The Real Outrage

If your only source of news is the front page of your local paper, or the updates played during commercial breaks on the radio, you might be under the impression that charitable do-gooders from Turkey were recently attacked by a bloodthirsty regime from Israel.

But that is not what happened this past weekend. Not even by a longshot.

At least as far back as 2008, the Palestinian terror organization Hamas has been launching missiles into Israel from the Gaza Strip. Those missiles have not been aimed at military or government targets, but have simply been lobbed into populated areas with the intention of killing whoever happens to be in the area where they land.

Israel eventually responded with a blockade, which was designed to prevent weapons from being delivered to terrorists while not preventing food or other staples of life from arriving in Gaza. Each week Israel itself delivers humanitarian aid that is measured in tons, and foreign aid groups do the same; the latter just have to stop in Israel first, so that their deliveries can be checked to ensure they don’t include weapons.

When the organizers of the Turkish flotilla announced that they intended it to deliver aid to Gaza, Israel’s only request was that the flotilla stop at an Israeli port for the same weapons check that other deliveries undergo. But the organizers refused.

Subsequently, the flotilla sailed toward Gaza, and as it approached, Israeli naval vessels repeatedly broadcast instructions for it to stop and follow them to port for inspection. Each time, those instructions were ignored, and therefore Israel authorized its commandos to board the flotilla. When the commandos arrived on deck they were attacked with baseball bats and metal poles, forcing them to fight back in self-defense.

Yet the MSM depicted Israel as the aggressor. MSNBC’s headline screamed “Bloody Israeli attack on flotilla sparks crisis,” and CBS’s proclaimed “Israeli Commandos Storm Aid Flotilla, 9 Killed.” The headline in the New York Times said “Deadly Israeli Raid Draws Condemnation.” But there was not a peep made about the flotilla refusing to show that it was really delivering aid instead of weapons; and thus there was not a peep made about the fact that this deliberately provocative behavior is what necessitated Israel’s action.

Then the United Nations and European Union condemned Israel, but could not bring themselves to criticize the actions of the flotilla or its organizers. And of course they couldn’t bring themselves to say anything bad about Turkey, a nation in which Hitler's autobiography recently became a best-seller after the government subsidized its republication.

Israel has always tried to protect the innocent. Conversely, its Islamist enemies always try to suppress and murder the innocent. The flotilla incident was par for the course because Israel acted with conscience and did nothing wrong. However, “the international community” once again ignored the truth and chose to side with merchants of destruction. That is the real outrage.

At what point are people going to start asking if the world today is just as anti-Semitic as it was during the Third Reich?

Update, 6/2/10: In an update that should not surprise anybody, it has been learned that many of the people on the "aid flotilla" have ties to Islamist terrorist groups (including Al-Qaeda) and many of them were traveling without identification.

Update, 6/4/10: Above, I wrote that Hamas has been launching missiles from Gaza into Israel since "at least as far back as 2008." That was based solely on memory, but I have since researched exact dates and feel it is important to mention that the missile attacks started all the way back in 2001.

Update, 6/4/10: And in case you haven't heard, pro-Palestinian activists are currently sailing from Ireland to Israel and have declared that their intention is to breach the blockade. Hopefully somebody will stand beside the Jewish state this time.