Gaza flotilla probe: IDF used excessive force but naval blockade legal
The final findings of the UN commission that investigated the events last May do not call for Israel to apologize; Israeli official: Turkish-Israeli reconciliation talks deadlocked.
By Barak Ravid Tags: Gaza flotilla GazaThe UN committee investigating the events of last May's Gaza flotilla, headed by former Prime Minister of New Zealand Geoffrey Palmer, convened Wednesday in New York to conclude the report.
According to a political source in Jerusalem, the final findings of the Palmer Report show that the Israeli naval blockade on Gaza is legal and is in accordance with international law.
The report also sharply criticizes the Turkish government's behavior in its dealings with the committee. Palmer, an expert on international maritime law, added in the report that Israel’s Turkel commission that investigated the events was professional, independent and unbiased.
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The Mavi Marmara, aboard which Israel's deadly raid on a Gaza-bound flotilla resulted in the deaths of 9 Turkish activists May 22, 2010 |
| Photo by: AP |
His findings on the Turkish committee were less favorable, with Palmer concluding that the Turkish investigation was politically influenced and its work was not professional or independent.
On Thursday, the Palmer Committee will present its findings to UN Secretary General Ban ki-Moon, yet it remains unclear if it will be made public. Turkey is pressuring the UN to delay that release of the investigation's findings, but the report is likely to be made public in the coming days.
The Palmer Committee also criticizes the IHH organization that organized the Gaza flotilla as well as its ties to the Turkish government, suggesting Turkey did not do enough to stop the flotilla.
Israel does not come out of the report unscathed, with the committee concluding that based on testimony given by passengers, the Israeli naval commandos used excessive force. Israel claimed the soldiers acted out of self defense, thereby justifying the use of force.
According to the final draft of the probe, Israel is not asked to apologize to Turkey, but the report does recommend it expresses regret over the casualties. The Palmer Report also doesn't ask Israel to pay compensation, but proposes Israel transfer money to a specially-created humanitarian fund.
Palmer says that although international law permits the interception of ships outside territorial waters, Israel should have taken control of the flotilla when the ships were closer to the limit of the naval blockade – 20 miles off the coast. Israel responded by saying that its interception of the flotilla so far from the coast was due to military and tactical considerations, following the organizers' refusal to stop.
Meanwhile, the efforts to mend relations between Israel and Turkey have reached a deadlock yet again, said a senior political source in Jerusalem on Wednesday. According to the source, talks between Vice Prime Minister Moshe Ya’alon and Turkish senior officials Wednesday in New York ended without conclusive results, and each side remains unrelenting in its stance.
"There is no agreement and no breakthrough on the horizon," said the source. "Everything still depends on the (Turkish demand for an Israeli) apology. The report will be released soon and a compromise seems very unlikely."
Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan has ordered the Turkish negotiation team not to back down from the demand for an official aplogy. Ya'alon told Turkish Foreign Ministry Undersecretary Feridun Sinirlioglu that Israel will not apologize, but is willing to express sorrow for the flotilla's tragic results.
Over the past two weeks there have been three rounds of negotiations between Ya'alon and Sinirlioglu - two of them took place in Europe and one in New York. They all ended in deadlock.
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to anyone with a sense of fair play, that excessive force was used. An apology for that, even without the UN recommendation, should be a minimum for Israel.
Even a stopped clock is right twice a day, and even the UN can get something right when it comes to Israel once in a while.
Let us see what happens Friday, but I think Turkey as well as the peace and human rights groups should challenge this report.
The law of the jungle is still in effect.
I don't believe that the blockade is legal. Many lawyers dispute it. The UN secretariat is not the body that can determine this. It is controlled by the countries which created Israel and sustain it.
Doesn't this finding also mean that Nasser's naval blockade of the Strait of Tiran in 1967 was also legal?
I don't think so. Let israel ponder upon that.....
Israel has never apologized for its wrong actions.Not even to its spoild American dad.
the essential finding is that the naval blockade on gaza is legal. the palmer committee by so finding simply followed and applied long standing international law. the criticism that turkey failed to stop the flotilla flows directly from the finding that the naval blockade is legal. the legal finding that the naval blockade is legal will directly render all future flotillas illegal.
these guys aren't exactly a bastion of morality. Rhwanda anyone? dead Jews get Holocaust museums, live Jews get UN condmenations. I prefer the latter.
Why apologize? Erdogan got exactly what he wanted. He sent armed islamic extremists to be self professed martyrs to strengthen his standing in the Arab world. How could he have known that within months there would be civil unrest in most arab states.
Sounds way to supportive of Israel to be adopted as the official UN position! Even the condemnation is based on the very perpetrators of extreme violence against the IDF, hardly an impartial source. Did they look at the videos that support Israel's assertion of self defense? Overall, kudos to a UN body for avoiding the usual knee-jerk condemnation of Israel. Might make the latest flotilla scoundrels think twice.
The terrorist on board the flotilla had wishes to be martyred and they were.
there will be hopefully an end to all those dumb claiming of Israel guilty of piracy and the blockade being illegal!
that says it al: IHH islamists+ extreme leftists = passengers
I defy any other police force anywhere else to use less force. these guys were fighting for their lives. The fact that they were swarmed and attacked with knives and metal rods- some were stabbed and at least one soldier was thrown over the railing- what was the expected outcome? That the soldiers would just stand there and sacrifice themselves to the appeasers? In my neighbourhood , just brandishing a knife at a police officer is justification for him to shoot- and the target is the chest area.
Have as many international news media reporters as possible attend a meeting with the foreign ministers of each country. At the meeting the Israeli minister needs to sit on the floor while the Turkish minister gets to sit on a throne..and only the Turkish flag is represented.
Mmmm. What has Israel to say about that?
Then what does that say about the greek commandos? That they are war criminals because they boarded the recent terrorist flotilla with heavy weaponry instead of paintball guns. The UN is a joke. The UN is a joke
"According to a political source in Jerusalem . . ."
... bad choice of representative for so delicate a task...
Israel acts according to international law
Take it to The Hague, Erdie
here we have the final, conclusive verdict of the (pro-Arab) U.N. : GAZA BLOCKADE IS LEGAL
Maybe Haaretz is, too. Turkey is many, many times the size of Israel. So are most nations. Once a true sense of proportionality ensues, instead of traditional worldwide Jew-hate, Israel-hate and resulting Jewish self-hate, maybe then people will see the gigantic anti-Israel farce for what it is. Turkey should apologize to Israel, not the other way around.
Better late than never. From the UN itself. funny how nobody organizing a flotilla to Syria...
Palmer was known as a pathetic hopeless person, failed politician in New Zealand. He is hated here. Its sad to know he is still casing trouble this report is a whitewash. To say the blockade is legal is beyond ridiculous.
There is nothing that the UN does that we as independent nations cooperating amongst ourselves cannot do better. They are nothing more than a pissant bunch of sycophants who harbor thieves, murders, despots and tyrants that ought by right to be hanged in public and left on the rope until the birds have picked their rotten corpses clean. Damn them all!