Monday, June 27, 2011

The New Gaza Flotilla: Lyn Adamson and Her Ship of Fools

In a Haaretz article entitled "In preparations for Gaza Flotilla, passengers briefed how to face Israeli soldiers" (http://www.haaretz.com/print-edition/news/in-preparations-for-gaza-flotilla-passengers-briefed-how-to-face-israeli-soldiers-1.369746), a Canadian participant in the upcoming flotilla attempts to explain why she is sailing to Gaza:

"'I'm appalled, as are many friends and colleagues, by the conditions in Gaza and by the silence of the international community regarding the ongoing blockade in Gaza,' says Lyn Adamson, trying to explain why they are taking this calculated risk.

Adamson, 59, a Quaker from Toronto, is active in a number of social justice advocacy groups.

'In the absence of effective action by the international community to pressure Israel and Egypt to change their policies ... we, at the grass roots, must take action,' she says."

Needless to say, no mention by Adamson of the abducted Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit, who has been held without visits by the Red Cross for more than five years; "honor killings" perpetrated against women in Gaza; the persecution and murder of Christians in Gaza; the persecution and murder of homosexuals in Gaza; the incarceration and murder of dissidents in Gaza; or the thousands of mortar shells, rockets and missiles fired from Gaza at Israeli civilian targets in recent years.

As can be expected, also no mention by Adamson of:

• the two luxury hotels opening in Gaza later this month;
• the gourmet restaurants (e.g., Roots, Carino's) to be found in Gaza;
• the three-story, $2 million wedding hall under construction in Gaza;
• the Mercedes and hot tubs that passed into Gaza last week via Israel;
• the hundreds of BMWs and pickup trucks that have been imported into Gaza in recent months;
• the opening of a second new shopping mall with escalators from Israel next month;
• the abundance and widespread use of cell phones and personal computers throughout Gaza;
• that all 130 engineering firms in Gaza are busy with work;
• that hundreds of new homes are being built;
• that two dozen new schools are about to go up;
• that unemployment has fallen dramatically to 25% according to Hamas's economic minister, Ala al-Rafati;
• that statistics for literacy, live births and longevity are better in Gaza than in Turkey or in most of the surrounding Arab countries;
• that health conditions are far superior to most of the developing world.

See, inter alia: http://www.commentarymagazine.com/2011/06/26/freedom-flotilla-readies-to-set-sail/

Suggestion: Compare unemployment in Gaza with that in Spain, which is higher than 21% - not much difference.

But why bother with details such as these, given the opportunity to create a self-serving provocation, which could, depending upon the conduct of the flotilla's participants, spiral out of control and jeopardize the well-being of fellow passengers.

3 comments:

  1. Thomas Friedman's Love Song

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UK7wwxkcQvU&feature=player_embedded#at=322

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  2. Unbelieveably,there is an element in the world that persists in holding onto the notion that Gaza is little different than the Warsaw ghetto,ignorant/unaccepting of the facts concerning the goods that flow in,the aspects of a thriving community,or the continual bombardments of southern Israel.

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  3. People hear what they want to hear.
    To what you so rightly term "the uber-Left) Gaza is a cause, regardless of their flouting international law concerning Israeli prisoner Gilad Shalit etc...
    Logically, Gaza should be part of Egypt to which it belongs more than it belongs to the West Bank Palestinian entity.
    The notion of non-contiguous land parcels forming a single state is a non-starter. The irony of course is that, given a referendum in Gaza (if such a thing were possible under an Islamic totalitarian regime) odd are that they would vote not to join Egypt on economic grounds - they might simply not wish to see their standard of living drop or join the higher unemployment figures of Egypt.

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