Ponce
3rd June 2010, 08:54 AM
American among 9 Gaza convoy dead.
updated 58 minutes ago
ISTANBUL - Funerals were being held in Istanbul on Thursday for the nine pro-Palestinian activists — including a U.S. citizen — who were killed during the Israeli raid on six aid ships trying to break the naval blockade of Gaza.
Hundreds of activists who were jailed and then released by Israel also arrived home to a hero's welcome, with Turkish crowds cheering their attempt to break Israel's naval blockade of the Gaza Strip.
Thousands packed Istanbul's main Taksim Square in the early morning hours before moving to Istanbul airport to welcome home the activists expelled from Israel. They waved Turkish, Palestinian and Hezbollah flags while chanting "God is Great!"
One large banner read "Murderous Israelis: Take your hands off our ships" while others in the crowd held signs with slogans like "From now on, nothing will be the same" and "Intifada is everywhere — at land and at sea" — in reference to the Palestinian uprising against Israeli occupation.
All of the nine activists died from gunshot wounds — some from close range — according to initial forensic examinations done in Turkey after the bodies were returned, NTV television reported, citing unidentified medical sources.
Born in New York
NBC News reported that among the nine slain was Furkan Dogan, 19, who was born in New York, returning to his family's homeland, Turkey, at the age of two.
Israel maintains that the commandos only used their pistols as a last resort after they were attacked, and released a video showing soldiers in riot gear descending from a helicopter into a crowd of men with sticks and clubs and being beaten. Footage also showed an activist with a knife stabbing a soldier.
However the Foreign Press Association complained Thursday that the Israeli military had seized journalists' videos and was selectively using footage to bolster its claims that commandos opened fire only after being attacked.
The organization, which represents hundreds of journalists in Israel and the Palestinian territories, demanded that the military stop using the captured material without permission and identify the source of the video already released. The material appeared Wednesday on the army's YouTube site labeled as "captured."
June 2: Israel continues to face furious criticism over the raid, but the United States is not one of the louder voices.
The United Nations has called for an international investigation to establish exactly what happened on Monday, but Israel instead proposed Thursday an Israeli inquiry — with the participation of outside observers.
'Invite observers'
Israel's foreign minister, Avigdor Lieberman, embraced a U.S. suggestion in an effort to calm a global furor over the killing of the activists.
"I am in favor of an investigation. We have enough high-level legal experts ... if they want to take on observers from the outside, they can invite observers," Lieberman said on Israel Radio.
Lieberman said Turkey "bore all the blame" and had sent a ship full of "hooligans with knives and metal bars."
Another aid ship, the MV Rachel Corrie, is heading toward Gaza, but Lieberman said Israel would not allow its Gaza blockade to be breached. "No ship will reach Gaza. The Rachel Corrie will not reach Gaza," he told Israel Radio.
Derek Graham, a crew member on board the converted merchant ship, named after an American woman killed in the Gaza Strip in 2003, told Reuters: "Everybody was very upset at what happened. Everybody has been more determined than ever to continue on to Gaza."
The ship has medical equipment, school supplies and cement, a material Israel has banned from entering Gaza.
"If they board us, we will be showing that we are not aggressive people, we are sitting showing we have nothing in our hands and will tell them where exactly crew are," Graham, a member of the Free Gaza Movement, said. When asked how confident he was feeling he said: "I would imagine somewhere around 50/50".
Israel wants any probe to focus on the legality and operational details of the commando raid rather than on its four-year-old blockade of Gaza and the humanitarian situation.
Israeli Finance Minister Yuval Steinitz told Army Radio: "There is a need for an investigation to draw lessons," an apparent reference to the military performance in the operation.
Israel was stung by a U.N. inquiry into the three-week offensive it launched in the Gaza Strip in December 2008 which found evidence that its forces committed war crimes, allegations Israeli leaders denied.
The head of the controversial Turkish charity that organized the flotilla of ships said activists had grabbed guns from 10 soldiers in self-defense.
"We told our friends on board: 'We will die, become martyrs, but never let us be shown... as the ones who used guns,'" said Bulent Yildirim, chairman of the Foundation for Human Rights and Freedoms and Humanitarian Relief.
He said he saw the commandos firing rubber bullets from close range before switching to live ammunition, after some of the activists attacked them with chairs and bats.
"Our friends only performed civil resistance. Even if we had used the guns that would be still a legitimate self defense," Yildirim said.
Several of those released by Israel accused the Israeli army of destroying evidence, and Yildirim said soldiers shot a doctor who wanted to surrender and threw bodies into the sea.
Kevin Ovenden of Britain said a man who had pointed a camera at the soldiers was shot dead through the forehead.
Other activists involved in the flotilla also insisted their purpose was entirely peaceful.
"However much the Israelis are screaming that they have found weapons, it is just nonsense," said best-selling Swedish crime novelist Henning Mankell, who was traveling on the Swedish-Greek ship Sofia in the Gaza convoy.
"On the ship where I was, they found one weapon and that was my safety razor, and they actually came forward and showed that, then you understand at which level this was," Mankell told Swedish radio.
However Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the aim of the flotilla had been to break the blockade, not to bring aid to Gaza. If the blockade ended, he warned, hundreds of ships would bring in thousands of missiles from Iran, to be aimed at Israel and beyond.
"This was not the 'Love Boat,'" Netanyahu said in an address to the nation. "It was a hate boat."
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/37484498/ns/world_news-mideastn_africa/
updated 58 minutes ago
ISTANBUL - Funerals were being held in Istanbul on Thursday for the nine pro-Palestinian activists — including a U.S. citizen — who were killed during the Israeli raid on six aid ships trying to break the naval blockade of Gaza.
Hundreds of activists who were jailed and then released by Israel also arrived home to a hero's welcome, with Turkish crowds cheering their attempt to break Israel's naval blockade of the Gaza Strip.
Thousands packed Istanbul's main Taksim Square in the early morning hours before moving to Istanbul airport to welcome home the activists expelled from Israel. They waved Turkish, Palestinian and Hezbollah flags while chanting "God is Great!"
One large banner read "Murderous Israelis: Take your hands off our ships" while others in the crowd held signs with slogans like "From now on, nothing will be the same" and "Intifada is everywhere — at land and at sea" — in reference to the Palestinian uprising against Israeli occupation.
All of the nine activists died from gunshot wounds — some from close range — according to initial forensic examinations done in Turkey after the bodies were returned, NTV television reported, citing unidentified medical sources.
Born in New York
NBC News reported that among the nine slain was Furkan Dogan, 19, who was born in New York, returning to his family's homeland, Turkey, at the age of two.
Israel maintains that the commandos only used their pistols as a last resort after they were attacked, and released a video showing soldiers in riot gear descending from a helicopter into a crowd of men with sticks and clubs and being beaten. Footage also showed an activist with a knife stabbing a soldier.
However the Foreign Press Association complained Thursday that the Israeli military had seized journalists' videos and was selectively using footage to bolster its claims that commandos opened fire only after being attacked.
The organization, which represents hundreds of journalists in Israel and the Palestinian territories, demanded that the military stop using the captured material without permission and identify the source of the video already released. The material appeared Wednesday on the army's YouTube site labeled as "captured."
June 2: Israel continues to face furious criticism over the raid, but the United States is not one of the louder voices.
The United Nations has called for an international investigation to establish exactly what happened on Monday, but Israel instead proposed Thursday an Israeli inquiry — with the participation of outside observers.
'Invite observers'
Israel's foreign minister, Avigdor Lieberman, embraced a U.S. suggestion in an effort to calm a global furor over the killing of the activists.
"I am in favor of an investigation. We have enough high-level legal experts ... if they want to take on observers from the outside, they can invite observers," Lieberman said on Israel Radio.
Lieberman said Turkey "bore all the blame" and had sent a ship full of "hooligans with knives and metal bars."
Another aid ship, the MV Rachel Corrie, is heading toward Gaza, but Lieberman said Israel would not allow its Gaza blockade to be breached. "No ship will reach Gaza. The Rachel Corrie will not reach Gaza," he told Israel Radio.
Derek Graham, a crew member on board the converted merchant ship, named after an American woman killed in the Gaza Strip in 2003, told Reuters: "Everybody was very upset at what happened. Everybody has been more determined than ever to continue on to Gaza."
The ship has medical equipment, school supplies and cement, a material Israel has banned from entering Gaza.
"If they board us, we will be showing that we are not aggressive people, we are sitting showing we have nothing in our hands and will tell them where exactly crew are," Graham, a member of the Free Gaza Movement, said. When asked how confident he was feeling he said: "I would imagine somewhere around 50/50".
Israel wants any probe to focus on the legality and operational details of the commando raid rather than on its four-year-old blockade of Gaza and the humanitarian situation.
Israeli Finance Minister Yuval Steinitz told Army Radio: "There is a need for an investigation to draw lessons," an apparent reference to the military performance in the operation.
Israel was stung by a U.N. inquiry into the three-week offensive it launched in the Gaza Strip in December 2008 which found evidence that its forces committed war crimes, allegations Israeli leaders denied.
The head of the controversial Turkish charity that organized the flotilla of ships said activists had grabbed guns from 10 soldiers in self-defense.
"We told our friends on board: 'We will die, become martyrs, but never let us be shown... as the ones who used guns,'" said Bulent Yildirim, chairman of the Foundation for Human Rights and Freedoms and Humanitarian Relief.
He said he saw the commandos firing rubber bullets from close range before switching to live ammunition, after some of the activists attacked them with chairs and bats.
"Our friends only performed civil resistance. Even if we had used the guns that would be still a legitimate self defense," Yildirim said.
Several of those released by Israel accused the Israeli army of destroying evidence, and Yildirim said soldiers shot a doctor who wanted to surrender and threw bodies into the sea.
Kevin Ovenden of Britain said a man who had pointed a camera at the soldiers was shot dead through the forehead.
Other activists involved in the flotilla also insisted their purpose was entirely peaceful.
"However much the Israelis are screaming that they have found weapons, it is just nonsense," said best-selling Swedish crime novelist Henning Mankell, who was traveling on the Swedish-Greek ship Sofia in the Gaza convoy.
"On the ship where I was, they found one weapon and that was my safety razor, and they actually came forward and showed that, then you understand at which level this was," Mankell told Swedish radio.
However Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the aim of the flotilla had been to break the blockade, not to bring aid to Gaza. If the blockade ended, he warned, hundreds of ships would bring in thousands of missiles from Iran, to be aimed at Israel and beyond.
"This was not the 'Love Boat,'" Netanyahu said in an address to the nation. "It was a hate boat."
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/37484498/ns/world_news-mideastn_africa/