(Israeli) "Foreign Ministry officials cautioned representatives of the defense establishment that it would be difficult to justify a military operation outside of Israel's territorial waters from both a political and public relations standpoint.

Thus, according to senior figures familiar with the details of the discussions, the Foreign Ministry urged defense officials to launch their operations to stop the flotilla only after the ships had crossed Gaza's maritime boundaries. The ministry's diplomats repeated this request on more than one occasion.

"IF SOMEBODY BREAKS INTO YOUR HOME AND YOU SHOOT HIM AFTER HE ENTERS THE DOORWAY, THERE'S NO PROBLEM IN JUSTIFYING THIS ACTION IN COURT," SAID A SENIOR MINISTRY OFFICIAL. "BUT IF YOU ATTACK THE BURGLAR WHILE HE IS ON HIS WAY TO YOUR HOUSE AT A DISTANCE OF TWO BLOCKS AWAY, THEN YOU HAVE A PROBLEM."

"It was made clear that we can ultimately prove that we acted according to international law, but this will be very complicated and we will absorb many denunciations along the way," the official said."

[From the Israeli newspaper Haaretz reporting on the raid on the flotilla]


Israel immediately attempted to control the coverage of the whole operation by holding the human rights activists incommunicado for several days and by taking all the passengers' recording devices and videos.
In this way the well funded propaganda operation was able to spread its version of events without challenge in the crucially important first few days.

Unlike most of the U.S. mainstream media that simply reprinted Israeli military sources, a few reporters including Max Blumenthal actually investigated some of the Israeli claims.
They found several Israeli misrepresentations (including the infamous doctoring of the released audio tape which claimed to be the radio communication with the Marmara)
As a result, Israel retracted or clarified some of its key false charges.

Blumenthal said: "The lesson of the debacle is that nothing the IDF [the Israeli military] says can be trusted by anyone. Not ever."


Most of the activists are now free and their stories strongly contradict the Israeli version.

However, since many of the mainstream media have now moved on to other stories, Israel's false version of events is still out there and accepted as gospel by many - as this thread serves to demonstrate