By Paul Craig Roberts

July 01, 2009 " informationclearinghouse InformationClearing House " --- On June 30, the government of Israel committed an act of piracy when the Israeli Navy in international waters illegally boarded the "Spirit of Humanity," kidnapped its 21-person crew from 11 countries, including former US Congresswoman Cynthia McKinney and Nobel Laureate Mairead MaGuire, and confiscated the cargo of medical supplies, olive trees, reconstruction materials, and children's toys that were on the way to the Mediterranean coast of Gaza. The "Spirit of Humanity," along with the kidnapped 21 persons, is being towed to Israel as I write.

Gaza has been described as the "world's largest concentration camp." It is home to 1.5 million Palestinians who were driven by force of American-supplied Israeli arms out of their homes, off their farms, and out of their villages so that Israel could steal their land and make the Palestinian land available to Israeli settlers.

What we have been witnessing for 60 years is a replay in modern times, despite the United Nations and laws strictly preventing Israel's theft of Palestine, of the 17th, 18th, and 19th century theft of American Indian lands by US settlers. An Israeli government spokesman recently rebuked the President of the United States, a country, the Israeli said, who stole all of its land from Indians, for complaining about Israel's theft of Palestine.

I knew the "Spirit of Humanity" would fall to Israeli piracy the minute I received on June 25 from an official of an Israeli peace organization a "public advisory" that the government of Cyprus had withheld permission for the "Spirit of Humanity" to leave for Gaza. The US State Department had advised that "The Israeli Foreign Ministry informed U.S. officials at the American Embassy in Tel Aviv that Israel still considers Gaza an area of conflict and that any boats attempting to sail to Gaza will not be permitted to reach its destination." The "Spirit of Humanity" obtained permission to leave Cyprus when all aboard signed a waiver absolving Cyprus of all responsibility for the crew's safety at the hands of the Israelis.

As President Obama has called for humanitarian aid to be sent to Gaza, and as the International Red Cross has damned the inhumanity of Israel's blockade of Gaza, the question that immediately comes to mind is why did not the United States send sufficient US Navy escort to see the "Spirit of Humanity" safely through international waters to Gaza? We send ships against Somalian pirates, why not against Israeli ones?

We all know the answer. The US talks a good "human rights" game, but never delivers--especially if the human rights abuser is Israel. After all, Israel owns the US Congress and President Obama. Israel even has an Israeli citizen and former member of the Israeli Defense Forces as the Chief-of-Staff in Obama's White House. Israel owns millions of American "Christian Zionists" and "rapture evangelicans." When it comes to Israel, the American government is a puppet state. It does what it is told.

Macho Americans might stand tall, but not when Israel snaps its fingers.

Israel, of course, will get away with a mere act of piracy. After all, Israel has been getting away with its war crimes and violations of international law for 60 years. If the UN tries to do anything, the US will veto it, as the US has done for decades.

What will happen to the kidnapped foreign nationals? Most likely they will be released and sent back to their respective countries. Israel, of course, will keep the stolen "Spirit of Humanity" to foreclose any further attempts by human rights activists to run Israel's inhumane blockade of Gaza.

On the other hand, Israel might declare its captives to be terrorists on the ground that the Gazans elected in a free election Hamas as their government. Hamas, unlike Israel, is declared to be a terrorist organization by the puppet American State Department in Washington. Thus the human rights activists onboard the "Spirit of Humanity" are aiding and abetting terrorists by delivering goods to them. The US Department of Justice (sic) prosecutes American citizens and charities for sending aid to Palestinians on the grounds that Palestinians, if not everyone a terrorist, are governed by terrorists.

I wouldn't be surprised if a Nobel Laureate and a former member of the US House of Representatives, along with the rest of the crew, are handed over to the Americans for indefinite detention and for torturing and waterboarding in the American torture facility at Bagram. I am certain that "Homeland Security" and the US Government are desperate to be rid of all of critics, and knocking off a Nobel Laureate and a member of the House sets a precedent for getting rid of the rest of us.

Meanwhile, California, which has become a failed state, has been denied bailout money from Washington. Israel, which has been a failed state for 60 years, can, unlike the American state of California, always count of Washington to deliver the money and the weapons to keep Israel going.

The same week that "our" government in Washington told the Governor of California "not one red cent," President Barak Obama handed over $2.775 billion to Israel.

Online Journal (June 29) reported that the handover to Israel of the unemployed Americans' tax dollars took place in a "tiny Capitol room" to which members of the press were denied access. I mean, really, who wants the media writing about US taxpayer dollars for Israel's nuclear weapons while Americans are being kicked out of their homes. Not that, of course, the "Christian" supporters of Israel would mind.

Unlike every other recipient of US military largesse, Israel is permitted to bypass the Pentagon and to deal directly with US suppliers. Consequently, the Israel Lobby's influence multiplies, because military suppliers fight for Israel in congressional committees in order to get Israel's business. This lets Israel turn the screws on Iran. According to Grant F. Smith writing in Online Journal, Republican US Representative Mark Steven from Illinois has received $221,000 in campaign contributions from Israel political action committees (PACs). Therefore, it was a sure thing that he would introduce legislation preventing the Import-Export bank from providing loan guarantees to countries doing business with Iran. onlinejournal

Americans think that they are a superpower, but in fact they are a stupor-power. A puppet state if truth be known.

There is a great deal of evidence, even in time Timemagazine that Israel is a child abuser. "God's Chosen People" routinely abuses captured Palestinian children. The Israelis also abuse Palestinian children by shooting them down in the streets.

Don't take my word for it. The Geneva-based Defense for Children International says, according to Time Magazine, that "the ill-treatment and torture of Palestinian child prisoners appears to be widespread, systematic and institutionalized, suggesting complicity at all levels of the political and military chain of command."

According to Time Magazine, "Often, children suffer lasting traumas from jail. Says Saleh Nazzal from the Palestinian Ministry of Prisoner Affairs, 'When soldiers burst into a house and drag away a child, he loses his feeling of being protected by his family. He comes back from prison alienated from his family, his friends. They don't like going back to school or even leaving the house. They start wetting their beds.' Says Mona Zaghrout, a YMCA counselor who helps kids returning from prison: 'They come out of prison thinking and acting like they are men. Their childhood is gone.' And they often turn to another father figure--the armed militant groups fighting the Israeli occupation.'"

And so it goes. There's no money for California, or for Americans' health care, or for the several million Americans who have lost their homes and are homeless, because Israel needs it. Israel needs the American taxpayers' money to that it can create even more enemies, and, therefore, need more American money to spend with the American armament industries to oppress more Palestinians and to make more enemies, requiring more American money to protect Israel from its folly and its evil.

And the brainwashed American public goes along year after year.

informationclearinghouse

By Yvonne Ridley

July 01, 2009 " informationclearinghouse InformationClearing House " -- THE arrogance of Israel is nothing short of breath-taking.

On the eve of one of the most damning reports ever to be published on human rights abuses and suspected war crimes, Israel committed an act of piracy.

While western naval fleets are patrolling the waters off the coast of Africa, acts of piracy are being carried out routinely in the Mediterranean.

One of Cynthia's friend received a phone call from Ramle prison. The incarcerated prisoners are calling themselves "Free Gaza 21" even though Huwaida and Lubna have been released. Below is Cynthia's statement;

We were in international waters on a boat delivering humanitarian aid to people in Gaza when the Israeli Navy ships surrounded us and illegally threatened us, dismantled our navigation equipment, boarded and confiscated the ship.

All of us on board were then taken off the ship and into custody, and brought into Israel and imprisoned. Immigration officials in Israel said they did not want to keep us, but we remain imprisoned. State Department and White House officials have not effected our release or taken a strong public stance to condemn the illegal actions of the Israeli Navy of enforcing a blockade of humanitarian assistance to the Palestinians of Gaza, a blockade that has been condemned by President Obama.

PRESS RELEASE

UN Expert denounces seizure of aid boat by Israeli forces
2 July 2009

GENEVA - The UN Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the Palestinian territories occupied since 1967, Richard Falk, denounced the unlawful naval seizure by an Israeli gunboat on the high seas of a ship carrying medicine and reconstruction material to blockaded people of Gaza.

Samedi, 04 Juillet 2009 09:45
Écrit par Free Gaza Team

Adie Mormech, one of over 21 human rights workers and crew taken prisoner on Tuesday 30th June when their boat was forcibly boarded by the Israeli navy, has spoken by mobile phone from his prison cell at Givon jail, Ramle, near Tel Aviv.

Amongst the other prisoners from the Free Gaza Movement boat, Spirit of Humanity, are Nobel Peace prize winner, Mairead Maguire, and former US Congresswoman, Cythnia McKinney. A message from McKinney on 2nd July condemned Israel for its "illegal" action in "dismantl(ing) our navigation equipment" and confiscating both the ship and its cargo of medical aid, childrens' toys and olive trees.

Report from the Kidnapped Passengers in Ramle Prison, July 4, 2009


On Monday, June 30, 21 passengers going to challenge the blockade of Gaza on board the Spirit of Humanity were seized by the Israeli Navy and taken to Israel against their will. All their equipment was taken and some of were roughed up. All were thrown into prison to await Israel’s decision on how and when they would be deported.

U.S. Department of State Middle East Digest 01 Jul 2009 briefing on the kidnapped passengers (with the U.S. State Department). The sheer stupidity of the answer boggles your mind.

QUESTION: Erin Connors from Press TV. Former congresswoman Cynthia McKinney and members of the Free Gaza Movement were intercepted by the Israeli army when they were on a humanitarian mission over there. What's being done about that? Are they on their way home? Will they be deported? What's the next step there, and will their supplies ever get to where they're going?

The Israeli prison guards are denying the right for Mairead to access her medicine. Continue to email and call Mark Regev and Shlomo Dror and express your outrage over the treatment of the FreeGaza21 while they are imprisoned. The women have no access to their luggage or their clothing.

Mairead is fasting, not just for her friends incarcerated along with her, but for the 11,000 Palestinians also thrown into jail, many without benefit of trial.

Saturday, 03 January 2009 15:16
Last Updated on Monday, 22 June 2009 23:21
Written by Free Gaza Team

The Palestinians need to rebuild their infrastructure. We need to help them by bringing in cement, PVC, glass, lumber, copper wire. Israel refuses to let them rebuild. We insist that they have that right.

Please help us buy a cargo boat to take supplies in by sea. Israel will not make a cent on this cargo. Remember, Israel makes money on the occupation. Their farmers make money on the occupation. Their military makes money on the occupation. We say 'enough, the people of Gaza have the right to farm, fish and build without Israeli interference. We will update this image once a month to let you know how we are progressing.

L'occupation israélienne continue d'emprisonner les militants du bateau anti-blocus «âme de l'humanité», dont le correspondant de la chaîne d'Al Jazzera, Othman Betieri et le photographe Mansour al Ibbi, dans la prison de Ramlah, sans déterminer toute date fixe pour les expulser vers leurs pays.

Al Jazzera a rapporté, le samedi 4/7, que son correspondant a affirmé lors d'un entretien téléphonique, que le sort des militants internationaux est totalement inconnu, en dévoilant qu'ils se sont soumis à des pressions psychiques suite aux pratiques oppressives des soldats sionistes.

Le 30 juin, la marine israélienne a commis un acte de piraterie en montant illégalement à bord du « Spirit of Humanity » qui se trouvait dans les eaux internationales.

dimanche 5 juillet 2009 - 07h:59
Paul Craig Roberts

Spirit of Humanity

La marine israélienne a kidnappé son équipage de 21 personnes, en provenance de 11 pays, notamment l'ancienne membre du congrès étasunien, Cynthia McKinney et Mairead MaGuire, prix Nobel. Elle a également confisqué les fournitures médicales, les oliviers, les matériaux de construction et les jouets d'enfants acheminés vers la côte méditerranéenne de Gaza. Le « Spirit of Humanity » est remorqué vers Israël en ce moment même.