd Al-Fatah Shayyeq Naaman, lecturer in Shari'ah law at a university in Yemen:

"The [Gaza] flotilla commander said yesterday: 'We will not allow the Zionists to get near us and we will use resistance against them.'

How will they wage resistance? They will resist with their fingernails. They are people who seek Martyrdom for Allah, as much as they want to reach Gaza, but the first [Martyrdom] is more desirable."

[Al-Aqsa TV (Hamas), May 30, 2010]

Update!

The International Muslim Brotherhood had a heavy hand in orchestrating the flotilla, reports Thomas Jocelyn (Weekly Standard June 3, 2010):

[T]he flotilla was organized in large part by a radical Turkish Islamist organization named IHH (Islan Haklary Ve Hurriyetleri Vakfi). The IHH, in turn, is part of a Saudi-based umbrella group called the Union of Good, which was created by Hamas. [...]

The Union of Good’s leaders include Sheikh Yusuf Qaradawi, a top Muslim Brotherhood cleric, and Sheikh Abd al Majid al Zindani, who heads Yemen’s Islah party. Zindani and the Islah party have deep Brotherhood roots.

In other words, the IHH is an offshoot of the Union of Good, which is in turn an offshoot of the Brotherhood -- as is Hamas.

Jocelyn goes on to investigate various flotilla passengers' connections to the Muslim Brotherhood. See also MEMRI's extensive investigation and profile of the flotilla passengers: "Writing Wills, Preparing for Martyrdom, Determined to Reach Gaza or Die".

Not without reason does Israeli ambassador Michael B. Oren describe the flotilla as "An Assault, Cloaked in Peace" (New York Times June 3, 2010):

What the videos don’t show, however, are several curious aspects Israeli authorities are now investigating. First, about 100 of those detained from the boats were carrying immense sums in their pockets — nearly a million euros in total. Second, Israel discovered spent bullet cartridges on the Mavi Marmara that are of a caliber not used by the Israeli commandos, some of whom suffered gunshot wounds. Also found on the boat were propaganda clips showing passengers “injured” by Israeli forces; these videos, however, were filmed during daylight, hours before the nighttime operation occurred.

The investigations of all this evidence will be transparent, in accordance with Israel’s security needs.

And The Washington Post now charges the Turkish government of Recep Tayyip Erdogan with responsibility for the flotilla fiasco:

Turkey's ambassador to the United States makes the argument that Israel had no cause to clash with the "European lawmakers, journalists, business leaders and an 86-year-old Holocaust survivor" who were aboard the flotilla. But there was no fighting with those people, or with five of the six boats in the fleet. All of the violence occurred aboard the Turkish ferry Mavi Marmara, and all of those who were killed were members or volunteers for the Islamic "charity" that owned the ship, the Humanitarian Relief Foundation (IHH).

The relationship between Mr. Erdogan's government and the IHH ought to be one focus of any international investigation into the incident. The foundation is a member of the "Union of Good," a coalition that was formed to provide material support to Hamas and that was named as a terrorist entity by the United States in 2008.

Against the Distribution of Humanitarian Aid?

What of the humanitarian supplies that Israel was dead-set against giving to the Gazans? (Jerusalem Post June 4, 2010):

Twenty-four hours after the last ship of the Gaza aid flotilla entered the Ashdod Port under the watchful eye of the Israeli Navy, all of the equipment on board was examined Tuesday and the majority of it was loaded onto trucks headed to the Kerem Shalom border crossing. The flotilla’s flagship, the Marmara - where the clash between Israeli commandoes and the passengers took place and which held the participant’s personal belongings - had yet to be fully inspected.

In a statement to reporters at the port on Tuesday, Colonel Moshe Levi, commander of the IDF’s Gaza Strip Coordination and Liaison Administration (CLA), said that none ofthe equipment found on board the three cargo ships was in shortage in Gaza.

In fact, on the topic of humanitarian aid to Gaza, see this report: Behind the Headlines: The Israeli humanitarian lifeline to Gaza (Israel Ministry of Foreign Affairs):

Large quantities of essential food items like baby formula, wheat, meat, dairy products and other perishables are transferred daily and weekly to Gaza. Fertilizers that cannot be used to make explosives are shipped into the Strip regularly, as are potato seeds, eggs for reproduction, bees, and equipment for the flower industry.

In 2009 alone, more than 738,000 tons of food and supplies entered Gaza. Pictures in local newspapers show local markets aplenty with fruit, vegetables, cheese, spices, bread and meat to feed 1.4 million Gazans.

In the first quarter of 2010 (January-March), 94,500 tons of supplies were transferred in 3,676 trucks to the Strip: 48,000 tons of food products; 40,000 tons of wheat; 2,760 tons of rice; 1,987 tons of clothes and footwear; 553 tons of milk powder and baby food.

In a typical week the IDF coordinates the transfer of hundreds of trucks containing about 15,000 tons of supplies. During the week of May 18, 2010 there were more than 100 truckloads of animal food, 65 trucks of fruit and vegetables; 22 truckloads of sugar, some 27 truckloads of meat, poultry and fish; and 40 trucks of dairy products. At holiday times, Israel increases transfers. During the Muslim holy days of Ramadhan and Eid al-Adha, Israel shipped some 11,000 heads of cattle into the Strip.

Update!

Israel's attempts to deliver the humanitarian aid were thwarted by Hamas, who refused to accept the cargo (CNN June 2, 2010):

Palestinian sources confirmed that trucks that arrived from Israel at the Rafah terminal at the Israel-Gaza border were barred from delivering the aid.

Ra'ed Fatooh, in charge of the crossings, and Jamal Khudari, head of a committee against the Gaza blockade, said Israel must release all flotilla detainees and that it will be accepted in the territory only by the Free Gaza Movement people who organized the flotilla.

Israel said it had 20 trucks of aid found on the ships, such as expired medications, clothing, blankets, some medical equipment and toys.

Israel has released all foreign flotilla detainees by Wednesday, but four Israeli Arabs remain in custody.

Who really cares about Gazans? -- Jordan, Saudi Arabia and Egypt and even Syria are cooperating with Israel to distribute humanitarian aid to Gaza.

Hamas' refusal of aid to the Gazans is to be expected. As Der Spiegel reports, "International donations are not always welcome in Gaza" (June 4, 2010):

"People who are not in with Hamas don't see any of the relief goods or the gifts of money," Khadar says. On the sand dune where his house once perched, there is now an emergency shelter. The shelter is made of concrete blocks that Khadar dug from the rubble, and the roof is the canvas of a tent that provided the family with shelter for the first summer after the war. "Hamas supporters get prefabricated housing, furnishings and paid work. We get nothing," Khadar complains.

The reason his family receives nothing: Like many of his neighbors, Khadar is a die-hard supporter of the Fatah party, the sworn political enemy of the more radical Islamists in Hamas. [...]

"We knew Hamas would take the goods for themselves and distribute them at their own discretion. For us, and for many of our friends, it doesn't make any difference whether the world is trying to help us. Our situation will only improve if the blockade is lifted," Khadar explains.

On Saturday (May 5, 2010), IDF forces piloted the Rachel Corrie to the port of Ashdod after boarding the ship. The Jerusalem Post reports:

None were harmed in the military operation as the international activists on the ship cooperated with the boarding party. The activists went as far as lowering a ladder to the soldiers patrol boat to allow them to board, army sources have revealed.

The military said its forces boarded the 1,200-ton cargo ship from the sea, not helicopters. Army spokeswoman Lt. Col. Avital Leibovich said Saturday's takeover took only a few minutes and that the vessel was being taken to Ashdod port.

Prior to the takeover, three navy ships tailed the aid boat for several hours throughout the morning, a few dozen kilometers from the blockaded Strip. The army said it had contacted the boat four times and urged its passengers to divert to Ashdod, but the activists had repeatedly refused.

Curiously, despite Gaza's need for assistance, The Free Gaza organization refused Israel's offers to facilitate the further distribution of aid from additional ships - Elder of Ziyon posts the radio exchanges btw/ ships and reports:

The flotilla team repeatedly had said that the reason the refuse to go to Ashdod is because Israel would not allow some of their cargo to go to Gaza. Here. we hear that Israel not only offered to transfer the cement that would have been brought on the ship to Gaza, but also that it would allow a third party NGO to bring it into Gaza.

Although their final response is not on this audio recording, Free Gaza evidently refused, although they were quite polite about it. They even helped the IDF soldiers get onto the ship.

* * *

I believe Israel has the right to protect its citizens from harm by way of a blockade of arms to Gaza (the controlling authority of which is Hamas, after all, an organization complicit in many terrorist acts against Israel's citizens and wholly committed to the eradication of Israel).

However, this is not to say that Israel didn't act badly in this situation and make some grievous errors in judgement resulting in the needless deaths of Palestinians as well as its own troops. Let's admit it -- those who organized the Flotilla got what they wanted: to force the hand of Israel and achieve a major propaganda win for her enemies.

Yaacov Lozowick (author of Right to Exist: A Moral Defense of Israel's Wars -- worth reading), has some pertinent thoughts on this matter. I agree with his conclusion: "It may have been justified, but it wasn't wise."

Israel will not disappear, not now, not later. It is one of the most vital places on earth, bursting with creativity and hugely committed to success; this is also one of the better moments in 3000 years of Jewish history – a rather glum statement, that, but true. Yet Israel is not being wise, as the case of the flotilla shows.

We all know that the threat from Hezbollah is greater than from Hamas, yet we don't blockade Lebanon. The price would be too high, so we grimly prepare for the next war in the hope that being prepared well enough will postpone it for a while, and in the meantime it's not an international detriment; on the contrary, perhaps we gain a measure of goodwill that we'll cash in on eventually. So why blockade Gaza? Is the blockade essential? Six months from now, or six years, we'll lift it, and Gaza will still be full of people who fervently wish for our destruction, just like in Lebanon: nu? At that point the defunct blockade will no longer be essential?

Some military actions will always be unavoidable. Do we do our very best to ensure that when we apply force, we're doing so in the most brilliant way possible? Have we thought out every scenario, and formulated a response to every counter move our enemies will make? Couldn't we could have silently jammed the propellers of those ships, leaving them dead in the water and begging us to save them from the blistering heat? Instead of heroic victims they'd be the world's laughing stock. I'm a mere blogger, not a decision maker, so perhaps there were reasons not to go that way: but were all options considered? Was the fiasco we ended up with the sole alternative? We handed our enemies an epic propaganda victory on a silver platter: that can't have been the best option?

See also:

• Israel was Right Israeli commandos mishandled the situation but Israel was right to storm a ship bound for Gaza. Leslie H. Gelb argues why.
• LiveBlogging the "Free Gaza" Media War (BackSpin)
• Flotillas and Falsehoods Monica Charen (National Review wonders, "don’t members of the press ever resent being so used?"
• Turkey Slouches Toward Iran, by Seth Cropsey (Weekly Standard): "The flotilla incident is less about Israeli-Palestinian issues than it is about Turkey."
• Those troublesome Jews, by Charles Krauthammer. Washington Post June 4, 2010.

Debunking the Casualty Statistics of the Palestinian Center for Human Rights

A blogger by the name of Elder of Ziyon has been investigating the list of Palestinian dead from the Israeli-Hamas conflict in Gaza in December '08-January '09, discovering the hundreds of those who were reported as "civilians" were, in fact, armed militants:

Our team cross-checked the names listed by PCHR with lists of "resisters" compiled by the Al Mezan Center for Human Rights, lists of "martyrs" published by Hamas, the Popular Resistance Committees and other militant groups in Gaza, as well as from the Ma'an News Agency, Palestinian Arabic discussion groups and other sources.

Our preliminary results show that at least 287 of the people killed, that PCHR classifies as "civilians," were, in fact, militants.

PCHR's criteria to determine exactly who is a "militant" is unclear. They seem to claim that they are only counting those whom they had direct evidence were engaging in hostilities at the moment of their deaths, but this is far from clear. At any rate, the term "militant" is not a legal term, and in common usage it refers to anyone who belongs to a military or paramilitary group. The PCHR's statistics are deceptive and slanted towards creating a false impression of IDF brutality.

Read the rest.

Deal Hudson on Israel and Palestinian Christians, Revisited

In his latest article for InsideCatholic.com, Deal Hudson presents Ten Hard Facts Confronting Benedict XVI in the Holy Land concerning the plight of Palestinian Christians.

One would expect that -- when presenting a list of "hard facts", particularly a topic as provocative as the Israeli-Palestinian conflict -- elementary journalistic standards would require the citation of a source.

Furthermore, one might expect the placement of such statistics in context to further enable a moral evaluation.

That Hudson completely neglects to do this is frustrating, to say the least.

Consequently, we have such indictments as

"Palestinians have been the subject of frequent attack [by Israel] -- often with civilians and their homes in the direct line of fire"

Such a statement, on its face, leaves out notable mitigating factors. Taking the most recent case of Gaza, for instance, Hudson could have mentioned Hamas' penchant for deliberately locating its troops and rocket positions in close proximity to civilians, even so far as housing weapons in schools and within its own mosques.

Other factors which might be brought to bear in the evaluation of Israel's targeting of Palestinians in civilian-populated areas is that Israel sought to warn civilians prior to impending attacks via Arabic-language voice mails on their cell phones, urging them to vacate homes where militants had stashed weapons. (Conversely, Hamas displayed complete disregard for civilian welfare, to the point of hijacking ambulances).

Again, Hudson states that:

"Israel's 21-day incursion into Gaza left an immense humanitarian crisis: More than 50,800 Gazans were left homeless; 80 percent of the population are now dependent on assistance"

But certainly at this point, might our appraisal of this fact be influenced by the knowledge that, even while Israel was fighting to protect their own cities against Hamas' rockets, they were bringing assistance to citizens of Gaza impacted by the conflict?

The Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs, for example, provides regular weekly reports on humanitarian aid to Gaza during the IDF operation and increased humanitarian aid to Gaza following the IDF operation as well.

In a February 2009 post ("Dispatch from the border of Gaza"), Michael Totten wrote about his tour of a temporary field hospital set up by the State of Israel at the Erez Crossing at the northern end of Gaza:

Palestinian civilians who needed medical attention were invited to come to Erez for treatment by Israeli doctors.

Humanitarian goods facilitated by the IDF also went through Erez into Gaza throughout the conflict, and the crossing was open to Palestinians with dual nationality who wanted out.

“We were asked by the government and the Ministry of Health to operate this regional medical clinic,” an Israeli doctor told me. “We've put everything here we can provide in a first-line clinic. It's not a hospital. We won't be able to operate here. But we need a humanitarian clinic to treat patients who need medical assistance.” [According to the Jerusalem Post, the clinic "offered not only medical specialists but also x-ray facilities, a lab and a pharmacy, meant to treat about 50 patients at once - both wounded Palestinians and those suffering from physical ailments"]. [...]

The Israelis had to close the place down. Only a handful of patients ever came through, which didn’t surprise me. I didn’t see any Palestinian patients there when I visited. Hamas didn’t allow their wounded to be treated by Jews.

Consider also, for instance, that the blog Elder of Zion together with PTWatch have documented 86 some terrorists killed by the IDF that have been reported as "civilians" by the Palestinian Center for Human Rights (the source of statistics cited by Hudson in his prior article).

All the more reason to regard "facts" -- and the mere citation of statistics absent of context -- with caution.

* * *

According to Hudson:

"Tension with Muslims is not the primary reason for the exodus -- only 11 percent of Palestinian Christians cite it as a reason for immigration."

With all due respect, I have reasons to approach this statistic with some skepticism. Most curiously, Hudson himself has previously cited (approvingly!) the work of Justus Reid Weiner, an international human rights lawyer who has made the plight of Palestinian Christians a subject of personal research. You can read an interview with Weiner here; a monograph, Human Rights of Christians in Palestinian Society is available for free download as well.

Weiner speaks of "intimidation, beatings, land theft, firebombing of churches and other Christian institutions, denial of employment, economic boycotts, torture, kidnapping, forced marriage, sexual harassment, and extortion" -- not, however, at the hands of Israel. (See the aformentioned links for documentation).

According to Weiner:

[Over a 10 year period] my research assistants and I have interviewed scores of Christian victims. Many of those interviewed were too terrified to tell their stories. In an effort to reassure them, I promised to conceal their real names, professions, and places of residence.

Suffice to say this doesn't strike me as an opportune environment for a persecuted minority to register open complaints about their condition. In fact, says Weiner, the silence and suppression of Palestinian Christians remain the norm when it comes to such persecution:

Weiner says he became aware of the many crimes against Christian Arabs under the Palestinian regime when, ten years ago, a Christian lay pastor said to him, "You're a human rights lawyer, what are you doing for the Christian Arabs?" Weiner replied that he was not doing anything for them as he was not aware they had any problems. The pastor then said: "Let me send you some people to interview and once you've done that make up your own mind."

Weiner remarks: "That began my education process on this subject. The problem I had the most difficulty understanding was why the large, powerful, populous Christian world has permitted this to go on for so long. This is the more surprising as the PA is in such need of funds and political support. Ten years down the road I can only say that it is a sad testimony for contemporary Christianity.

"I discovered a wide gap between the Palestinian Christian leadership and their flock. The former tended, for many years, to put on their nice robes and hats to meet Arafat for religious occasions. They are the same people who keep touring around the United States and being feted in different locations where they repeat the false story that everything is fine.

"These patriarchs and archbishops of Christian Arab denominations who are currently deceiving the international community are self-interested people. They collaborate with the Muslim perpetrators of intimidation and violence. Against all evidence they claim that the Christians Arabs are living comfortable and prosperous lives. In fact the present situation is growing worse by the day."

The numerous incidents of Muslim persecution told by Weiner stand in stark contrast to the testimony of, say, Michael Sabbah (former Latin Patriarch of Jerusalem 1987-2008), who in a December 2003 interview dismissed such accounts:

Is it difficult being a Christian Palestinian in a predominantly Muslim and Jewish land?

Christians are part of Palestinian society, and the Palestinians are Christians and Muslims. No one is going to flee because of Islamic influence, but because of the lack of work, or the political tension provoked by the curfew. But there is no Muslim persecution of Christians, and in fact they share the same hope of one day having an independent state.

Don’t you see a desire on the part of Muslims to dominate and convert other faiths?

Just a moment. This isn’t easily understood in the West. We Palestinians know how to live together and how to understand this relationship. We are one people, even if there are some difficulties.

But aren’t you isolating the case of the Palestinians? This isn’t a relationship that is easily exported. To find Christians who are persecuted it’s enough just to look at Vatican reports. Think of Pakistan, Afghanistan, Indonesia, Iraq.

In Arab countries there is no persecution of Christians. I don’t speak of Pakistan, but in Egypt, Syria, Iraq, Lebanon—no. Historically there have been some massacres, beginning when Europe entered the Mideast. ...

Not even any effort at the conversion of Christians?

There’s always that, but much of it is social pressure, that’s all. Nowadays we cannot say there is persecution. There are problems of the majority and minority, disputes of a social nature. These governments are very vigilant about relations between Muslims and Christians. There’s a lot of propaganda in the West; I don’t know why. Let us live in peace and don’t foment fear, it’s fear that weakens us. Our vocation is to live among Muslims and to give testimony to Jesus in a Muslim society. It’s difficult, but we accept it.

Rod Dreher, a journalist and [Orthodox] Christian blogger, conveyed his own first-hand encounter with the self-imposed censorship of Palestinian Christian prelates in 2005:

When I was in the Holy Land covering John Paul's visit, I spent time talking to Palestinian Christians. They have hard lives, no doubt about it, and all blamed Israel. But a funny thing happened when I put my notebook away after one of these interview sessions. The Christians with whom I was speaking suddenly started talking about how terrified they were of the Muslims, and said how life would be far worse for them if the Islamists took power within the PA. They wanted me to know that, but did not want me to quote them. They (correctly) saw things as hopeless all around for Palestinian Christians, and just wanted to move. There are no Christian suicide bombers, but the Christians have to pay the price for what the Muslim suicide bombers do. And so forth.

[...]

At my newspaper a couple of months ago, the Anglican bishop of Jerusalem, a Palestinian, came by for an interview with the editorial board. It was pathetic to watch. He was dhimmi-ized through and through. Couldn't bring himself to condemn anything Muslims did. Everything was the fault of the Israelis. If a Muslim blew himself to bits and killed scores of Israeli civilians in so doing, that was Israel's fault. No, there is no enmity between Muslims and Christians there, he insisted; we have always gotten along wonderfully, couldn't be better, he said.

I couldn't figure out if he was lying to himself, or to us. But when he said that Abraham wasn't Jewish, well, that just took the cake.

Weiner concedes that Israel does bear some responsibility for the situation and cites several issues (which Hudson raised in his article), such as visa restrictions which hamper foreign and local Christian clergy from traveling between parishes, and "economic hardship and unemployment is caused by the cutoff from outside aid due to Israeli security measures that bar most Palestinians from working inside Israel."

Nonetheless, to reiterate my prior post: any moral evaluation of the restrictions on movement imposed by Israel must take into account the reasons why they were established and imposed in the first place.

There is no disputing that life would be easier for Palestinian Christians and their counterparts if Israel were to dismantle the checkpoints and the security fence. But such a removal would, of course, be predicated upon the willingness of organizations like Hamas and Islamic Jihad to disavow terrorism.

And that's something Hudson hasn't actually addressed.

* * * In closing, perhaps as an incentive to further discussion, permit me to pose some questions:

What do you anticipate would happen, were Israel to suddenly dismantle its security measures -- the checkpoints? the security fences?

How would Palestinians react? -- Fatah? Hamas? Islamic Jihad?

Noting that the Vatican has itself formally recognized the State of Israel, is such a recognition incumbent on Palestianian Christians and their Muslim counterparts?

Related

• Christians in the Land Called Holy, by Habib Malik. First Things January 1999.
• Denial of Religious Rights by the Palestinian Authority: Not just Jews, but Christians have also been victimized by Islamic intolerance for 'infidel' holy sites. By Lenny Ben-David. HonestReporting.com November 11, 2002.
• The Mayor of Bethlehem is Christian, but It’s Hamas That’s in Charge, by Sandro Magister. (www.Chiesa) 2005.
• Israel and the Territories: Disappearing Christians of the Middle East, by Daphne Tsimhoni. Middle East Quarterly Winter 2001. A good analysis of the situation.

Michael Totten, reporting from the border of Gaza

“You have to remember,” Major Deutsch said, “that the damage isn't the number of physical casualties, it's the number of people with Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder. The kids in first grade in Sderot were born when rockets were being fired at Sderot. They have lived their entire lives having to think that when they leave the house, when they're walking down the street, when they're playing ball, that they have fifteen seconds to hide from an incoming rocket. And it's not only the kids, it's the parents. I have a friend who won't drive with two kids in the car. If the alert goes off he doesn't want to have to ask himself which of his kids he is going to save. He and his wife don't go out to weddings, bar mitzvahs, or things like that at night because they don't want to leave their kids with a babysitter.”

IDF officials say that in the years prior to last month’s war in Gaza, Hamas fired far more rockets at some times of the day than at other times. “Those times were between seven and eight in the morning,” Major Deutsch said, “and between six and seven at night. Between seven and eight in the morning is when everyone is leaving their home. They're on their way to work, and their kids are on their way to school. They are farthest away from protected spaces and most vulnerable. And in the evening Hamas wanted to be the opening item on the evening news. The school is a choke point. You have kids leaving from all the different places around the city, but they have to congregate around the gate to enter the school. And you'll see that they target areas near schools.”

* * * It may appear as though Israelis can’t be bothered about the well-being of civilians in Gaza, especially after they bombed that already tormented society for several weeks in a row. But I found that isn’t true.

A temporary field hospital was set up by the State of Israel at the Erez Crossing at the northern end of Gaza.

Palestinian civilians who needed medical attention were invited to come to Erez for treatment by Israeli doctors.

Humanitarian goods facilitated by the IDF also went through Erez into Gaza throughout the conflict, and the crossing was open to Palestinians with dual nationality who wanted out.

“We were asked by the government and the Ministry of Health to operate this regional medical clinic,” an Israeli doctor told me. “We've put everything here we can provide in a first-line clinic. It's not a hospital. We won't be able to operate here. But we need a humanitarian clinic to treat patients who need medical assistance.” [...]

The Israelis had to close the place down. Only a handful of patients ever came through, which didn’t surprise me. I didn’t see any Palestinian patients there when I visited. Hamas didn’t allow their wounded to be treated by Jews.

-- Excerpt from Michael Totten's report, February 8, 2009.

Criminals operating with impunity in Gaza

Unless you've been reading The Elder of Ziyon's roundups on Israeli news, chances are you might have missed some of these stories on Hamas' recent exploits:

• The Palestinian Authority’s Health Ministry accused the Hamas-run de facto government’s security services of turning medical centers into virtual prisons. Ma'an News Agency. February 7, 2009.

• UNRWA (UN Relief and Works Agency) informed the IDF on Friday it is suspending humanitarian aid deliveries to the Gaza Strip after Hamas stole supplies it had transferred to the Palestinian territory. Jerusalem Post February 8, 2009.

• The IDF has transferred 1,100 blood units into the Gaza Strip Friday, via the Erez crossing (YNet News February 6, 2009):

  The blood was brought aboard the Lebanese aid ship which was detained by the Israel Navy off the Strip's coast Thursday. The units were transferred into Gaza by Magen David Adom blood Bank teams. ...

  [Head of the Blood Bank Prof. Ayelet Shenhar] could not say if the was a blood shortage in the Strip's hospitals during the Israeli offensive in Gaza, since "MDA was not contacted on the matter. As far as I know Jordan sent blood to Gaza and there was no need for the Israeli Blood Bank to do the same. The Palestinians refused to receive blood units from us.

  "Blood is a vital (medical) resource and the goal was to get it to the Gaza hospital," she added. "I'm happy that it worked out."

  Elder of Ziyon calls to mind a similar situation in January where an Israeli medical clinic that was set up in Gaza failed - Hamas refused to allow Gazans to be treated by the best medical teams in the world, because they were from Israel.

• The Palestinian Press Agency reports that Hamas militias are selling large quantities of baby formula from France that arrived in Gaza as humanitarian aid, which it then confiscated.

• The Palestinian Press Agency also reports that Hamas negotiators in Cairo went on a $25,000 shopping spree in a high-end mall after leaving Gaza for talks with Egypt.

• Ma'an lists the names of 181 people who were either killed, shot in the legs or had their legs broken by Hamas in Gaza in the past month by Hamas.

  Meanwhile, Interrogations of Hamas and Islamic Jihad men who were captured by the IDF during Operation Cast Lead reveal numerous abuses -- including the storing of weapons within school compounds and civilian houses; the confiscation of humanitarian aid and refusal to distribute to those aligned with Fatah, and the senior leadership of Hamas holed up in a bunker under Shifa Hospital in Gaza City.

  "Palestinians who opposed Hamas's use of their land and homes as launch pads were shot in the legs."

When reality gets in the way of a good rant ...

"The Israelis withdrew after beating the living hell out of a terrorized civilian population and killing over a thousand innocent people, including hundreds of children. How noble."

Mark P. Shea, Catholic "Apologist"

There is a good reason to be skeptical of Hamas' claims of civilian casualties, given historical precedent of Palestinian sources for inflating the numbers.

A survey of recent stories indicates that we're a long way from sorting this out.

• Gazan doctor says death toll inflated YNetNews.com January 22, 2009:

  What really is behind the numbers reported on the number of civilian casualties in the Gaza Strip? Italian newspaper Corriere Della Sera reported Thursday that a doctor working in Gaza's Shifa Hospital claimed that Hamas has intentionally inflated the number of casualties resulting from Israel's Operation Cast Lead.

  "The number of deceased stands at no more than 500 to 600. Most of them are youths between the ages of 17 to 23 who were recruited to the ranks of Hamas, who sent them to the slaughter," according to the newspaper article.

  The doctor wished to remain unidentified, out of fear for his life.

  A senior Palestinian Health Ministry official later denied the claims, and the Israel Defense Forces' estimate on the number of casualties in Gaza has also remained unchanged.

  Despite the claims, the IDF stood behind its estimate that between 1,100 to 1,200 people were killed in the Strip during the fighting, more than two-thirds of them Hamas members.

• The number of Palestinians killed in Operation Cast Lead did not exceed five or six hundred, Lorenzo Cremonesi, a correspondent for Italy's Corriere della sera reported on Thursday Jerusalem Post:

  Cremonesi based his report on tours of hospitals in the Gaza Strip and on interviews with families of casualties. He also assessed the number of wounded to be far lower than 5,000, the number quoted by Hamas and repeated by the UN and the Red Cross in Gaza.

  "It is sufficient to visit several hospitals [in the Gaza Strip] to understand that the numbers don't add up," he wrote. [...]

  Cremonesi interviewed Gazans who echoed Israel's insistence of how Hamas gunmen used civilians as human shields. One Gazan recalled civilians in Gaza shouting at Hamas and Islamic Jihad men, "Go away, go away from here! Do you want the Israelis to kill us all? Do you want our children to die under their bombs? Take your guns and missiles with you."

  "Traitors, collaborators with Israel, spies of Fatah, cowards! The soldiers of the holy war will punish you. And in any case you will all die, like us. Fighting the Zionist Jews we are all destined for paradise. Do you not wish to die with us?" the religious fanatics of Hamas reportedly responded.

• Elder of Zion calls attention to Hamas "creative accounting of dead terrorists":

  The shop prints customized, full-color posters and banners commemorating the dead _ a Palestinian tradition for people killed by Israel. In the wake of Israel's 22-day Gaza offensive _ which killed nearly 1,300 Palestinians _ the shop is one of Gaza's few businesses experiencing a postwar boom. ...

  While not comprehensive, the posters enter a new element into the debate over how many militants were killed by Israel. The Israel military says it killed 700, while Hamas and other militant groups say they lost 158. In its final report on the death toll, the Palestinian Center for Human Rights said 223 of the 1,285 killed in the war were fighters.

  Although the shop hasn't kept records, al-Hor guesses he has done posters for 350 people since the war's end, about 250 of them militants, suggesting the militant groups lost more fighters than they acknowledge. Other say the groups often claim the dead as members of their movements even when they were not.

• Hamas tried to hijack ambulances during Gaza war Sydney Morning Herald:

  Palestinian civilians living in Gaza during the three-week war with Israel have spoken of the challenge of being caught between Hamas and Israeli soldiers as the radical Islamic movement that controls the Gaza strip attempted to hijack ambulances.

  Mohammed Shriteh, 30, is an ambulance driver registered with and trained by the Palestinian Red Crescent Society.

  His first day of work in the al-Quds neighbourhood was January 1, the sixth day of the war. "Mostly the war was not as fast or as chaotic as I expected," Mr Shriteh told the Herald. "We would co-ordinate with the Israelis before we pick up patients, because they have all our names, and our IDs, so they would not shoot at us."

  Mr Shriteh said the more immediate threat was from Hamas, who would lure the ambulances into the heart of a battle to transport fighters to safety. ...

  Mr Shriteh says Hamas made several attempts to hijack the al-Quds Hospital's fleet of ambulances during the war.

• IDF: Only 250 of Gaza fatalities were civilians YNetNews. January 26, 2009:

  Gaza Division Chief Brigadier-General Eyal Eisenberg alluded to the fact that the majority of the Palestinian fatalities were Hamas operatives, but refused to specify numbers.

  The IDF has yet to verify the identity of some 200 fatalities, mostly men in their 20s, whose identification is delayed because they are still buried under the rubble. The defense establishment believed many of them would prove to be Hamas men.

  Many of the fatalities were considered to be civilians at first, because there were no weapons found with them, said a military source, "But that method of operation is consistent with the way Hamas was hiding in the midst of civilians, moving between their strongholds with no weapons. In many cases someone thought to be a civilian casualty turned out to be a Hamas operative after we ran our checks."

  The civilian-gunman casualty ratio, he added, was one to three, proving that the IDF was targeting Hamas and not civilians. The IDF stressed that the forces took significant precautions in order to avoid harming any civilians; but considering the way that Hamas chose to involve civilians in the fighting, mounting a surgical strike resulting in absolutely no civilian casualties was impossible.

• EU envoy lays Gaza blame on Hamas BBC News. January 26, 2009:

  A senior European Union official touring war-torn Gaza has blamed the ruling militant movement Hamas for the humanitarian crisis there.

  Humanitarian aid chief Louis Michel called the destruction left by Israel's offensive "abominable", but said Hamas bore "overwhelming responsibility".

  He said there would be no dialogue with the "terrorist" movement until it gave up violence and recognised Israel.

  He also announced emergency aid for Gaza worth more than US $70m (£50m).

  [...]

  Touring some of Gaza's worst-hit areas of Israel's 22-day assault which killed about 1,300 Palestinians, including 400 children, Mr Michel described the situation as "abominable, indescribable".

  "At this time we have to also recall the overwhelming responsibility of Hamas," he said.

  "I intentionally say this here - Hamas is a terrorist movement and it has to be denounced as such."

  Thirteen Israelis were killed in the conflict, and Mr Michel later visited the southern Israeli town of Sderot, the target of Palestinian militant rocket fire.

  There, he called on Israel to lift its blockade of Gaza and accused both sides of violating humanitarian law.

  "Please open the crossings, you have to broaden the range of products that you let in," he urged Israel's authorities. "We, the EU, condemn Qassam attacks and military options which target the civilian population."

To be sure, civilian deaths are lamentable, and speaking from a Catholic POV, Israel may bear some culpability. Nonetheless, there is a problem when a Catholic apologist not only parrots with a straight face blatant propaganda already crumbling under scrutiny -- but places the blame squarely on the Israeli Defense Forces, with nary a mention of Hamas.

But, you know, let's not let reality get in the way of a good rant.

Cease-fire -- as Europe pledges to keep Hamas from re-arming

Haaretz reports that One day after Israel announced a unilateral cease-fire in the Gaza Strip, six key European leaders on Sunday pledged to work to prevent Hamas from rearming:

The commitments were offered both at the Sharm al-Sheikh summit in Egypt and at a meeting in Jerusalem with Prime Minister Ehud Olmert.

The six leaders - British Prime Minister Gordon Brown, French President Nicolas Sarkozy, German Chancellor Angela Merkel, Italian President Silvio Berlusconi, Spanish Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero and Czech Prime Minister Mirek Topolanek, who currently holds the European Union's rotating presidency - offered to provide troops and technological assistance to prevent Hamas from smuggling weapons and terrorists into the Gaza Strip, in cooperation with Egypt and the United States.

They expressed support for the cease-fire in Gaza and for an end to Palestinian rocket fire on southern Israel.

Olmert said that on Saturday, he also received a letter from EU leaders pledging cooperation in halting the arms smuggling into Gaza.

At the start of the Jerusalem meeting, Olmert said that Israel has no intention of staying in the Gaza Strip or reconquering it, despite its three-week offensive on the Hamas-ruled coastal territory.

* * *

During the January 18th' Angelus, Pope Benedict offered a prayer for the victims of violence in the Holy Land:

"Let us also bring before the Lord today the hundreds of children, old people, women who are innocent victims of the inconceivable violence, the wounded, those who are grieving for their loved ones and those who have lost their possessions," he said.

"I also invite you to accompany with your prayers the efforts of numerous persons of good will who are trying to stop the tragedy," the Pontiff continued. "I sincerely hope that it is seen how to profit, with wisdom, from the space opened up to reinstate the truce and move toward peaceful and durable solutions."

"In this regard, I renew my encouragement of those who, on the one side and on the other, believe that in the Holy Land there is room for all, that they help their people to rise up from the rubble and terror and courageously take up again the thread of dialogue in justice and truth," affirmed Benedict XVI. "This is the only way that they can effectively unlock a future of peace for the children of that dear land!"

Understanding the Vatican's "Neutrality" on the conflict in Gaza

David-Maria A. Jaeger, an Israeli Franciscan Priest, defends the Vatican's "neutrality":

Now as an Israeli (and it would be the same for the citizen of any other Nation), it never displeases me to see that there are those who look at my Nation with sympathy, who wish to understand its reasons, and who are determined to comprehend even the most difficult and controversial choices of its government. And as a human being, first and foremost, it can never displease me that there are those who feel deeply for the unending sufferings of a helpless civilian population, which is even otherwise sorely tried. But as a Catholic, as a Priest, it offends me that there are those who abuse this as an occasion to attack the Church. It displeases me very much that that there are still any who obstinately refuse to recognise that the Church in general, and the Holy See in particular, do not participate, and by their nature cannot participate, in political debate, do not take sides in temporal disputes, cannot and must not do it, and that in the end it is in the interest of everybody that they do not; that there are those who decline to acknowledge that the Holy See is not simply one more voice in the often cacophonous chorus of international actors.

The Church speaks on a completely different plane. She has a completely different mission. The Church never supports one Nation against another, and never acts as arbitrator, except when invited to do so by all the parties concerned. The Church promotes solely the exigencies of humanity and gives voice to mercy, to divine and human pity, to that righteousness that love alone fulfils. If there are circumstances in which political communities, acting within the specific logic of this-worldly power-relationships, judge that they cannot avoid the recourse to force, the Church cannot be there to bless their arms. This was recognised by Benedict XV well before being confirmed by Benedict XVI.

The persistence of the Holy See in discouraging and deploring always, everywhere and in whatever circumstances, the recourse to violence, and in promoting “in season and out of season” the sole ways of peaceful dialogue, cannot be reduced to the level of the disagreements among actors on the international scene, but must be seen as the pure expression of its own mission in representation of a “Kingdom that is not of this world. To read these expressions of that which is specific to the Church as if they were simple political partisanship, or the fruit of cold diplomatic calculations, or else ostentation of some “pacifist ideology” (in opposition to other political-military doctrines), means not knowing who and what the Church is. And when those who do so are cultured persons, who should be able to know better and understand more, this kind of attitude causes much wonderment, indeed perplexity and sadness.

Let all of these critics pause for a moment and think, and let them then admit that if the Church of Christ were to abandon this her high mission, and were to lower herself to the level of just another participant in the quarrel – albeit on the side that they believe to be in the right – our world would thereby be made frighteningly and dangerously the poorer.

Personally, I can respect the Vatican's position as described by Fr. Jaeger. I would also add that this position as explicated in this essay seems to be fully embodied in the words and actions of Pope Benedict XVI.

Less so, or perhaps not at all, in Cardinal Martino, who -- in keeping with a remarkable penchant for provoking repeated controversy with the most ridiculous of remarks -- likened the situation in Gaza to "a concentration camp".

According to the New York Times, The Vatican sought to distance itself from Martino's remarks:

The Vatican spokesman, Rev. Federico Lombardi, called Cardinal Martino’s choice of words “inopportune,” and said they created “irritation and confusion” more than illumination.

While calling the cardinal “an authoritative person,” Rev. Lombardi added that “The more authoritative voice and line would be that of the pope.”

The Israel-Hamas Conflict - A Roundup

• Israel has defeated a special unit of Hamas trained by the Iranian Revolutionary Guard; and two captured terrorists admit they were "surprised" by Israel's response to Hamas' rocket attacks (Israel National News reports):

  Two captured terrorists interviewed by Maariv/NRG say that Hamas was not expecting Israel's response to the escalation in missile attacks on Israeli targets that preceded Operation Cast Lead. One of them, a 52-year-old victim of a premature detonation who had already done time in an Israeli jail, said, "Hamas took a gamble. We thought, at worst Israel will come and do something from the air - something superficial. They'll come in and go out. We never thought that we would reach the point where fear will swallow the heart and the feet will want to flee. You [Israel] are fighting like you fought in '48. What got into you all of a sudden?"

  The second terrorist, a 21-year-old, said Hamas brought order to Gaza, but also brought fear. He noted that it was dangerous in Gaza for non-Hamas members, citing an instance of his being beaten and another in which he saw a friend killed when he went to get gas. "Now they're all gone," he said. "There have been no Hamasniks in the streets since the start of the campaign."

• Palestinian "Fauxtography" GatewayPundit. "Using children's toys, like using children's shoes, is a very effective tool for the photographer turned propagandist."

• Gaza's True 'Disproportion', by Carlos Alberto Montaner. Washington Post January 12, 2009:

  Here's another very important asymmetry. The Jews build underground shelters in all houses near the border; they close the schools and hide the children at the least sign of danger; they treat the death of a single soldier as a national tragedy; they do everything possible to rescue their prisoners, and protect the civilian population from the consequences of war. In contrast, the authorities in Gaza, drunk with violence, fire their machine guns irresponsibly into the air to express joy or grief (causing numerous injuries), do not hesitate to install their headquarters or hide their guns in schools, mosques or hospitals, use human shields to protect themselves, turn to suicidal terrorists and reward the families of such "martyrs" with money.

  One week before Hamas broke the truce and stepped up its rocket attacks against the Jewish state (the spark that set off this conflict), I was in Israel, where I had been invited to deliver a lecture at the University of Tel Aviv. As part of the contacts organized by my hosts, I visited the Wolfson Medical Center to learn about the program "Save a Child's Heart." I was very moved. It is a foundation devoted to providing heart surgery for very poor children, most of them from the Arab world. As it happened, I witnessed the hurried arrival of a tiny 5-day-old girl, who had to be operated on at once to keep her from dying. She was brought in by her mother, a woman in a black head covering that allowed me to see only her tear-filled eyes, and her husband, a small, bearded man who watched with amazement the indescribable kindness with which a group of doctors and nurses treated the baby. The family came from Gaza.

  Since the war erupted, I have asked myself constantly what became of them all.

• Israelis near Gaza can’t lower guard - Sebastian Rotella reports from Sderot, Israel. Los Angeles Times January 15, 2009:

  Hamas units that build and fire rockets have suffered severe losses but retain hundreds of rockets in their arsenal, intelligence officials say. The Israeli officials warn that a pipeline used for smuggling arms and components through tunnels from Egypt will resume functioning unless a concerted military or diplomatic solution shuts it down.

  And Israeli leaders assert that ending the attacks has become more difficult because Hamas fighters resort to firing from densely populated areas in Gaza, using civilians as a shield against retaliation.

  "To surround yourself with innocent people and to launch it from within a city, from within a refugee camp, is not a tactical situation," said Avi Dichter, Israel's minister of public security, during a visit to Sderot on Tuesday. He said Israeli forces "can see the line of the missile in the sky and you know exactly where it comes from. But to respond with artillery to the middle of a refugee camp, I think that everybody understands that it's impossible."

  And bad news -- the rockets are getting more and more advanced:

  Hamas smuggled in explosives and chemicals enabling the production of a more advanced generation of Qassams with a range of up to 11 miles, said an Israeli intelligence official who spoke on condition of anonymity for security reasons. The rockets had had a range of about 7 1/2 miles.

  In addition, militants developed a network of tunnels from Egypt to smuggle in more potent Grad rockets manufactured in China, Iran and North Korea and supplied by Iran, according to Capt. Ron Edelheit, a spokesman for the Israeli military.

  "The impact is much larger because the explosives payload is much bigger," Edelheit said. "The amount of casualties is much higher. If a Qassam hits a house, everything in a room might be destroyed. When a Grad hits an apartment building, it is so much larger it can take down the whole home."

• Can we trust the casualty numbers? -- Stephanie Guttman reminds us that as you read about the Gaza death toll, remember Jenin:

  virtually every public official in the Gaza strip, including hospital administrators, is, in effect, a Hamas appointee. It is, after all, a totalitarian regime that has crushed any remnant of a free press and thrown dissenters off the roofs of buildings. Israel thus “seriously questions Hamas’s figures,” but at this point — obviously — it has no way of doing the kind of intense forensic investigation needed to issue its own more precise estimate.

  It’s time to recall another Israeli incursion in which Palestinians used casualty numbers seemingly plucked out of the air to justify its claim that Israel was employing “disproportionate force.” In the spring of 2002, after months of near-daily suicide bombings inside Israel, the IDF decided to make a major incursion into the Jenin refugee camp ...

  The last time the Palestinians protested a "massacre of thousands", the United Nations "found no evidence of such, supported IDF claims that about 45 Palestinians had died, mostly men aged 18 to 45." When it was claimed that Israelis had shelled the "western wing" of a hospital, it was later discovered that “there never was such a wing and, in any case, no part of the hospital was shelled or bombed.”
  
  

  In What is a "child"?, blogger Elder of Zion reminds us that, while statistics given to the Western media, without exception, refer to any Palestinian Arab victim in the violence who is under 18 as being a "child", a considerable number of young adults are employed in Hamas' terrorist activities.

Would this classify as child abuse?

Nizar Rayyan, Martyr to Hatred

An Israeli air strike on a home in the Gaza Strip on Thursday killed a senior Hamas political leader Nizar Rayyan. Sadly, his 4 wifes and 11 children perished with him, persuaded by Rayyan to martyr themselves for the cause:

Surviving family members spoke to local Arab media and said that in the days before his death, Rayyan had repeatedly asked his children, "Who wants to die with me as a martyr?" The children would respond, "Yes, daddy, we all want to be with you alive or dead."

Rayyan's adult daughter, Wala, said even the younger children wished to die with their father. "If In the days before his death, Rayyan has repeatedly asked his children, "Who wants to die with me as a martyr?" you had asked my four-year-old sister Aisha, who died in the attack, she would have told you that she preferred to die as a martyr," Wala told Ma'an news.

One of Rayyan's daughter-in-laws said she was offered the chance to die with the family. She stopped by the family's large home in Jabaliya and was asked by Rayyan if she wished to die with him, his wives and their children. She agreed to die, but later left the building, shortly before the IAF strike.

As it turned out, when Rayyan offered his daughter-in-law the "opportunity" to die he had already received a phone call from the IDF warning him to evacuate his house due to an impending airstrike.

In the summer of 2006, Jeffrey Goldberg, national correspondent for The Atlantic and the author of Prisoners: A Story of Friendship and Terror (Vintage), had an opportunity to interview Rayyan. He came away with convinced Why Israel Can’t Make Peace With Hamas:

I asked him the question I always ask of Hamas leaders: Could you agree to anything more than a tactical cease-fire with Israel? I felt slightly ridiculous asking: A man who believes that God every now and again transforms Jews into pigs and apes might not be the most obvious candidate for peace talks at Camp David. Mr. Rayyan answered the question as I thought he would, saying that a long-term cease-fire would be unnecessary, because it will not take long for the forces of Islam to eradicate Israel.

There is a fixed idea among some Israeli leaders that Hamas can be bombed into moderation. This is a false and dangerous notion. It is true that Hamas can be deterred militarily for a time, but tanks cannot defeat deeply felt belief.

The reverse is also true: Hamas cannot be cajoled into moderation. Neither position credits Hamas with sincerity, or seriousness.

The only small chance for peace today is the same chance that existed before the Gaza invasion: The moderate Arab states, Europe, the United States and, mainly, Israel, must help Hamas’s enemy, Fatah, prepare the West Bank for real freedom, and then hope that the people of Gaza, vast numbers of whom are unsympathetic to Hamas, see the West Bank as an alternative to the squalid vision of Hassan Nasrallah and Nizar Rayyan.

Holding Sderot Hostage

The above video was posted by Dawn Eden, who remarks on the night Hamas struck an Israeli synagogue:

While the United Nations cries out against Israel for defending itself—and takes no notice of Hamas' using its own citizens as human shields—residents of the Israeli town of Sderot, one mile from Gaza, have lived under Hamas rocket fire for eight years.

This extraordinarily moving video shows what happened at a Sderot synagogue on May 17, 2007, the night it was struck by a Qassam rocket just after congregants celebrated a scribe's completion of the temple's new Torah.

SderotMedia.com, a citizens-journalism site in the hard-hit town, made the above video as well as this one, taped on Thursday, after a Qassam rocket severely damaged a Sderot home. It relates how one of the firefighters responding to the hit discovered it was the home of his own parents—who were unhurt, thank God.

These and other videos on SderotMedia.com hint at the human toll that Hamas rocket attacks have taken on Israel for years. Sderot's suffering has been almost entirely ignored by the international media, save for rare exceptions ...

The Vatican's response to the war between Israel and Hamas

The Italian journalist and commentator on all-things-Vatican Sandro Magister discusses the oft-perplexing policy of the Church with regard to the Middle East and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, barely concealing his frustration in the title: "In Gaza, the Vatican Raises the White Flag":

The authorities of the Catholic Church do not defend the existence of Israel – which its enemies want to annihilate, and is ultimately at stake in the conflict – with the same explicit, powerful determination with which they raise their voices in defense of the "nonnegotiable" principles concerning human life.

This has been seen in recent days. The authorities of the Church, and Benedict XVI himself, have raised their voices in condemnation of "the massive violence that has broken out in the Gaza Strip in response to other violence" only after Israel began bombing the installations of the terrorist movement Hamas in that territory. Not before. Not when Hamas was tightening its brutal grip on Gaza, massacring the Muslims faithful to president Abu Mazen, humiliating the tiny Christian communities, and launching rockets every day against the Israelis in the surrounding area.

About Hamas and its vaunted "mission" of wiping the Jewish state from the face of the earth, about Hamas as an outpost for Iran's expansionist aims in the Middle East, about Hamas as an ally of Hezbollah and Syria, the Vatican authorities have never raised the red alert. They have never shown that they see Hamas as a deadly danger to Israel and an obstacle to the birth of a Palestinian state, in addition to its being a nightmare for the Arab regimes in the area, from Egypt to Jordan to Saudi Arabia.

In the December 29-30 issue of L'Osservatore Romano, a front-page commentary by Luca M. Possati, checked word by word by the Vatican secretariat of state, claimed that "for the Jewish state, the only possible idea of security must come through dialogue with all, even those who do not recognize it." Read: Hamas.

Many are prompted to wonder what kind of "dialogue" can possibly be achieved with those who not only show little inclination to engage in discourse, but, according to its fundamental statement of principles, asserts that "Israel will rise and will remain erect until Islam eliminates it as it had eliminated its predecessors"; that militant Jihad against Israel is "an individual duty binding on every Muslim man and woman"; that "[Peace] initiatives, the so-called peaceful solutions, and the international conferences to resolve the Palestinian problem, are all contrary to the beliefs of the Islamic Resistance Movement" and that "There is no solution to the Palestinian problem except by Jihad. The initiatives, proposals and International Conferences are but a waste of time, an exercise in futility."

This past week, Cardinal Renato Martino, President of the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace, fanned the flames of controversy with a comparison of the Gaza Strip to "a huge concentration camp". John Allen Jr covered the incident:

To be fair to Martino, the full text of his comments on Gaza comes across as more balanced than the sound-bite cited above. Here's what he said, in a Jan. 7 interview with the Italian Web site Il Sussidiario ("Subsidiarity"), in my translation: "The consequences of egoism are hatred, poverty and injustice. It's always the unarmed populations who pay. Look at the conditions in Gaza -- more and more, it resembles a huge concentration camp. …What's needed is will on both sides, because both are guilty. Israelis and Palestinians are sons of the same land, and they have to be separated, like you'd do with two brothers. … If they can't come to an agreement, someone else has to feel the duty to do it. The world can't stand by and do nothing."

Yet even given that context, Martino is no naïf, having spent 16 years as the Vatican's observer to the United Nations. He had to know that his reference to a "concentration camp" could not help but call to mind the crude imagery popular in Arab and Islamic extremist circles comparing Israel to Nazi Germany. Cartoons routinely show the Star of David twisted into a swastika, Israeli Defense Forces dressed up as SS storm troopers, and so on. The comment was, therefore, the diplomatic equivalent of a poke in the eye. (That's not to mention the dubious wisdom of a Vatican official invoking the memory of World War II-era concentration camps, since the question of Christian acquiescence in the Holocaust remains a tremendously sensitive point in Christian/Jewish relations.)

This, of course, is merely the latest instance in which Israel and its supporters have complained about prejudice in the Vatican's approach to what it calls the "Holy Land" -- a linguistic convention intended to express neutrality, but taken by many Israelis as a subtle refusal to recognize the legitimacy of the Jewish state.

Mr. Allen, appearing sympathetic to the frustration of Israelis with the Vatican's response ("here's what drives Israelis crazy: Generally, the Vatican gets cranked up to denounce violence in the Holy Land only when it's initiated by Israel"), nonetheless emphasizes four points to put it all in context:

1. First, the broad aim of Vatican diplomacy is to support a two-state solution that would provide stability and security for both Israelis and Palestinians. As a result, commentary from the Holy See has been critical of violence on both sides. In his Angelus address on January 1, for example, Pope Benedict XVI affirmed "the profound desire to live in peace that stirs in the hearts of the vast majority of both the Israeli and Palestinian populations, which has one again been placed at risk by the massive violence unleashed in the Gaza Strip in response to other violence." On Jan. 4, the pope implored "the authorities and those responsible on both sides, Israeli and Palestinian, to act immediately to put an end to this tragic situation."
2. Second, in the past the most egregiously anti-Israeli line from the Vatican generally came from L'Osservatore Romano under its former editor, Italian layman Mario Agnes. A transition in leadership has meant that this time around, the tone from Vatican media has been more even-handed. A statement from Jesuit Fr. Federico Lombardi, the Vatican spokesperson, in late December on Vatican Radio offers a case in point: "Hamas is a prisoner of a logic of hatred," Lombardi said, "Israel of a logic of trusting in force as the best response to hatred."
3. Third, Benedict XVI has been far more willing to openly challenge Muslim leaders to repudiate violence and terrorism than John Paul II, as well as to demand "reciprocity," meaning an acknowledgement of the right to religious freedom, from majority Islamic states.
4. Fourth, despite Martino's rhetoric, not everyone perceives an anti-Israeli tilt to Vatican commentary. After Benedict XVI condemned the violence in Gaza on Jan. 6, a prominent Saudi commentator wrote: "The pope could and should have been much more explicit. He should have convened a synod for Gaza, as he did for Lebanon. But he preferred to kowtow to the Jews, whatever their crimes and sins."

* * *

Last week, The Vatican expressed alarm over the burning of Israeli flags by Muslims protesting against Israeli actions in Gaza during Muslim prayers staged outside Italian cathedrals (according to Robert Owen of the Times (UK), reports):

Cardinal Renato Martino, head of the Vatican Council for Justice and Peace, said he was not disturbed "by prayer as such." If Muslims wished to come to St Peter's to pray, he would not object, the cardinal said. "Prayer always does good".

However prayers held recently outside the Duomo in Milan and the Basilica of San Petronio in Bologna, with thousands of prostrate Muslims facing Mecca, had been accompanied by flag burning which was not only anti Israeli but anti Semitic, with protesters carrying banners depicting the Star of David alongside the Nazi swastika. "What matters is the spirit in which one prays - and prayer excludes hate" Cardinal Martino said.

Bishop Ernesto Vecchi, vicar general of the Bologna diocese, said the Muslim prayers were "not just prayers but a challenge, not so much to the basilica itself as to our democratic system and culture". Bishop Vecchi suggested the staging of mass prayers outside Christian churches in Italy was a deliberate move "on orders from afar" as part of a strategy of "Islamisation" of Europe.

However, Abu Imad, the imam of the main Milan mosque, claimed that the demonstration had ended up on the cathedral square "by chance" at the hour of prayer, "so we prayed. There was no provocation or insult intended."

On Friday, January 9th, Archbishop Silvano Tomasi, the Holy See's permanent observer at the U.N. offices in Geneva, delivered the following address regarding the conflict in Gaza (via Zenit News Service):

The Delegation of the Holy See would like to express its solidarity with both the people in Gaza, who are dying and suffering because of the ongoing military assault by the Israeli Defense Forces, and the people in Sderot, Ashkelon and other Israeli cities who are living under the constant terror of rocket attacks launched by Palestinian militants from within the Gaza Strip, which have caused casualties and wounded a number of people.

The patriarchs and heads of churches of Jerusalem marked last Sunday as a day of prayer with the intention to put an end to the conflict in Gaza and to restore peace and justice in the Holy Land. It is their conviction that the continuation of bloodshed and violence will not lead to peace and justice but breed more hatred and hostility and thus a continued confrontation between the two peoples. These religious leaders call upon both parties to return to their senses and refrain from all violent acts, which only bring destruction and tragedy. They urge them instead to work to resolve their differences through peaceful and nonviolent means.

The Holy Father, Benedict XVI, underlined last Sunday that the refusal of dialogue between the parties has led to unspeakable suffering for the population in Gaza, victims of hatred and war.

Mr. President, it is evident that the warring parties are not able to exit from this vicious circle of violence without the help of the international community that should therefore fulfill its responsibilities, intervene actively to stop the bloodshed, provide access for emergency humanitarian assistance, and end all forms of confrontation. At the same time, the international community should remain engaged in removing the root causes of the conflict that can only be resolved within the framework of a lasting solution of the greater Israeli-Palestinian conflict, based on the international resolutions adopted during the years.

May I conclude with the words of Pope Benedict XVI pronounced yesterday during the annual meeting with diplomats accredited to the Holy See: "Once again I would repeat that military options are no solution and that violence, wherever it comes from and whatever form it takes, must be firmly condemned. I express my hope that, with the decisive commitment of the international community, the ceasefire in the Gaza Strip will be re-established -- an indispensable condition for restoring acceptable living conditions to the population -- and that negotiations for peace will resume, with the rejection of hatred, acts of provocation and the use of arms."