Israel attacks Aid Flotilla. At least 2 dead

gandalf wrote: »

To be honest I would welcome these posters because while they may be posting "the party line" they are being exposed to alternative ideas and there is a chance that some of these ideas may take root.

From what I can deduce part of the problem from Israeli society is that it is isolated from alternative ideas to the issues in that part of the world and its healthy no matter what reason they come to sites like this in the first place for them to discuss the issue with other nationalities.

I don't know. The pattern I've observed from those defending Israel in this incident on boards:

Every single eye-witness report or piece of evidence of IDF wrong doing is criticised in the minutae.

While they parrot the official line ad nauseum and refuse to question it in any way.

And... they regularly resort to blaming the victims.

But the most damning thing of all is how they don't seem to take note of the number of times the IDF has already been proven to have lied in THIS incident, nevermind in the past. They just ignore the posts that prove how the IDF are lying and a few pages/posts later will keep parroting the IDF line.

They are SO eager to believe that the IDF has done no wrong that they will even convince themselves that IV bottles are firebombs.

wes wrote: »

Just saw this via Richard Silverstein's Tikun Olam blog:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RlElXOJV4CA&feature=player_embedded

A description of the video from the blog:



I wonder what we could see if we had the rest of the footage from the floatilla people avaliable.

I call shenanigans on that. That weapon that the person is holding (the video is so jumpy its hard to identify if they are actually soldiers) is not an M4 rifle or a Glock pistol which is what the S13 is normally issue with plus the action that the soldier is doing with his right hand is not consistent with a rifle, if you fired a rifle or carbine pretty much one handed like that the recoil would make the gun react in a completely different way from that.

Also all the dead were killed by 9mm rounds according to the turks, IDF rifles use 5.56mm ammunition so this video dosen't tie in with the evidence that the turks themselves released so you need to look at this kind of thing objectively before rushing to judgement.

alastair wrote: »

What then? You let the Palestinians sort out their own affairs and keep your oar out unless it impacts on Israel - and if it does you respond with proportional measure - a new trick for an old dog. The logistics and specifics of whatever peace/withdrawal deal is agreed don't really matter to the long-term decisions that the Palestinians need to make - no more than the Egyptians or Jordanians are guided by the terms of their peace deals.

There was a good piece on the Abbas governemnt by Mark Urban on Newsnight last night. Its seems that the palestinian authority in the west bank is making a good fist of things recently and the internal palestinian economy is thriving. With a proper peace deal the palestinian people could be well off, it looks like Abbas is trying to demonstrate that if you go in a peaceful direction that things will get better.

wes wrote: »

I didn't jump to any conclusions, but the video looks pretty damning to me. As I said it would be nice to see all the footage. I wonder if the IDF destroyed it or not.

You posted a video with a blog quote saying

It shows IDF commandos executing a passenger on the Mavi Marmara with one and possibly two point blank shots from above into the victim who lies on the boat deck. In truth, one cannot distinguish the face of the victim since it is blocked by a boat railing. But from the muzzle flashes and weapon recoils and the downward direction in which the shooter looks at his victim, it is clear this is an execution just as I described earlier

In your post you did not objectively look at what the blog is describing is consistent with what is in the film and whether it is consistent with how weapons actually work. The blog jumps to a lot of conclusions not supported by fact and by posting it so do you.

The blog was talking about its interpretation, which is just as valid as the next persons.

If the "interpretation" isn't consistent with how things actually work then it isn't valid.

BlaasForRafa wrote: »

There was a good piece on the Abbas governemnt by Mark Urban on Newsnight last night. Its seems that the palestinian authority in the west bank is making a good fist of things recently and the internal palestinian economy is thriving. With a proper peace deal the palestinian people could be well off, it looks like Abbas is trying to demonstrate that if you go in a peaceful direction that things will get better.

watched it as well found it very interesting, seems like when the Palistinians locked up the terrorists from Hamas and increased security for their citizens that Israel was able to start to pull back and with investment from the UK and USA the economy was doing quite well. They had loads of food, medicine and building materials.

Still many issues like being able to get to the world market without so many delays and issues with police needing permission from the Israeli's to travel to another town. But a very promising start.

But it left me confused, i thought this would be a good approach and thought it would work as it seems to be, but for some reason it wont work in Gaza i cant put my finger on what is different about the two situations.

Clawdeeus wrote: »

To be fair, you can at least admit it will mean nothing to you what the IDF release, you clearly already have your mind made up regardless. Dont really care, just pointing out the obvious.

I want all the video to be released, and nothing less than that is unacceptable imho. If the IDF release all the video, and it confirms there version of events, then I will believe it, but seeing as they are so reluctant to do so, then this leads me to believe, that the footage does not support there version of events.

Also, remeber the IDF have lied several times about this incident alone, and as such, I see no reason to believe what the IDF says, as they have been caught out lieing severals times on this icident alone, not to mention all the other times. So, all the various little snippets etc being release by the IDF are untrustworthy as the IDF themselves are untrustworthy. Now why should I trust anything the IDF says exactly? I have made up my mind on the IDF, on the basis of the fact that they have blatantly lied several times about this incident already. You may choose to ignore all those lies, but I will not.

BlaasForRafa wrote: »

I call shenanigans on that. That weapon that the person is holding (the video is so jumpy its hard to identify if they are actually soldiers) is not an M4 rifle or a Glock pistol which is what the S13 is normally issue with plus the action that the soldier is doing with his right hand is not consistent with a rifle, if you fired a rifle or carbine pretty much one handed like that the recoil would make the gun react in a completely different way from that.

Also all the dead were killed by 9mm rounds according to the turks, IDF rifles use 5.56mm ammunition so this video dosen't tie in with the evidence that the turks themselves released so you need to look at this kind of thing objectively before rushing to judgement.

The weapon looks like a Remington shotgun with a M4 butt stock and if thats the case it is not the weapon that killed any of the activists. They all died from 9mm bullets more than likely from pistols or a Uzi submachine gun.

prinz wrote: »

Since none of the dead AFAIK were killed using a shotgun, could it be possible that the above was actually being used to fire those non-lethal bean bags they were talking about? That's what it struck me as watching it first... although I still can't make out if he does fire anything at all.

I'd say so because there is no visible muzzle flash. Although firing those at such a close range even with bean bags at some one lying on the deck would be extremely callous would it not?

gandalf wrote: »

The weapon looks like a Remington shotgun with a M4 butt stock and if thats the case it is not the weapon that killed any of the activists. They all died from 9mm bullets more than likely from pistols or a Uzi submachine gun.

Thanks for clarifying that, I thought it looked like a shotgun but didn't want to say without being positive, I figured it would be Manic Moran who would pop along eventually

The moment I saw that video I knew that it didn't tally with what the blog post was saying. I guess that interpretation wasn't equally valid after all.

rapparee wrote: »

Have a look at what Norman Finkelstein has to say about the whole thing. What's going to happen is Israel will reject all findings (except their own) And it will be talked about until the next tragedy happens.

Would we expect anything less from Israel.....