Gaza impunity: Israel and the Great Eviction

Israel may or may not have God on its side (opinions vary), but it certainly has the US government, and that seems to be enough.

- Gwynne Dyer

It has just attacked an unarmed civilian ship called Conscience with armed drones near Malta in the central Mediterranean, almost 2,000 kilometres from Israel — and nobody has said “boo”.

Sceptics, please note: Israel has not for-mally claimed responsibility for the operation. The culprit might theoretically have been any other country from Albania to Zimbabwe, but I am assuming that the only country with a motive for the attack probably did carry out the attack.

When the Freedom Flotilla Coalition, the group that sent the Conscience, sent an earlier aid convoy to Gaza bearing 10,000 tonnes of aid in 2010, Israel waited until the ship Mavi Marmara neared the coast and sent commandos who abseiled down from helicopters. Ten civilians were killed and 28 injured, and there was an almighty international uproar about it.

That was really the main purpose of the trip. Israel can always be counted on to overreact, and the coalition expected to exploit that overreaction to turn the spotlight on the Israeli blockade of the Gaza Strip. The sponsors of the Mavi Marmara probably didn’t expect so many dead, or even any dead, but in terms of publicity, it was all grist for the mill.

Drones have made it a lot easier for Israel this time. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s regime was able to disable the ship much farther away, and though it couldn’t be sure nobody on the Conscience would be killed, there would at least be fewer dead.