ROBIN SHEPHERD: WHAT REALLY HAPPENED? SEE NOTE

Posted By on June 1st, 2010

I LOVE ROBIN SHEPHERD BUT I THINK HIS COMMENT “Let’s get our priorities right: the first thing to say and think about the awful events this morning aboard the “Freedom Flotilla” ship bound for Gaza is to mourn the loss of life and the violence suffered by all sides.”….IS OVERSPEAK AND OVERMOURN….ONE SIDE ATTACKED AND THEY GOT WHAT THEY DESERVED….PERIOD….RSK

http://www.robinshepherdonline.com/
“Freedom Flotilla” debacle condemned around the world, but what really happened?
Let’s get our priorities right: the first thing to say and think about the awful events this morning aboard the “Freedom Flotilla” ship bound for Gaza is to mourn the loss of life and the violence suffered by all sides.

Now, let’s get our facts right as hotheads around the world rush to judgement. How did this happen, and who is responsible? We can divide this into what we know for certain, what, on the balance of probabilities is likely to have happened, and what we simply do not know at this stage.

So, What do we know for certain?

1) Again, this is tragedy of terrible proportions for the families of the deceased.

2) The “Freedom Flotilla” and its organisers were looking for confrontation. Israel had made it clear that it would not allow the ships to dock in Gaza. This made confrontation of some description a certainty.

3) As I pointed out in a previous posting, many of the participants in the Flotilla are extremists. One of them was quoted in an Israeli newspaper last week comparing Israel to Nazi Germany and offering a rationale for terrorism in saying, “These people are doing what reality causes them to do.” If you are deliberately soliciting confrontation and carry among your number apologists for terrorism and people who call Jews Nazis, that confrontation is likely to be unpleasant.

4) This is a public relations disaster for Israel.

Now, on the basis of what we have heard and what we can piece together, what, on the balance of probabilities, happened?

1) It seems highly unlikely that Israeli officials are being anything other than truthful in saying that the members of the flotilla initiated the violence. Israel had literally nothing to gain from an outcome of this kind. The situation that led to the deaths was either forced upon the Israelis or their operation was botched. They would not have intentionally opted for the train of events which actually transpired.

2) Given the kind of people who we know were aboard the ship — fanatics in many cases, holding extreme views about the Jewish state — the notion that the activists initiated not merely violence, but potentially lethal violence is highly plausible. Early reports (and pictures) suggest that members of the flotilla attacked Israeli soldiers with axes, iron bars and hand guns and that in at least one case a flotilla activist wrestled a gun from an Israeli soldier and began spraying bullets around. Most of this will probably turn out to be true.

That’s about all we’ve really got at this stage. My feeling is that the best course of action is to wait and see what the investigation reveals. We simply don’t know the full context in which this tragic loss of life took place. We don’t know, for example, whether Israeli soldiers botched the mission to board the ship, found themselves pinned down and unable to get off the ship, and then had no choice but to defend themselves. Maybe one or more soldiers panicked and over-reacted. Maybe there is much more to be revealed about the level of violence used by the activists. We just don’t know. And that, at this stage, is where any sensible and level headed observer must leave it for now.

Postscript

There will be much more to say about all this, but the responses coming out of the EU are all too predictable, and indeed illogical. CNN is running a strap line saying EU condemns use of excessive force, calls for investigation. But why call for an investigation if you’ve already drawn your conclusion that the use of force was excessive?

That’s basically an admission that this is simply another any-stick-will do approach to Israel where blind prejudice immediately becomes the default position, even at the price of making inherently irrational statements…

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