Updates:
From Israel’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs
Some video footage of attacks on the IDF
Now if the news was “19 Swedes dead and several injurerd” it would be a day of landssorg/ national mourning – more tears in the ocean.
As expected: they have planned, sacrificed afew lives and achived their goal
Israel is not happy about what has happened. Who is happy about what has happened ? Is anyone happy? Does anyone stand to gain – and if so, who, and what??
What has happened is tragic and could have been avoided, especially if the foolhardy sailors had called the whole thing off – instead of playing heroics. Fortunately Henning Mankell and Mattias Gardell and others of the peaceful Swedes are apparently not among those who put up an armed resistance by firing on / attacking members of the IDF whose sole purpose was to escort their ships to a safe harbour, as planned and as they had informed the Flotilla and the world, well in advance
Mankell, Gardell, Löfgren & their comrades are probably wishing that they had stayed home or are glad that they didn’t – or regretting that their comrades-in-arms did not co-operator with the IDF when it would have been a wise thing to do so since they were not an invading army or the US Marines and had not declared that their purpose was to wage war on the IDF. IN any case, what they were attempting to do in defiance of Israeli authority, was illegal.
Now here is a preliminary IDF report
Soon enough, Carl Bildt will be hollering, ”Let my people go!”
This is what the machete-wielding hooligans (pirates) wanted to happen, to provoke this kind of situation and then point an accusing finger at Israel – like children killing their parents and then crying that they are orphans and martyrs. Is martyrdom-ology ( to win the sympathy of the gallery) a deliberate strategy? It’s the ideology of the suicide-bomber, to regard himself/ herself as a martyr, to make that kind of self-sacrifice to achieve his goal – that kind of regard for life.
The ensuing fight – the exchange of fire occurred on board vessels at sea. The same principle could have been challenged had the ” non-violent” decided to fly in the non-violent aid into Gaza, thus violating Israeli airspace in doing so.
Then, most predictably the aid carrier in the air would have either been escorted to a safe landing place by the Israeli airforce or, alternatively, shot down.
The purpose in boarding the ships was to escort them to safety ( Gaza has no harbour). That the Israelis were met with violent resistance from the armed hooligans with guns, machetes and knives is no surprise because I heard it on al-Jazeera that they ( the hooligans) were not going to be conducted to an Israeli port, without resistance. They had previously intimated that they were going to cause plenty of trouble and they have been true to their promise.
As peropaco wrote at the beginning of another thread, similar action would be expected by South Korea – should the North enter their peaceful waters and refuse to comply with orders in a vain attempt at breaking an embargo – even after being warned about the course of action that would be the inevitable consequence