The IDF soldiers who landed on the deck of the Mavi Marmara opened fire in self-defense after forty minutes of this:
Update [12 Jul 2010 1050 PDT]: Initial reports which said that the IDF commandos waited 40 minutes to open fire are incorrect. Apparently the second soldier to land on the deck was fired upon with a gun taken from the first one — or perhaps his own gun was taken. The Israelis fired back within a few minutes of landing. All in all there were at least four cases of live fire directed at IDF soldiers. In one case a soldier was wounded in the knee by a non-IDF bullet, and cartridge cases from non-IDF weapons were found on the deck.
Technorati Tags: Israel, Gaza, flotilla, Mavi Marmara
I want to comment on one aspect of this which has not been the focus of the world’s attention. i.e. The operational failure on our part. We seemed to have no idea of who was waiting on the ship. We have at least one severely injured soldier because of this. We walked into their trap stupidly.
And this when we had all the means in the world to dictate the way this would happen in terms of the violence.
Perhaps the main outrage is at the hypocrisy cynicism and evil of the world ‘s reaction but there is also anger at our not having done the job properly.