“The best planned accident” – Attack on the USS Liberty

The 1967 Six-Day War was used by Israel to snatch new territory from its neighbours, including the West Bank and East Jerusalem, then under Jordanian control.

On June 8th 1967, three days after the outbreak of war,  Israel attacked and nearly sank the USS Liberty, an unarmed American communications and monitoring vessel. The Liberty, clearly flying the US flag, was assaulted by aircraft and torpedoes in broad daylight, as it sailed in international waters in the Mediterranean Sea close to the Sinai peninsula.

On the day of the attack Israel was in the process of wresting the Sinai from Eyptian control (land it would eventually hand back to Egypt a decade later in an Egypt-Israeli peace deal brokered by US President Carter).

USS Liberty torpedo hole

Thirty-four American servicemen were killed in the brutal two-hour blitz by Israeli warplanes and torpedo boats. 172 were injured. It was the largest single cause of casualties to the US naval personnel on any day – before or since – after World War Two. Even life-rafts were destroyed.

Featured below is the classic BBC Four Investigative Report about the USS Liberty – ‘Dead in the Water‘, produced and directed by Christopher Mitchell. It was broadcast on the BBC in Britain in 2002/3.

As far as I can tell, this poweful and well-researched documentary has never been shown on Australian TV.

Why not?

Mangled remains of the USS Liberty

A campaign to get ‘Dead in the Water’ shown on the ABC in prime time would be worthwhile, whether or not it succeeds.

• If successful – fine! It’s long overdue the Australian TV-viewing public learns the story of the USS Liberty!
• If Australia’s national broadcaster refuses to show it, the Zionist bias of our publicly-funded institution would come under greater public scrutiny.
• In either event, more people would become aware of this superb documentary and watch it online

Many theories have been proposed over the years as to why the Israelis attacked the USS Liberty. Israel has always claimed the incident was an accident, but as the documentary shows, that’s simply not credible.

Phil Tourney: Liberty survivor and hero

The most probable explanation, it seems to me, is that the USS Liberty attack was a ‘false flag’ operation gone wrong. If things had gone according to Israel’s plan, the USS Liberty would have been sunk without survivors, Egypt would have been blamed for the attack and the USA would have been drawn into direct military support for Israel, possibly bombing Egypt.

Miraculously most of the torpedoes missed (perhaps some of the Israeli naval personnel couldn’t bring themselves to fire straight?) The Liberty survived, due to heroic action by the crew.

Then the long, long cover-up began…

Dead in the Water was brilliantly researched by Peter Hounam. The film combines dramatic reconstruction of the events with interviews of former officers in the US and Israeli armed forces and intelligence services. Interviews include President Johnson’s Secretary of Defence Robert McNamara, former head of the Israeli navy Admiral Shlomo Errell and some surviving members of the USS Liberty crew.

A must see!

The Nobel Peace Prize is increasingly – and not without cause – derided as the world most devalued accolade. Even so, not every Nobel Peace laureat is a rank hypocrite or brazen mass murderer.

One Nobel Peace Prize winner worthy of respect is Mairead Maguire, a courageous Irish woman who came to prominence during the Northern Ireland ‘Troubles’. In recent years, she has become a strong and persistent advocate for peace in what used to be known as the Holy Land.

Mairead Maguire, peace activist

Maguire was onboard the Gaza flotilla boat ‘Rachel Corrie’ during the attempt to bring humanitarian aid to Gaza in June 2010. The ship was intercepted by Israeli forces in international waters; she was taken forcibly to Israel, before leaving the country.

Two weeks ago, Mairead Maguire flew back to Israel to meet up with Palestinian and Israeli peace activists and resume her bridge-building efforts in that troubled land.

On arrival, she was arrested. The next day, a KLM pilot refused to carry her out of Israel against her will, so Israeli police took her back into custody for a week. Meanwhile, Maguire appealed her right to remain in Israel. Her appeal was rejected by a three-judge panel and she was finally deported on 4th October. Mairead Maguire has been told she’s banned from re-entering the Israeli State for ten years.

Ms Maguire intends to appeal that decision. Her statement about the affair is powerful and inspiring. Here’s a short extract (emphasis added):

At the Supreme Court appeal, Maguire on speaking to the 3 Judges said she loved the Israeli and
Palestinian people and was saddened by their suffering. However, she insisted peace will not come to Israel until the Israeli Government ends Apartheid.

And again:

Vanunu: peace on earth!

I went to Israel in good faith with nothing but love for Israelis and Palestinians and wishing a good future for both people to live in justice and peace. Because I am critical of the Israeli Government policies does not make me an enemy of Israel or her people, but an upholder of an ethic of human rights and nonviolence, and a believer that peace is possible between both peoples when justice reigns.

What type of State is so terrified of peace that it prevents prize winning  peace hero Mordechai Vanunu from leaving the country, while banning another eminent peace activist from coming in?

A State of paranoia, addicted to violence?

Through his heroic life – at enormous personal cost – Mordechai Vanunu shows the world that peace, not paranoia, is the way ahead.

I wonder why Hollywood seems uninterested in his remarkable story?

It’s reported today that the UN Atomic Agency Curtails Probe of Israel’s Nuclear Capability.

Boycott Apartheid Israel

Tasked earlier this year – for the first time ever – with preparing a report on Israel’s nuclear weapons program, United Nations inspectors explained “they couldn’t compile enough information to assess the extent of the country’s nuclear program”.

So they want to give up.

There’s a split in the 151 nation International Atomic Energy Authority. Some nations had wanted the isue of Israel’s nuclear weapons off the agenda; until very recently, they had their way. Bloomsberg reports that “countries including Canada, the U.K. and U.S. opposed the probe, saying that the inquiry risked turning the IAEA into a political battleground“.

That’s such a preposterous comment it would be amusing, if the subject wasn’t so serious.

These same western nations used the IAEA as a stick to beat the signatory nations of Iraq and Iran over the course of the last 20 years. At the behest of the western Zionist Lobby, first Iraq and now Iran have been repeatedly attacked over their inability to prove a negative (that they don’t have nuclear weapons). Iraq was invaded and occupied, allegedly on those grounds. Iran continues to be threatened, harrassed and sanctioned.

Meanwhile, Israel isn’t even a signatory to the IAEA. It’s known to possess many nuclear weapons (and a wide range of biological and chemical weapons). Yet to this day, it has avoided international inspections.

Boycott Apartheid

The injustice is so blatant the mind reels.

The leadership of western nations has become infested by Zionists. These people are like puppets controlled by Israeli ventriloquists. Fortunately, this dismal state of affairs is becoming ever more apparent to the general public.

Israel is akin to an invasive, malignant cancer. Not the Palestinian land itself of course, nor the people as such…. but the ugly, paranoia-based, supremacist ideology of Zionism and its physical manifestation as a militaristic Apartheid State.

The western world was fooled into accepting the malignancy and encouraging its growth. Our hi-jacked governments tell us this is the way things should be.

They try to sell us a double-standard. If they were to succeed, it would fracture our world.

Fortunately, there’s no place for sectarian supremacism in the new globalized era that’s emerging. The Zionist canker must be excised to enable humanity to heal and survive.

The sooner we do it, the healthier our global human society will be.

Is there anything worse than a 63 year military occupation?

Perhaps there is?

More from Palestine Think Tank TV here.