Thursday, May 27, 2010

Israeli Government Comment on the Flotilla

CAMERA

1) The Israel Defense Force Spokesperson provides an overview of the humanitarian situation in Gaza, enumerating the aid provided. The report notes, for example, that:

In the first quarter of 2010 (January-March), 94,500 tons of supplies were transferred in 3,676 trucks to the Strip: 48,000 tons of food products; 40,000 tons of wheat; 2,760 tons of rice; 1,987 tons of clothes and footwear; 553 tons of milk powder and baby food.

In the first quarter of 2010 (January-March) 1,068 tons of medicine and medical equipment were transferred in 152 trucks. In the first quarter of 2010 Israel transferred:

250 trucks with equipment for the UNWRA summer camp, including: arts and crafts equipment, swimming pools, inflatable toys, ice cream machines, musical instruments, clothing, sports equipment, etc.

Seven trucks with equipment for upgrading the sewage pumping station, which was carried out by UNWRA.

74 empty containers for UNWRA for use in classrooms and bathrooms

2) Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesman Yigal Palmor states Israel's case in a short video clip. See it here.

He notes that:

The land crossings remain the most efficient system to transfer goods to Gaza, and the flotilla organizers are well aware of this fact. The organizers also know that since December 2008, their ships have been denied permission to land.

Israel has invited the organizers of the flotilla to use the land crossings, in the same manner as all the reputable international organizations.

However, they are less interested in bringing in aid than in promoting their radical agenda, playing into the hands of Hamas provocations. While they have wrapped themselves in a humanitarian cloak, they are engaging in political propaganda and not in pro-Palestinian aid.

3) Mark Regev, spokesman for the Prime Minister, said:

These people call themselves human rights activist, but they are the opposite. They have nothing whatsoever to say about the human rights of Israeli civilians who have been on the receiving end of Hamas rockets for years. They have nothing whatsoever to say about the human rights of Palestinians who live in Gaza under the jackboots of the Hamas regime that oppresses women, Christians, and gays - a regime that has brutally suppressed all political opposition, destroyed independent media, closed down internet cafés, and has even made it illegal for a male hairdresser to cut the hair of a woman.

Flotilla Sponsors: Radicals and pro-Hamas Palestinians

According to the Free Gaza Web site "The Freedom Flotilla Coalition is comprised of: Free Gaza Movement (FG), European Campaign to End the Siege of Gaza (ECESG), Insani Yardim Vakfi (IHH), Ship to Gaza Greece, Ship to Gaza Sweden, and the International Committee to Lift the Siege on Gaza, with hundreds of groups and organizations around the world supporting the effort."

* The Free Gaza Movement includes on its Board a number of people involved in the radical ISM, International Solidarity Movement. Huwaida Arraf, Adam Shapiro, Caoimhe Butterly and Ewa Jasiewicz are among these. The ISM supports violence ("armed struggle") against Israel as part of its mission, and specializes in sending foreigners to Palestinian areas to thwart Israeli self-defense measures. Other Free Gaza members are veteran anti-Israel activists, including Greta Berlin from Los Angeles and Dror Feiler from Sweden.

* European Campaign to End the Siege of Gaza (ECESG), headed by Dr. Arafat Madi, is a pro-Hamas umbrella group made up of more than 30 pro-Palestinian groups in Europe. Madi himself is the executive director of the Palestine Return Center, based in London.

* Insani Yardim Vakfi (IHH), or Humanitarian Relief in Turkey, is a Turkish-Palestinian group. Bülent Yildirim, IHH chairman, is said to be the driving force behind the flotilla. In a speech at a sendoff for one of the vessels in Istanbul, he said: "Israel is acting the way Hitler acted toward the Jews. Hitler built concentration camps in Germany, today Zionism builds concentration camps in Palestine."

* Ship to Gaza Sweden/Greece is a Swedish initiative led by Dror Feiler and others, involving Swedish radicals in the arts, government and academy. It should be remembered that it was Sweden's Aftonbladet newspaper that ran a libelous story in August 2009 claiming Israel kills Palestinians to harvest organs for trafficking. The story fueled a wave of related anti-Semitic libels throughout the Arab world.

Hamas Agenda

European and American collaborators in the so-called Freedom Flotilla either ignore or sympathize with the genocidal aims of Hamas enshrined in the group's charter and routinely espoused in the media, mosques and political pronouncements of the society. That agenda denies any right to the Jewish people to a sovereign nation in the land of Israel and exhorts Muslims to never-ending violence to dislodge Israel and kill Jews.

Obviously, no legitimate "rights group," – or campaign, committee, movement, humanitarian effort – aligns itself with a regime espousing genocide.

No comments: