The Convoy Incident

I listened to the news as I was driving to work the other day. And as the journalists and Norwegian doctor Mads Gilbert told us how horrible and inconsiderate the Israelis are for attacking the convoy, I say to myself: There's something not right here. Why do they exclude Israeli's side of the incident?

"The officials said if the flotilla of eight ships does not turn back, the boats will be hauled to an Israeli port, the activists sent back to their countries and the supplies transferred to Gaza by land" (http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=127140754).

The Israeli navy asked the convoy to sail towards Ashdod instead, so that Israel could inspect and control the supplies, before they could be transported to Gaza by land. (- http://www.nrk.no/nyheter/verden/1.7147518. Unfortunately, only in Norwegian.)

According to this, it was never about Israel not wanting these supplies to reach Gaza. It was all about how the convoy tried to reach Gaza directly, with unknown cargo, and how the convoy disregarded Israeli warnings.

Israel DID warn the convoy several times, even before the ship set sail. So in spite of that, why did the convoy have to travel. And why did they have to bring that many activists on board, and weapons under deck?

When the Israeli defence organization warned the convoy, the ship did not respond at all. I think all of us can agree that if anyone of us were in charge of the military defense system of Israel, facing a giant ship with activists from all over the world, on its way into waters protected by Israel for security reasons, 'armed' with Israeli-aggressive opponents and weapons, not receiving any response whatsoever when trying to make a dialog with them, not even when firing warning shots, we would have seen no other way but to board the ship, trying to turn it around. It is usually referred to as: Self-Defence.

(The soldiers intention was to do it in a peaceful matter, and they were the first ones to be attacked before they even got the chance to get on deck.)

Information about the boarding of the ship, demonstrators throwing soldiers over board:
- http://www.nrk.no/nyheter/verden/1.7147093
- http://www.nrk.no/nyheter/verden/1.7148246


There is so much that can be said about Israel's blockade of the Gaza area and people's response to that. But I think it's only fair that we, more often, speak Israel's side of the case.
I am surprised over the fact that people cannot see that the activists did this just because they KNEW that Israel would react. They knew that this encounter would create headlines. So the true purpose of the convoy's trip couldn't have been to just provide supplies for Gaza. Should it not be clear to everyone that they're intention was all about creating more opposition against Israel?