There was an argument in there? How many helicopters carrying troops were there? Can you tell from the edited footage?
Please respond to my argument if you would like to discuss it.
… and makes no sense.
So the IDF started firing from the air. And when they send down commandos, why did they still have their sidearms holstered, and their paintball guns drawn? And if they’d decided already to use lethal force, why were the soldiers allowing themselves to be beaten by crowbars rather than simply shooting their attackers?
To say nothing of one of his more bizarre claims, that the commandos in the helicopters were “firing almost indiscriminately without even looking where they were firing.”. He’s honestly claiming that the IDF decided to start sniping people, but they decided instead to just fire randomly.
While it seems to methe headline and initial comment of this blog post by a certain Max Blumenthal with a translation from Hebrew of an Israeli article pre-incident is overdone, the article does suggest that the Israeli forces had psyched themselves up for a violent confrontation and the post-facto protests to the contrary, came with a penchant to view this as a guns-blazing situation.
While the argument of intent seems overdone, this comment is I think just:
In keeping with other critical comment, I think this article confirms that the Netanyahu government inappropriately boxed itself into an over-the-top and aggressive plan from political conceit and willful blindness.
Sure, I was discussing it. I’ll repeat again, as you seem to have missed it: how many helicopters carrying troops were there? Are you going to continue being this evasive when people call you on your arguments?
Since, as I mentioned before, I’ve long given up hope “debating” anything to with Israel with certain posters on this and other boards, I’ll simply post a written transcript of the pertinent revelations made in her account of events:
Full transcript here: Gaza flotilla: Sarah Colborne’s account – underline mine.
Now, any similitude between this account and what was fed to the world MSM via the IDF & the Israeli Spin Machine, must be clearly in the imagination of the reader.
That’s all.
This is the argument I posted:
If your claim is that there were other helicopters where they opened fire, you still still need to explain why we have footage of commandos rappelling down with painball guns and their sidearms holstered, and that even when attacked with lethal force they still weren’t shooting their attackers.
Please explain why, exactly, this would happen.
Is this a joke?
The first team sent in attempted to confront the activists with non-lethal weapons; they were overwhelmed. The second team abseiled in with assault rifles and live ammunition.
Sticks and perhaps crowbars, only thing we can really tell from the evidence is the sticks.
You’re starting from the presumption that the IDF account is entirely factual. That is a very large assumption that is very reasonably not shared by those with a critical view of the operation. In particular in light of the Israeli seizure of the journalists materials (at high seas).
Of course it rather escapes why the Israelis proceeded as they did no matter the sequence, so perhaps the answer is, sheer incompetence, driven in part by excessive confidence.
I rather imagine that’s exaggeration, probably panic as well, influencing. What they may have been shooting (and perceived sequence of events - fog of war / stress is likely to make accounts somewhat jumbled without adding in any deliberate spin).
Again people should check. Her recorded speech on video has differences from the “transcript.”
Do not appear where they’re alleged to be. Again, readers really should check that out. At time index 5:20, she has just finished the lines “. I saw him. He was obviously in a very bad way and he subsequently died.” *The very next thing she says on the tape is “The captain [that] announced live ammunition was being used.”
The lines from the “transcript” that allegedly come between those two statements do not. Likewise, numerous lines are mangled, her actual comments about how the captain said they should not resist “this act of piracy” are on the video, but not the transcript. The folks who’ve been talking about sloppy propaganda will, I hope, condemn this rather blatant piece of it.
In any case, even going off the transcript: she did not see how the fighting started, does not say that the Israelis opened fire before being attacked. Your claims that her testimony someone demolished the reports we’ve seen are false. She also claims that she left the actual scene of violence (and so didn’t see that either) but that a firefight had already developed where she claims that unarmed people were being shot at, although she also somehow doesn’t mention the commandos being attacked by men with crowbar or knifes so it’s safe to say that she certainly may have missed details, and that while ducking from a firefight one might not notice if someone who was shot had a knife.
Edit: the time indexes I was using come from the original YouTube. The Guardian video seems to be the exact same one just with a bit of a different time signature, but the “transcript” is still incorrect.
You claims agree with the IDF claims that they didn’t initiate lethal force until their commandos were overwhelmed and even in your gloss it was a second helicopter that opened fire after the first helicopter’s crew was subjected to lethal force, and so you agree that claims of them starting sniping people from the word ‘go’ contradict the facts.
Even weirder, the YouTube video that Red posted seems to be an edited version of the Guardian version (ironic).
Even in the guardian version the lines
do not appear. Check for yourself. It starts at 2:45 on the Guardian video.
It goes straight from “There were bullets flying all over the place when I was on the top deck and I took the decision to go downstairs”
To “We asked for the Israelis to stop the attacks.”
The rest of it is filled with significant mistquotes. But I think the inclusion of an entire paragraph that evidently never happened is probably the most egregious bit.
Damn odd.
Even weirder, at 12:15 in the YouTube video she agrees that people were trying to stop the commandos from getting on the boat. She’s just dodged a question as to what form the resistance took and instead talked about how they had kitchen knives on board but she didn’t see any being used. When the reporter presses her on what form the resistance took, she again dodges the question and instead reiterates her “piracy” claim.
Then she claims that she wasn’t aware of any passengers on the boat beating commandos with crowbars or cudgels. She also gets caught up in her own story and can’t decide if she was on the top deck or the second deck. When pressed again on what sort of resistance she saw, she claims that she only saw people standing and shouting.
That goes to about 13:15 on the video.
Between this and the Guardian’s faux-transcript, I would hope that those who have deplored propaganda speak out harshly against this nonsense.
If the commandoes were overwhelmed with “lethal force”, how come none of them died? Damn odd. Must be really, really tough.
Of course, all the people on the ship who were shot and who didn’t die were also not subjected to lethal force.
Same for everybody involved in a case of assault with a deadly weapon. For quite some time everybody in the criminal justice system has been using the metric of whether or not a weapon was a lethal weapon, but really we should have been using the metric that the person had to have died.
Stab someone and they live? Not a lethal weapon.
Shoot someone and they live? Not a lethal weapon.
Bash someone with a crowbar and they live? Definitely not a lethal weapon.
Oh, we clearly have some examples of lethal force being applied, no question there. About nine of them, last I heard. And my point is not to engage with you in an exercise in semantic precision, but simply that the lethal force which demanded lethal defense had no lethal outcomes, except for the peace terrorists. Doesn’t prove anything, necessarily, but doesn’t fit your preferred narrative very well.
In fact, I don’t recall seeing any photos of any injured commandos at all, which is odd, don’t you think? Considering that they were mobbed and set upon with iron bars and coriander?
My guess? I’m guessing (and I emphasize “guess”) the soldiers set upon were being hit with sticks, being battered and bruised, but not in mortal danger and didn’t pull their pistols because: they didn’t want to kill anybody. Which, to my mind, reflects first rate training and self-discipline, as well as laudable humane courage.
But somebody panicked. And it would only take one or two, losing their cool with automatic weapons. And I wouldn’t so much blame them, fear deranges the mind. I blame the men who cut their orders, who coolly and deliberately put them in that situation. Of course, the only thing wrong with that is that some of the peace terrorists were shot with exceptional targeting precision.
If you want a nice long discussion about what the word “lethal” means, I’m sorry to disappoint, but I’m lazy and easily…ooh! Shiny!
**Elucidator **-
First of all, they did not panic. They asked for permission to fire, and Admiral Eli Marom, Commander in Chief of the Israeli Navy, who was standing in a skiff 30 yards away and watching the fight through night vision goggles, granted it.
Second of all, one of the soldiers was shot inthe torso, one shot in the leg, one stabbed in the gut, one knocked unconscious by a metal bar to the head and another suffered head injuries after being thrown to the lower deck. This has been reported extensively in the Israeli media, including interviews with the wounded soldiers. I can also confirm it from my own personal, first-hand sources, so if you don’t trust the Israeli media, then please believe me. You’ve known me long enough - I wouldn’t lie about this sort of thing.
Be assured that your personal integrity is not in question. And I don’t doubt your faith in your personal source, but they are not my personal sources, and my faith in your integrity goes only that far, that you honestly believe it to be so.
Do you really belive that every Israeli newspaper and TV channel is lying?
There is no dissent? No one questions the utter veracity of the IDF? All of the Israeli media say exactly the same thing?
Not my query to respond to, but no, to the credit of your nation, I don’t
Thus it would seem a total news blackout wasn’t in effect – or rather ineffective performance-wise.
Regard that.
~Red
The Rachel Corrie has been intercepted at sea. No casualties.