---

Israel's latest criminal outrage, while very far from being its worst,
is nevertheless so flagrant that it exceeds the capacity of the most
well oiled propaganda machine to hide. Canadian Prime Minister,
Stephen Harper, urged people to wait for the facts to be uncovered
about an Israeli attack that left several activists dead as they
attempted to deliver humanitarian aid to Gaza. Harper's plea was a
feeble attempt at damage control because the key facts were known at
once.

Taking the Israeli account at face value, activists resisted as
Israeli commandos boarded their ship in international waters. Nine
activists were shot dead. The Israelis claim they acted in self
defense, which is like an armed robber claiming he broke into a house
and shot his victims in self defense. That is the essence of the "PR
problem" Israel's apologists have lamented since the attack. The "PR
problem" is aggravated by the fact that the Israelis murdered Turkish
citizens rather than Palestinians, whom they are accustomed to killing
with near impunity.

What was known initially was damning enough. What has come out since
the attack will create an even bigger "PR problem" for Israel.

A UK Guardian article reported autopsy results on the bodies of the
victims:

"... a 60-year-old man, Ibrahim Bilgen, was shot four times in the
temple, chest, hip and back. A 19-year-old, named as Fulkan Dogan, who
also has US citizenship, was shot five times from less than 45cm, in
the face, in the back of the head, twice in the leg and once in the
back. Two other men were shot four times, and five of the victims were
shot either in the back of the head or in the back, said Yalcin Buyuk,
vice-chairman of the council of forensic medicine."

According to the Guardian, forty-eight other people suffered gunshot
wounds. [1]

Israel failed to secure complete control over video recordings that
were made during the incident. Video smuggled out of Israel shows
activists treating the wounded and pleading with the commandos to stop
firing. [2]

It is instructive to look at how the Canadian press has responded to
the incident.

At the fanatical extreme are people like National Post columnist
George Jonas who called the slain activists "peace terrorists". He
argued that Israel must blockade Gaza to prevent rocket attacks.
Therefore anyone who tries to break the blockade – even through the
delivery of crutches (his example) – is threatening Israeli "security"
and is therefore a terrorist. [3]

In the same newspaper, David Frum expressed his contempt for the
victims with more subtlety. Frum wrote

"In human terms, the losses begin with the battered and injured IDF
soldiers who boarded the Mavi Marmara. One may wonder if we should not
tally as winners the nine militant blockade runners who gained the
martyrdom they sought."[4]

So according to the Frum, the real victims were the Israeli commandos
who were roughed up while the people they murdered were fanatics who
got what they wanted.

Rex Murphy also used his space in the Post to openly spit on the
graves of the activists:

"As to the 'peace activists' on that sixth ship, the ones who received
the Israeli soldiers boarding the ship with bats, pipes, knives and
chains -- well, the video footage of the moments preceding the
boarding and the boarding itself will make most rational people review
their understanding of peace and activism..."[5]

Propagandists are often wise to be aggressive, but the National Post
pundits will likely repel all but the most hateful "supporters of
Israel".

A more insidious attempt to defend the indefensible was made by Martin
Regg Cohn in the Toronto Star. Cohn rebuked Israel for not simply
ignoring the activists' aid flotilla. He characterized Israel's action
as stupid rather than criminal and (like his counterparts in the Post)
he spread the myth tha t Israel's behaviour is driven by security
concerns. [6]

Palestinians are invariably presumed not to have any security
concerns, or any right to self defense, regardless how many are killed
by Israel, and regardless that Israel illegally occupies Palestinian
land and not the other way around.

Rocket fire from Gaza has killed 14 Israelis over seven years.
Israel's military has killed 1000 Palestinians in Gaza since 2008 - in
addition to killing 5000 in the Occupied Territories in the period
between 2001 to 2008. [7] Yet according to a Lexis Nexis search of
English language newspapers, the words "Israel's right to self
defense" appeared in 128 articles over the past two years while the
words "Palestinian right to self defense" appeared in only one
article. The words "Israel's security concerns" appeared in 40
articles. The words "Palestinian security concerns" appeared in zero
articles.

The media has also buried the fact that Israel, not Hamas, broke a
cease fire that had virtually eliminated rocket fire from Gaza. [8]

In 2003, the UN Special Rapporteur for Food said that 22% of
Palestinian children were malnourished and that this was direct result
of Israeli policy. [9] This was years before electoral victories by
Hamas in 2006 – one of the pretexts Israel has used to intensify the
economic and military pounding of Gaza. Moreover, if the situation had
been reversed, if Palestinians had been strong enough to impose
malnourishment on 22% of Israeli children, it is not difficult to
imagine the reaction from corporate pundits in Canada and the US. It
would be called an act of war – in fact, a war crime. Israel would not
be expected to passively accept the suffering imposed by their
neighbours.

During its early days, Hamas was funded by Israel. [10] The idea was
to create a counterweight to the PLO which was, at the time,
considered a serious obstacle to Israel's expansionist aims. The dire
threat posed by the PLO was that it accepted Israel's right to secure
borders. In 1976, a draft UN resolution, supported by the PLO, offered
Israel everything it publicly claims to want. Israel, with the backing
of the US, was able to defeat the resolution. [11] Today, Hamas is
feared rather than funded because it is no longer a marginal group and
it is willing to resist the Israeli occupation.

In 1948, Israel's military expelled 700,000 Palestinians and
confiscated their property. Since 1967, when Israel seized control of
the West bank and Gaza, it has relentlessly moved hundreds of
thousands settlers into the territories. It is not security, but the
desire to consolidate gains acquired through massive and ongoing theft
that drives Israeli policy. [12]

The fantasy of Israeli state planners is that, through the use of
brute force, Palestinians will be convinced to either flee the
occupied territories or suffer passively as Israel steals whatever
land and resources it considers valuable. Decades ago, Moshe Dayan, a
former Israeli Minister of Defense, suggested to his colleagues that
Palestinians be told

"We have no solution, you shall continue to live like dogs, and
whoever wishes may leave, and we will see where this process
leads"[13]

Israeli leaders have become less intelligent since Moshe Dayan's day.
Despite the corporate media's best efforts, Israel's brutality is
impossible to conceal even from people who are unfamiliar with the
conflict. Consequently, Israel's apologists have increasingly resorted
to the refrain that its crimes are "unfairly singled out" for
condemnation. The appropriate reply is that Israeli crimes have been
singled out for a tremendous amount of support from Canada and the US.
We should put an end that support. [14]

SUGGESTED ACTION

Send polite, non-abusive emails to the following newspapers. Please
copy all letters and replies to Joe@canuckmedeiamonitor.org

National Post: http://www.nationalpost.com/contact/letter...r+to+the+editor

Toronto Star lettertoed@thestar.ca)

NOTES

[1]http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/jun/04/gaza-flotilla-activists-
autop sy-results

[2 Democracy Now; http://www.democracynow.org/blog/2010/6/10/the_images_they_didnt_want_se...
ideo_and_photographs_from_on_board_the_mavi_marmara

[3] George Jonas: "Crusade of the peace terrorists"; National Post;
June 4, 2010 [4] David Frum; "The Geopolitical Scoreboard"; National
Post; June 5, 2010

[5] Rex Murphy; "Propaganda Floats"; National Post; June 5, 2010

[6] Martin Regg Cohn; "Why Israelis Can't Stop Fighting"; Toronto
Star; June 8, 2010

[7] Medialens Alert: "An Eye for an Eyelash: The Gaza Massacre"
http://www.medialens.org/alerts/09/090112_an_eye_for.php

[8] FAIR: Misleading Media on Israel and Gaza Rockets
http://www.fair.org/blog/2010/06/11/misleading-media-on-israel-and-gaza-...

[9] Steven Edwards; "Israel Accuses UN Author of Political Bias";
National Post, October 10, 2003

[10] Richard Sale; "Israel Gave Major Aid to Hamas"; February 24,
2001; UPI http://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2002/06/08/1320881.php

[11] See my exchange with Deborah Orr of the UK Independent about this
matter for more details: http://www.medialens.org/forum/viewtopic.php?t=2927&sid=d64fd1da0f9fb538...

[12]Steve Shalom; "Background to the Israel-Palestine Crisis; Znet;
May, 2002 http://www.zcommunications.org/background-to-the-israel-palestine-crisis...

[13] Noam Chomsky; "Turning Point?"; Znet; June 7, 2009
http://www.zcommunications.org/turning-point-by-noam-chomsky-1

[14] See Yves Engler's recent book "Canada and Israel: Building
Apartheid" for details.