Gaza City, June 07: Israeli forces shot dead four Palestinians at sea off Gaza on Monday, medical sources and witnesses said.
Palestinian witnesses said they saw Israeli helicopters and naval forces firing on a vessel off the coast of Nusseirat, south of Gaza City, at around 4:00 am (0100 GMT).
Two hours later, four bodies in diving suits were pulled from the water and taken to hospital, medical sources and witnesses said, describing the dead as “commandos”. Searches were under way for another two people who were believed to have escaped the attack.
The Israeli military said a naval force in the area had attacked a boat carrying “a squad of terrorists wearing diving suits on their way to execute a terror attack,” without giving any further details.
Survivor Abu Al Walid said there were seven unarmed men on board, all from the Al-Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigades, an armed group which is losely tied to the Fatah movement of Palestinian Authority president Mahmud Abbas.
“We were doing some regular training along the Gaza coast,” he said. “During the early morning, we were surprised by dozens of naval boats which opened fire and began shelling us. Four of our people were killed, two of us escaped and one is still missing.”
Walid said there were “no arms in the boat,” and that the group had been engaged in “swimming training” at the time of the attack, which took place about 100 metres (yards) off the shore.
“We do this training every year, it is our right to train where we want when we want. It is also our right to resist,” he said.
Several hours later, there was an Israeli air strike in northern Gaza, which moderately injured an armed member of the Hamas-run police force near Jabaliya, Palestinian medical and security sources said.
The Israeli military said the attack had “targeted a terrorist squad preparing to fire rockets into Israel.” It said more than 10 rockets or mortar rounds had been fired into southern Israel over the past three weeks.
Israel releases all Rachel Corrie activists
All 19 people on board the Rachel Corrie aid ship which tried to run the Israeli blockade of Gaza, have been released and deported, an Israeli immigration official said on Monday.
“They have all left,” she said, adding that the five Irish nationals, including Nobel Peace Prize winner Mairead Maguire, had flown out on a plane which left at around 5:00 am (0200 GMT).
Six Malaysians and a Cuban were deported on Sunday, leaving via the Allenby Bridge crossing into Jordan, while the remaining activists — including six Filipinos and a Briton — had left in the evening and overnight.
Israeli forces intercepted and seized control of the Rachel Corrie on Saturday as it tried to reach the Gaza Strip, in a peaceful operation which had a radically different outcome from an earlier raid on an aid flotilla that left nine dead last week.
Iran Red Crescent to send two aid ships to Gaza
The Iranian Red Crescent has decided to send two aid ships to Gaza this week.
Red Crescent director for international affairs Abdolrauf Adibzadeh told the state IRNA news agency late on Sunday that the decision to send the ships was taken after a meeting with the foreign ministry.
“One ship will carry donations made by the people and the other will carry relief workers. The ships will be sent to Gaza by end of this week,” Adibzadeh said.
He said the Red Crescent has called for Iranian volunteers to act as relief workers and accompany the vessels.
“Volunteers who want to go to Gaza and help the oppressed people of occupied Palestine can refer to the Red Crescent website and register,” Adibzadeh said.
He said the initial plan was to send the ships through an intermediary country, but “based on a decision by the society, they will be sent directly.” He added that the aid would consist of foodstuffs and medicines.
The Iranian Red Crescent had previously sent an aid ship carrying food and medicines to Gaza in December 2008 but it was prevented from reaching the territory by the Israeli navy.
The decision to send the two ships comes hot on the heels of a report that Iran’s elite Revolutionary Guards had expressed readiness to escort aid flotillas to Gaza.
“If the respected leader of the revolution (supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei) gives an order in this regard, the Revolutionary Guards’ naval forces will take a practical step using their capability and equipment to escort flotillas to Gaza,” Khamenei’s aide in the Guards’ naval wing, Ali Shirazi, told the Mehr news agency on Sunday.
It was unclear, however, how the Guards would escort the flotillas as their naval wing is largely made up of speed boats and light vessels.
Last week’s Israeli commando raid on an aid flotilla headed for Gaza, in which nine pro-Palestinian activitists died, has sparked outrage across the political spectrum in Iran.
Khamenei called for the prosecution of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defence Minister Ehud Barak.
In a message issued on Tuesday, Iran’s supreme leader called on the international community to end the Israeli blocakde.
President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad too lashed out at Israel, demanding that it face “political sanctions” for the raid.
Israel, which has the Middle East’s sole if undeclared nuclear arsenal, has refused to rule out a resort to military action against Iran over its nuclear program. Iran says its program is only for energy and medical purposes.
Queen of Jordan criticises Israel over flotilla raid
Queen Rania of Jordan criticised Israel Monday over its deadly raid on the aid flotilla last week and warned that its hardline policies towards the Palestinians were squeezing out moderates in the region.
Writing in The Independent newspaper, she said Israel’s blockade of Gaza had “reduced it to a barely functioning, open-air prison”, adding: “Every day the blockade continues is another day our humanity remains under siege.”
Israel’s attack on a convoy trying to break the blockade was conducted with “blatant and absurd disregard for anything resembling international law, human rights and diplomatic norms”, she said.
“Although I was stunned at the glaring outrageousness of the attack, I am not surprised by it,” the queen wrote, arguing it was the result of a defensive doctrine whose “primary goal is to survive — and that precludes everything.”
The wife of King Abdullah II continued: “Assigning themselves authority and immunity, Israel’s leaders feel licensed to do whatever they like and not expect an international outcry.”
She warned of the long-term effect of such actions, writing: “I fear that if the tides don’t turn in our region, moderation will be amongst the most painful casualties of continued aggression and hardline policies.”
Jordan, which signed a peace treaty with Israel in 1994, has joined the international condemnation and calls for an inquiry into the flotilla attack, which the Jewish state says was provoked by the activists on board.
Malaysian premier condemns Israel as ‘gangsters’
Malaysia’s prime minister on Monday condemned Israel as “world gangsters” and said it should face the International Criminal Court over the deadly Gaza aid flotilla attack.
“Malaysia will urge the United Nations Security Council to tackle Israel’s aggressive acts and to have those who committed such heinous crimes to be brought before the International Criminal Court,” premier Najib Razak told parliament.
He also called on the United States to make Israel behave responsibly.
“The Israeli commandos shot the activists point blank and even from the back, and this is an act of a coward which cannot be forgiven,” he said.
“These blatant acts occurred because the world gangsters, Israel, feel they are protected by a world power.”
Najib also urged Israel to pay compensation for confiscated humanitarian aid and for the “physchological, emotional and physical trauma brought upon the activists”.
France, Britain urge international Gaza inquiry
The foreign ministers of France and Britain said an “international” inquiry was necessary to resolve the dispute over Israel’s deadly raid on Gaza aid ships, after talks late Sunday in the French capital.
“We think it is very important that there is a credible and transparent investigation… there should be an international presence at minimum” in the probe, said British Foreign Secretary William Hague at a press conference with his French counterpart Bernard Kouchner.
Kouchner added that the international inquiry was needed “because several countries are involved” in the incident.
France also proposed that the European Union could step in to help defuse the situation by checking the cargo on ships bound for the Gaza Strip as well as the Rafah crossing point into the Palestinian territory.
Hague also spoke of how the EU could “help as it has in the past” by ensuring that a flow of needed aid and economic assistance reaches Gaza, while at the same time addressing Israel’s concerns that weapons are not coming into the territory.
Israel’s ambassador to Washington Michael Oren said on US television that his country rejects “the idea of an international commission.”
Turkish PM vows to pursue Israel over ‘state terror’
Turkey’s Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan vowed Sunday to hold Israel to account over its “state terror” in the Middle East as thousands protested against the deadly raid on Gaza-bound aid ships.
Gaza “is a historical cause for us,” Erdogan said in a public speech in the northwestern city of Bursa, parts of which were carried by the CNN-Turk news channel.
“We object to those who force the people of Gaza to live in an open-air prison… We will stand firm until the blockade on Gaza is lifted, the massacres cease and the state terror in the Middle East is accounted for,” he added.
Turkey recalled its ambassador to Tel Aviv and cancelled joint military exercises after last week’s raid, while demanding a formal apology from Israel.
Israel will be absent from the participants of international aerial exercises that the Turkish army said Sunday would take place in central Turkey on June 7-18 with planes from the United States, the United Arab Emirates, Italy, Spain and NATO taking part.
—Agencies