'Israel's Ruthless Criminality' - WRI statement on attack on Freedom Flotilla
War Resisters' International - an international pacifist network with more than 80 affiliates in more than 40 countries - condemns the murderous Israeli attack on the Freedom Flotilla to Gaza and calls for an immediate lifting of the blockade on Gaza.
The Israeli state has been responsible for many outrages in its history, especially against the population of Gaza. To put it at its mildest, as reported last week by the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation, after a thousand days of the Israeli blockade, 61 per cent of the households of Gaza are “food insecure”.
The international nonviolent activists killed in the attack on the Free Gaza Flotilla did not regard their lives as more important than those of Palestinians - not more important, but nevertheless more visible. The ruthless criminality of this attack on an unarmed flotilla of nonviolent activists bearing humanitarian aid demonstrates for those who did not know before just to what extent the state of Israel regards itself as immune from international norms.
In view of the involvement of some of our own members in organising this, we also know full well that this flotilla is not a tool of Hamas, let alone of Al Qaeda or any other spectre the Israeli propaganda machine seeks to raise. Knowing the nonviolent preparations undertaken for this flotilla, and knowing a number of the activists involved and their principled commitment to nonviolent forms of action, we suggest that only those who want to excuse Israel can believe that Israeli commandos who boarded the ships were then attacked.
This is a state that has acquired nuclear weapons illicitly and offered them to at least one other racist state, apartheid South Africa. This is a state whose secret services have carried out acts of assassination, kidnapping, sabotage and espionage throughout the world. This is a state which day after day has committed violence against Palestinians, indeed whose own sense of security depends on subjection and expropriation of Palestinians.
War Resisters' International works in support of those Israelis who speak out against or refuse to cooperate with the criminality of their government. Our affiliates pressure their own governments and also particular corporations to withdraw support from the Israeli government and its politics of paranoia and persecution. We work too alongside Palestinians to develop nonviolent strategies that offer hope for justice and ultimately peace – strategies including the nonviolent Freedom Flotilla.
War Resisters' International now calls once more
- for disinvestment from companies supporting the state of Israel,
- for a boycott of products marketed by institutions identified with the Israeli state and support for the fair trade products of Palestinian cooperatives.
- for support for the war resisters in Israel itself
- for support for Palestinians in persevering with nonviolent strategies for justice and freedom
It is clear that the state of Israel is not the rightful inheritor of the millions of innocent Jews killed in the Nazi holocaust, but rather is based on violence, denial of human rights and the violation of international norms of human decency.
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Gush Shalom: Only a government that has crossed all red lines ..
Uri Avnery: this night a crime was perpetrated in the middle of the sea, by order of the government of Israel and the IDF Command
A warlike attack against aid ships and deadly shooting at peace and humanitarian aid activists
It is a crazy thing that only a government that crossed all red lines can do
"Only a crazy government that has lost all restraint and all connection to reality could something like that - consider ships carrying humanitarian aid and peace activists from around the world as an enemy and send massive military force to international waters to attack them, shoot and kill.
"Noone in the world will believe the lies and excuses which the government and army spokesmen come up with," said former Knesset member Uri Avnery of the Gush Shalom movement. Gush Shalom activists together with activists of other organizations are to depart at 11:00 from Tel Aviv to protest in front of the prepared detention facility where the international peace activists will be brought.
Greta Berlin, the spokeswoman for the flotilla organizers located in Cyprus, told Gush Shalom activists that the Israeli commandos landed by helicopter on the boats and immediately opened fire.
This is a day of disgrace to the State of Israel, a day of anxiety in which we discover that our future was entrusted to a bunch of trigger-happy people without any responsibility. This day is a day of disgrace and madness and stupidity without limit, the day the Israeli government took care to blacken the name of the country in the world, adding convincing evidence of aggressiveness and brutality to Israel's already bad international image, discouraging and distancing the few remaining friends.
Indeed, today a provocation took place off the coast of Gaza - but the provocateurs were not the peace activists invited by the Palestinians and seeking to reach Gaza. The provocation was carried out by Navy ships commandos at the bidding of the Israeli government, blocking the way of the aid boats and using deadly force.
It is time to lift the siege on the Gaza Strip, which causes severe suffering to its residents. Today the Israeli government ripped the mask of its face with its own hands and exposed the fact that Israel did not "disengage" from Gaza. Real disengagement from the area does not go together with blocking the access to it or sending soldiers to shoot and kill and wound those who try to get there.
The State of Israel promised in the Oslo Accords 17 years ago to enable and encourage the establishment of a deep water port in Gaza, through which Palestinians could import and export freely to develop their economy. It's time to realize this commitment and open the Port of Gaza. Only after the Gaza port will be open to free and undisturbed movement, just like the Ashdod and Haifa ports, will Israel really have disengaged from the Gaza Strip. Until then, the world will continue - and rightly so - to consider the Gaza Strip under Israeli occupation and the State of Israel as responsible for the fate of the people living there.
Contact: Uri Avnery 0505-306449
Adam Keller, Gush Shalom spokesman 03-5565804 or 054-2340749
Coalition Against the Siege Yacov - 050-5733276, 09-7670801, Sebastian -050-6846056
Greta Berlin spokeswoman for flotilla organizers
35799187275
31.5.2010
Gush Shalom: Only a government that has crossed all red lines
Communiqué de l'organisation pacifiste israélienne Gush Shalom
Uri Avnery: this night a crime was perpetrated in the middle of the sea, by order of the government of Israel and the IDF Command
A warlike attack against aid ships and deadly shooting at peace and humanitarian aid activists
It is a crazy thing that only a government that crossed all red lines can do
"Only a crazy government that has lost all restraint and all connection to reality could something like that - consider ships carrying humanitarian aid and peace activists from around the world as an enemy and send massive military force to international waters to attack them, shoot and kill.
"Noone in the world will believe the lies and excuses which the government and army spokesmen come up with," said former Knesset member Uri Avnery of the Gush Shalom movement. Gush Shalom activists together with activists of other organizations are to depart at 11:00 from Tel Aviv to protest in front of the prepared detention facility where the international peace activists will be brought.
Greta Berlin, the spokeswoman for the flotilla organizers located in Cyprus, told Gush Shalom activists that the Israeli commandos landed by helicopter on the boats and immediately opened fire.
This is a day of disgrace to the State of Israel, a day of anxiety in which we discover that our future was entrusted to a bunch of trigger-happy people without any responsibility. This day is a day of disgrace and madness and stupidity without limit, the day the Israeli government took care to blacken the name of the country in the world, adding convincing evidence of aggressiveness and brutality to Israel's already bad international image, discouraging and distancing the few remaining friends.
Indeed, today a provocation took place off the coast of Gaza - but the provocateurs were not the peace activists invited by the Palestinians and seeking to reach Gaza. The provocation was carried out by Navy ships commandos at the bidding of the Israeli government, blocking the way of the aid boats and using deadly force.
It is time to lift the siege on the Gaza Strip, which causes severe suffering to its residents. Today the Israeli government ripped the mask of its face with its own hands and exposed the fact that Israel did not "disengage" from Gaza. Real disengagement from the area does not go together with blocking the access to it or sending soldiers to shoot and kill and wound those who try to get there.
The State of Israel promised in the Oslo Accords 17 years ago to enable and encourage the establishment of a deep water port in Gaza, through which Palestinians could import and export freely to develop their economy. It's time to realize this commitment and open the Port of Gaza. Only after the Gaza port will be open to free and undisturbed movement, just like the Ashdod and Haifa ports, will Israel really have disengaged from the Gaza Strip. Until then, the world will continue - and rightly so - to consider the Gaza Strip under Israeli occupation and the State of Israel as responsible for the fate of the people living there.
Contact: Uri Avnery 0505-306449
Adam Keller, Gush Shalom spokesman 03-5565804 or 054-2340749
Coalition Against the Siege Yacov - 050-5733276, 09-7670801, Sebastian -050-6846056
Greta Berlin spokeswoman for flotilla organizers
35799187275
31.5.2010
Pour une Paix Juste et Durable entre Palestiniens et Israéliens
Lien vers le communiqué du Collectif national (ie : français) pour une paix juste et durable entre Palestinien/ne/s et Israélien/ne/s :
http://www.france-palestine.org/article14841.html