Gaza blockade 2010 by Free Gaza Flotilla a PR victory for Hamas

The Gaza Blockade, a very essential aspect of the Israeli/Palestinian conflict, was started about three years ago by Israel and Egypt to contain Hamas, the militant Palestinian group that controls Gaza. The Israeli raid on the Free Gaza Flotilla last week has refocused international attention on the Israeli/Palestinian conflict and also onto the Gaza’s isolation. Numerous international leaders question the reasons for the blockade to continue. Critics call the Gaza Blockade a strategy of inhumane oppression. Supporters of the whole thing say the blockade is essential to prevent rocket attacks by Hamas on Israeli soil.

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U.N. wants Israeli raid investigation

The United Nations, European leaders and many others criticized Israel after its commandos stormed six ships in international waters. There were about 700 activists were trying to break the Gaza Blockade by bringing in 10,000 tons of aid. It was reported by Voice of America that U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said the violence aboard the Turkish ship could are avoided if Israel had heeded earlier calls to lift the Gaza Blockade, which has prevented essential goods from reaching Gaza’s 1.5 million residents. Ban said he is considering having an investigation put into the Israeli raid that resulted in the deaths of nine pro-Palestinian activists.

Gaza Blockade defended by Israel

Israel says it allows a lot more than enough food, medicine and supplies into Gaza and suggests that there be no independent investigation of the attack on the Gaza Freedom Flotilla. The Associated Press reports that Israel also rejects claims that Gaza is within the midst of a humanitarian crisis. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said in an address to his nation the aim of the flotilla was to break the blockade, not to bring aid to Gaza. ”This was not the ‘Love Boat’,” Netanyahu told everybody, “It was a hate boat.” Israel says its soldiers were acting in self-defense because there were passengers that attacked them when the commandos rappelled onto the ship from helicopters.

Hamas wins just by losing

The attack on the Free Gaza Flotilla is seeming to be the latest public relations coup for militant organizations dedicated to antagonizing Israel. In 2006 Hezbollah, a gun-toting, grenade-throwing Islamist political organization scored a huge victory over Israel merely by surviving an onslaught it sought to provoke in southern Lebanon that devastated the countryside. Hamas, which regularly terrorizes Israel with rocket attacks from Gaza, seems to escape international rebuke for that misbehavior. In the meantime, Israel finds itself in lose-lose situations when it claims to be defending itself. Netanyahu has warned that if the blockade ends, hundreds of ships will bring in thousands of missiles from Iran to be aimed at Israel.

Israel gives enemies gifts

The situation created by the Gaza Blockade and also the Free Gaza Flotilla creates a geopolitical Rubik’s Cube for the United States. America’s relationships within the Middle East may have to be reset to some kind of balance of power that now sees Turkey — a non-Arab country who gained massive Middle East street cred by sanctioning the blockade — as the linchpin. Israel is the loser. Hamas gets to be the winner. As outlined by the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, the U.S., Egypt and even the Palestinian Authority had been betting on the weakening and eventual demise of Hamas. Hamas can operate from a position of strength, ironically, because of Israel.