Gaza aid flotilla: Israel censured for ‘excessive’ force

Israel's inquiry, unlike Turkey's, clears military actions but blames passengers.

ISTANBUL: A Turkish probe team on Sunday censured the Israeli army for using excessive force in its assault on a Gaza-bound flotilla of aid ships even as a separate Israeli inquiry cleared the government and military of wrongdoing in the May 2010 seizure.

The findings of the two inquiries were announced on the same day. The preliminary conclusions of the Turkish report said “the Israeli army used excessive force against the Mavi Marmara”.

Nine Turkish activists onboard the ship were killed in the assault by Israeli forces to prevent the Mavi Marmara and other vessels carrying humanitarian aid to Gaza, from breaching the blockade on the Palestinian territory. “The force used to intercept the Mavi Marmara exceeded the limits of what was appropriate and necessary,” the document said.

The commission of inquiry set up by Turkey last year interviewed Turkish and foreign activists on the flotilla.

The commission’s preliminary report criticised the “disproportionate nature of the attack” and called on the Jewish state to pay compensation to the families of the victims.

In stark contrast, an Israeli probe concluded that Israel’s actions against the aid convoy “were found to be legal pursuant to the rules of international law”. The probe said passengers were to blame for the violence.

The Turkel Commission, whose report will form the core of Israel’s submission to a UN inquiry into the May 31 incident, endorsed the sea closure but urged Israeli reviews of how to focus sanctions on Gaza’s Hamas rulers and spare its civilians. Once-strong ties between Turkey and the Jewish state have foundered, with Ankara demanding a formal apology and compensation for the dead and wounded. Israel has refused.

The Turkel Commission said the Gaza blockade was justified given the threat to gun-running to Hamas and Israel’s efforts to maintain humanitarian supplies to ordinary Palestinians there.

“Even if the naval blockade ... had been considered not to meet the requirements of international law, individuals or groups do not have the right to take the law into their own hands and breach the blockade,” the 245-page report said, referring to pro-Palestinian activists behind the flotilla.

Published in The Express Tribune, January 24^th,  2011.