The Israeli military has again committed an act of piracy against a civilian relief ship intended for the Gaza prisoners.

Why isn't our Federal government speaking out against this act of war against a Canadian citizen?

Ed

Gaza-Bound Aid Ship’s Crew Tasered, Greek MPs Reportedly Attacked
Israel Keeps Former Canadian MP in Custody
by Jason Ditz, October 21, 2012

The crew of the Gaza-bound aid ship Estelle reported “extreme violence” on the part of Israeli Naval forces who attacked and captured their ship over the weekend, including prolonged use of tasers on detained activists, including Greek MPs.

Israel is denying the use of tasers, and forcibly removed the detained crew from the courtroom when they began recounting the attack. Most of the detainees have been allowed to leave, but Israel is keeping several, including former Canadian MP Jim Manly, in custody on charges of illegally entering Israel.

The charge of entering Israel without permission has been a common one to levy against the shanghaied aid ships, with Israeli troops forcing the passengers onto Israeli soil then immediate “arresting” them for doing so. It is unclear how long Manly, who turns 80 next week, will be held, but his son expressed annoyance at the Canadian government’s ambivalence at his detention, noting Greece and Spain quickly got their citizens released.

The ship was reportedly loaded down with food, though Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu insisted nothing on board amounted to “humanitarian equipment,” claiming the captured aid ship’s crew knew there is “no crisis” in Gaza and were only going to “slander Israel.”

Ex-MP sits in Israeli custody while fellow protesters released
GLORIA GALLOWAY
The Globe and Mail
Oct. 21 2012,

A former Canadian parliamentarian who was arrested by Israel for trying to breach a blockade of the Gaza Strip was not released when fellow protesters from other countries were set free, and his supporters blame a lack of political pressure from Ottawa.

Jim Manly, a former New Democrat MP who is a week shy of his 80th birthday, was taken into custody on Saturday when the Israeli military boarded the Estelle, the ship carrying opponents of the maritime blockade who say the measure has created intense hardship for the 1.7 million people living in Gaza. Also on board were members of several European parliaments.

The Greek and Spanish members of the contingent were released on Sunday, said Ehab Lotayef, a spokesman for Canadian Boat to Gaza, the organization that helped organize Mr. Manly’s mission.

“Those who were released were released due to political pressure,” said Mr. Lotayef. “The Greek ambassador and the Spanish embassy staff were there from the very beginning on a political level rather than on a consular level and they put on enormous pressure. They both had members of parliament on the Estelle and they got their people out right away.”

But there has been no similar arm-twisting from the Canadian government, he said. “And this is really sad.”

A spokesman for Canada’s Foreign Affairs department said in an e-mail on Sunday that Canadian consular officials in Tel Aviv and in Ottawa are monitoring the situation closely and have been in contact with Mr. Manly. But questions to Foreign Affairs Minister John Baird about whether the government was willing to exert political pressure to help free him went unanswered.

Israel has maintained a naval blockade since Hamas took control of the Gaza Strip in 2007, saying its aim is to prevent weapons smuggling.

Mr. Lotayef took part in a protest flotilla last year and ended up in the same prison where Mr. Manly was being held on Sunday. He said the Israelis acted very differently when governments sent their ambassadors to the prison to negotiate the release of their citizens. So, he added, “we have also tried very hard with different Members of Parliament to take a public stand in support of Jim but we have not gotten the expected support, even from his own party, from the NDP.”

Paul Dewar, the Foreign Affairs critic for the New Democrats, said his party has been concerned about Mr. Manly. Even before the Estelle was boarded by the Israelis, he said, the NDP urged both sides to show restraint and asked the Canadian government to ensure that consular services would be on hand should something happen.

Mr. Manly’s son, Paul, said Sunday he was relieved to hear that his father had been seen by an Israeli doctor, but now he wants him released.

“My father is a man of conviction,” the younger Mr. Manly said. “And if he was talking to you right now, he would be citing the UN report that came out in August of this year that says the humanitarian crisis in Gaza is going to create an unlivable area by 2020.”

That report said urgent action must be taken to improve access to water, electricity, education and health.

Mr. Manly, a former United Church minister who served as an MP for eight years in the 1980s, requires regular medicine following two bypass surgeries.

Because Harper is more interested in the interests of Israel than he is about non conservative citizens of Canada.

That's like saying the police engaged in piracy for enforcing the speed limit.

Piracy, by definition, does not bear the insignia nor flag of a sovereign nation. Israel is a sovereign nation therefore any military asset bearing its flag and insignia cannot engage in piracy. You can call it a violation of a convention, if you so choose. Or some other term to demonstrate your dislike of Israel's security network. However, calling it piracy is wildly inaccurate.

This op's posting clearly shows that his/her dislike of "da joos" runs deeper than their security network. In fact, that they do defend themselves at all is his/her issue. And the issue with those whose writing he/she favours.

It appears that I must again remind you of the difference between Judaism, the religion, and Zionism, the racist political ideology that claims Palestine as a distinctly Jewish homeland.

I have no animosity toward Judaism. As religions go, it has probably done no more harm than the other ‘biggies’, Christianity and Islam.

I'd guess that a majority of the world's Jews are not Zionists. Most are model citizens, law-abiding, and prolific contributors to every facet of society, in business, finance, science and the arts. I’m an admirer of, and somewhat envious of, the accomplishments of Jewish people.

What I'm opposed to is the treatment of the people who were living in Palestine prior to the 'creation' of the state of modern Israel, and their decendants. Most of the fault lies with the Western leaders, Churchill, Truman, et al, who were only too willing to solve their 'Jewish Problem' by collaborating with the Zionists and confining the tide of Jewish refugees to yet another ghetto. Even the most dim-witted politician should have realized the problems that would result.

Actions taken by the Israeli government have reflected unfavorably on the Jewish people. The average Jew living in Israel is in more danger, and has a lower standard of living, than his counterpart living outside Israel.

“Irrespective of the cost in life and property to anyone who stands in the way, the Zionist ideology is the antithesis of Jewish religious values and is an embarrassment and a disgrace to the Jewish People.” Rabbi Yisroel D. Weiss of Neturei Karta Int. at a rally in Times Square, New York City on May 14, 2004.

What is your response to this statement by thirty-one prominent American Jews regarding the Zionist's campaign for a 'homeland' in Palestine?

...we protest against the political segregation of the Jews and the re-establishment in Palestine of a distinctively Jewish State as utterly opposed to the principles of democracy which it is the avowed purpose of the World's Peace Conference to establish. Whether the Jews be regarded as a "race" or as a "religion," it is contrary to the democratic principles for which the world war was waged to found a nation on either or both of these bases.
("Jewish Anti-Zionist Petition Presented to President Wilson in 1919," American Jewish Alternatives to Zionism Report, No. 52, p. 138.)

Ed

So you think there should not be a country where the majority of the population is Jewish?

Why should there?
Do we designate countries where the majority is of any other specific religion?

How did you come up with that interpretation?

A country where the majority of the population is Jewish is fine if it occurs naturally, and the minority is not discriminated against.

The world 'came down hard' on the white South African government for it's apartheid policies, but is hypocritically silent on Israel's treatment of the Palestinians.

Ed

Do you consider it piracy when the Canada Border Services Agency / RCMP arrest people for sneaking into Canada illegally?

Your definition of piracy is quite exaggerated.

Of course it is. I'm using the term allegorically, to attract attention to the issue. And of course, you are technically correct with your criticism.

The main purpose of these 'voyages' is to draw the world's attention to the Israeli government's treatment of the political prisoners in Gaza.

Ed

Yvonne Ridley is a British journalist and an observer at the trial of four Israeli military commanders behind the May 2010 'piracy' event.

Ed

The Mavi Marmara Case
by YVONNE RIDLEY

Istanbul

Israel squirms and wriggles like a worm on a fishhook over the Turkish trial into the deaths of nine unarmed humanitarian aid volunteers on board a ship bound for Gaza.

Tel Aviv has called the hearing in Istanbul a “show trial” with no legal foundation or meaning at all since, rather predictably, the four military commanders at the centre of the brutal air and seaborne assault are being tried in absentia.

In a 144-page indictment, the four stand accused of inciting murder and injury, and prosecutors are seeking multiple life sentences for the top brass group which includes the former Israeli military chief of staff Gabi Ashkenazi.

I sat and listened in a hushed courtroom as the trial opened on the first day with a number of survivors recounting the military assault on their aid flotilla in May 2010 bound for besieged Gaza.

They came from around the world and included a former US Army colonel, journalists and peace activists who witnessed the massacre onboard the Mavi Marmara.

They told how live ammunition was fired at them killing nine and injuring countless more; how hundreds of thousands of dollars in cash, laptops, credit cards and other valuables were stolen never to be seen again.

Aid collected and organised by the internationally renowned and respected Turkish charity IHH simply disappeared and most was never recovered.

Their stories and graphic recollections could have come from the pages of an action-packed thriller about piracy on the high seas, but the pirates were Israelis and the international waters were the Mediterranean.

The wood-panelled courtroom was packed, standing room only with scores more standing outside the long corridors waiting for snippets of information from within the chamber. As the evidence was given there was a profound silence punctuated by occasional, uncontrollable sobs from two rows of widows and mothers who had lost their loved ones. A man sitting next to me was unable to stop the trickle of tears pouring from his eyes as the damning evidence unfolded … this was not a show trial, a political stunt or a symbolic hearing. This was real.

Yet back in Ankara, Israeli embassy officials continued to insult the dead by pouring scorn on the trial calling it a “unilateral political act with no judicial credibility” because the four accused were being tried in absentia.

Not for the first time the weasel words of Israeli officialdom smacked of hypocrisy – were these not the same mealy-mouthed accusations levelled by Nazi supporters against the Nuremberg Trials?

Those military tribunals, launched after the Second World War, saw the top Nazi leaders tried in absentia during 1945-46. Martin Bormann wasn’t present in the dock but he must have spent the rest of his miserable life looking over his shoulder after the death penalty was imposed. Yes, it was a pity that the Nazi Party Secretary was never brought to justice, but at least some of those survivors of the regime got closure from the sentencing knowing that he would spend his life waiting for that knock on the door.

Israel knows all about trials in absentia – in fact it has conducted similar courts without the accused being present. According to the Global Research agency, between 1950-1961 the Nazis and Nazi Collaborators Punishment Law (Hok Le’Asiat Din BaNatzim) was used to prosecute 29 Jewish Holocaust survivors accused of being Nazi collaborators. The first and only time it was used to execute a person was in the Adolf Eichmann case. He was illegally kidnapped, drugged and moved by Mossad from Argentina in 1960 and two years later was hanged after a televised trial in Israel.

“What makes this a special event from a legal point of view is that this law is a retroactive and extraterritorial law since the State of Israel didn’t exist during WWII. Moreover, the alleged crimes were neither committed in Israel nor against Israeli citizens. An ex post facto law (Latin for “after the fact”), or retroactive law, is a law that retroactively changes the legal consequences of actions committed prior to the enactment of the law.

“Such laws are expressly forbidden by the United States Constitution, though some countries accept them. They cannot be accepted as fair practice, regardless of the justifications used for their approval. Simply, how can one protect oneself against a law that has not been legislated? Years later, it was used to harass Ivan Demjanjuk (see Western Psikhushka Killed Demjanjuk),”says Global Research.

The trial in Istanbul is very real and as I sat there and watched the faces of the survivors, the families of those who died, I realised this event is the cornerstone of a historic legal action which will eventually deliver justice to those seeking it.

Protest as it might, the State of Israel which is also no stranger to carrying out extra-judicial killings, thereby doing away with the right to a trial by jury, hasn’t a leg to stand on when it makes hollow claims about the legitimacy of the Istanbul court.

Israel, as everyone knows, has a long distance relationship with international law. It has violated or ignored more than 70 UN sanctions – this is more than any other country in the world. It is also a stranger to due legal process and still has detentions without trial even for children under the age of 18.

During the coming days almost 500 people are expected to give evidence before the court reaches a verdict on the four accused.

Israel’s foreign ministry said in a statement that the trial “clearly falls under the category of a show trial, an act which has nothing to do with either law or justice” adding it was ”merely a propaganda display” and that Turkey should deal with the issue through bilateral dialogue.

The truth is while Israel has expressed “regret” over the Mavi Marmara deaths it still steadfastly refuses to apologise despite a raft of damning reports and comments from a number of bodies including the United Nations. This typically stubborn refusal to say “sorry” will come to cost the Zionist State dearly – it is already regarded as a pariah state by many.

But this reprehensible position questioning the legitimacy of the trial insults every victim, including those who perished in the Holocaust and the survivors who relied on Nuremberg to help give them some sort of closure through justice.

The Turkish Prime Minister, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who plans to make an official visit to Hamas-controlled Gaza soon in the wake of the high profile visit by the Emir of Qatar, describes the flotilla deaths as “state terrorism”.

We will have to await the outcome of the trial on the four – Ashkenazi; Eliezer Marom, former commander of the Israeli navy; Amos Yadlin, former commander of the air force; and Avishai Levy, former head of air force intelligence – to find out if the court agrees with Erdogan.

Whatever the outcome Israel must accept the result – it can not play two games. The rule of law is there for one and all and there should be no exceptions.

Perhaps Ashkenazi, Marom, Yadlin and Levy should man up and travel to Istanbul to submit themselves before the court. It would be the right and honourable thing to do – but historically, doing the right and honourable thing is something which is an alien concept to the Zionist State.