The IHH has now published a very thorough-looking report on the whole flotilla project and Israel’s raid against it. Kudos to Adam Horowitz and Mondoweiss for publishing it.
I’m reading it now.
IHH was one of six civil-society organizations, all based in different countries, that jointly organized the flotilla. This is a truly international report.
Inside Israel, meanwhile, the “Turkel Committee”, which was appointed by PM Netanyahu in order to appease the Americans though it has no sub-poena powers and no basis in Israel’s legal structure, has already started to challenge its (extremely restricted) mandate. The good people at Gush Shalom tell us that “Judge Tirkel undertook to the Supreme Court that the Committee’s activities will be suspended until July 11, and that it will conduct no activity until the change in its authority is determined.”
They cited this PDF document (in Hebrew.)
Gush Shalom head and former MK Uri Avnery said in a statement,
- It seems that already before our appeal got to any hearing before the court, the State representatives in practice admit Gush Shalom’s main contention – that the Tirkel Committee, with the very narrow authority and mandate given it by the government, was not able to conduct a serious investigation into the circumstances which led to the killing of nine passengers on the Gaza Flotilla, and subsequently to a severe damage of Israel’s international position. I am glad to see that the Prime Minister apparently has also understood this, even if belatedly…
Nevertheless, we don’t withdraw our demand to form a Judicial Commission of Inquiry, independent and fully empowered, which is the instrument created by Israeli law exactly for sensitive investigations of this kind. A thorough and independent investigation is needed, first of all, not for the Americans, not for the Turks, and not for the U.N. but for ourselves, for the sake of Israel’s future in order to help prevent such grave fiascos from happening again.
To which I’d add merely that yes, actually it would be nice if Avnery admitted that the raid needs to be very thoroughly and credibly investigated precisely for the sake of the many Turkish families left bereaved by Israel’s grisly May 31 assault, and not just for the sake of the claimed “moral purity” of Israel’s long-pampered Jewish citizens.
I must say I was a bit disappointed with the report. together with dozens of spelling mistakes, the evidence in the report is scant, and I find it less persuading.
However disappointing, though, it will be very interesting to compare it to the mock report currently in progress by the tirkel commission.
And my guess is, the IHH and the rest of the Flotilla Team, will come up with a few more reports at a later stage.
Like Cast Lead, I don’t think this incident will go away so easily, and it takes more than a few reports – from the solidarity movement or Israelis alike – to silence any critics. the debate will go on.
I too was a bit disappointed by the report–it seemed to have been written too hastily and rather than with a careful, weighted objectivity, it slipped into rhetorical language at times. Captioned pictures would have assisted, as well as a rigorous timeline. I do hope that the Gaza Flotilla partners are each gathering the statements of their participants and attempting construction of full details to rebut the Israeli government’s official statements.
One thing I think is very important to establish is testimony about what appears to be, based upon a number of testimonies so far, the continuously abusive–and selectively abusive–behavior of the Israeli personnel during transport of the ships to Ashdod, during interrogation, processing, imprisoning, guarding, and transporting the flotilla members.
Let’s hope that the Israeli commission demands and gets more authority; and uses it objectively to get at the facts.
So, Tord Steiro, it detracts from the credibility of the report that there are mistakes in the English, does it?
For me, by the way, errors like that rather add to the credibility, and suggest that it is a genuine effort by non-English speakers, rather than a smooth highly expensive piece of propaganda.
I wouldn’t expect all the evidence in a summary report.