An article in Ha'aretz today will surely get attention for the headline, 'Foreign Ministry warned Israel Navy not to raid Gaza flotilla in international waters'.
Further down, is the following:
Thus, according to senior figures familiar with the details of the discussions, the Foreign Ministry urged defense officials to launch their operations to stop the flotilla only after the ships had crossed Gaza's maritime boundaries. The ministry's diplomats repeated this request on more than one occasion.
"If somebody breaks into your home and you shoot him after he enters the doorway, there's no problem in justifying this action in court," said a senior ministry official. "But if you attack the burglar while he is on his way to your house at a distance of two blocks away, then you have a problem."
"It was made clear that we can ultimately prove that we acted according to international law, but this will be very complicated and we will absorb many denunciations along the way," the official said.
Firstly then, despite all the propaganda post-2005 redeployment about Israel washing its hands of Gaza, and the occupation being 'over', Israel still views the territory as under its control - and acts accordingly.
The flotilla, of course, was expressly headed to the Gaza Strip, not Israel, and yet the "senior foreign ministry official" feels that the appropriate analogy is preventing an intruder from entering your own home.
But secondly, and more disturbingly, while the use of lethal force by commandos has been justified by the Israeli government and its propagandists as impromptu 'self-defence' against "armed" activists, here it seems that the Foreign Ministry's advice in the planning stages was concerned with the most appropriate location for the use of violence against the boats' passengers.
Israel euphemistically calls it a “security situation” (see link for MAP):
Maritime Zone
Not only is the P.A. non existent in Gaza due to a US/Israel backed coup attempt, but worse still, Israel, which has long violated the Oslo Accords thus rendering them null and void, suddenly cites “agreements” between it and the P.A. as some kind of legitimate justification for its control of the maritime waters.
the the excusoid is Oslo
“Oh what a tangled web we weave,
When first we practice to deceive”
Yes, but tangled webs can sometimes be quite effective. Especially when the prey are dimwitted Americans.
They will only deny they said it, or meant it, the next time they contradict it. Consistency is not a characteristic of Israeli policy.
It seems to have been hard to find anything that would amount to the kind of internationally advertised warning required by the San Remo convention, to which appeal was so suddenly made. This may be the reason why the poor old PA quislings are being dragged into it, though I doubt if even they would admit that they were at war with Gaza or engaged in a civil war against Hamas with Israel as a trusted ally. Avi is right that the PA does not look like the power in effective control of Gaza but I suppose that it could be declared the legitimate power, but then Gaza would not – at least not in every important way – be No Man’s Land (rather than Occupied Territory) as it currently is in Israeli ideology, or seemed to be the last time I looked. Grimly amusing if it wasn’t for people getting killed.
So, cold-blooded murder in international waters is a no-no, but inside them, it’s O.K.?