Israel seizes the last ship of the aid flotilla

ASHDOD, ISRAEL: Israeli forces on Saturday boarded another aid craft heading for Gaza, but there was no repetition of the bloody violence that erupted when commandos stormed an aid boat earlier in the week.

While Israel hailed the peaceful end to the operation which the military said was carried out without any injuries on either side, the pro-Palestinian organisers accused it of “hijacking” the ship, Rachel Corrie, which reportedly ignored orders to not head towards Gaza.

The Israeli military said its forces had boarded the vessel “with the full compliance” of the crew and passengers in a peaceful operation. It added that the ship and the 15 people on board, most of them Irish or Malaysian activists, were being escorted to the southern Israeli port of Ashdod.

But the takeover prompted a furious response from the Dublin-based Ireland Palestine Solidarity Campaign. “For the second time in less than a week, Israeli forces stormed and hijacked an unarmed aid ship, kidnapping its passengers and forcing the ship toward Ashdod port,” it said, also noting that those on board were believed to be unharmed.

Army spokeswoman Avital Leibovitz said the Rachel Corrie had been commandeered in international waters some 21 nautical miles northwest of Ashdod after the vessel refused to respond to four requests to change course.

The operation began shortly after dawn on Saturday when activists on board the vessel spoke by phone with the Gaza-based welcoming committee and said they had been surrounded by Israeli naval boats.

The boat was carrying around 1,000 tonnes of aid and supplies, half of which was reportedly cement – a substance which Israel does not allow into Gaza, claiming it could be used for building fortifications.

Despite an international outcry over the deadly commando operation, Israel vowed to block all attempts to reach Gaza by sea in defiance of the tight blockade it has imposed on the impoverished territory since 2006.

Israel had warned it would stop the Rachel Corrie, named after a US activist killed in 2003 as she tried to prevent an Israeli bulldozer from razing a Palestinian home.

Activists on board the ship had made clear they would not heed Israeli calls to change course, but had also said they would not put up any resistance to Israeli forces should they board the vessel.

They said they would allow their 1,000 tonnes of cargo to be inspected, preferably by an international force.

As news of the standoff on the high seas reached Gaza City, people began streaming towards the port in anticipation of the ship’s arrival, with officials hailing what they saw as the imminent end of the Israeli blockade which has been in place for nearly four years.

“We are in the last 15 minutes of the siege,” said Ahmed Yussef, deputy foreign minister in the Hamas-run government.

Rachel Corrie had been due to join the flotilla of ships which attempted to run the blockade earlier this week but was held up for technical reasons.

Reuters quoted Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s statement saying: “Forces used the same procedures for Monday’s flotilla and Saturday’s sailing but was met by a different response … The only difference was [that on one ship] extremist Islamic activists, supporters of terrorism, waited for our troops on the deck with axes and knives.”

Meanwhile, The Guardian reported that autopsy results on the bodies of nine Turks killed in the Israeli raid on the aid ship on Monday found that they were shot 30 times and many at close range.

Published in the Express Tribune, June 6^th, 2010.