By Lee Kaplan
Saturday, July 7, 2007
The International Solidarity Movement has consistently shown itself to be on the side of terrorist movements that prolong the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and prevent peace. At the same time, the Israeli government has been slow to react to ISM enablers helping those who wish to destroy the Jewish state and who defend murderers of Israeli citizens. However, newer restrictions on ISM activities by Israeli security services in the West Bank have slowed down the effectiveness of this subversive organization on land.
The purpose of using internationals in the ISM is to threaten Israeli sovereignty and facilitate terrorist attacks against the Jewish state while its members claim to be "peace activists" engaging in "nonviolent resistance." Now, in order to take a new tack in their war effort against Israel, the ISM has put out a communiqu that it plans to go to sea to help the new Hamas terrorist government in Gaza.
Israel is reluctant to create international incidents by being too strict with the ISM foreigners who are trained to work in solidarity with Arab irredentists and terrorist groups out to dismantle the Jewish state. ISM leaders such as Huwaida Arraf and Paul LaRudee, as well as other ISM leaders, have openly stated they work with Hamas, Islamic Jihad, and even Hezbollah, all designated terrorist organizations per the US State Department. This new effort on the part of the ISM is being organized to deliberately help the Hamas terrorist regime break Israeli control of seaports that can be used to smuggle weapons and terrorists into Gaza.
Dubbed the Free Gaza Movement, a new campaign costing an estimated $300,000 or more, the action is being planned to end "the Israeli occupation of Gaza." There is one small problem: Gaza is no longer occupied by Israel. Despite this, The Free Gaza movement website claims "Israeli forces control Gaza by land, sea and air" and proposes sending a flotilla of ships into Gazan waters to further break Israeli control of the sea borders. The Gaza border with Egypt is no longer under Israeli control and the daily missile barrages on southern Israel show just how stupid it was to surrender that border entry by land. Current Israeli control of sea and air access to Gaza is part of the Oslo Accords until a genuine peace settlement occurs, if ever, and only logical to staunch the flow of offensive weapons.
The ISM plan calls for getting 100 international "volunteers" to sail from Cyprus to Gaza in two to six seagoing vessels containing from 12 to 60 passengers each. The prospective date is set for August 15th , and the ISMers think they can make the cross-sea journey in 24 hours.
In case anyone does not understand what a danger this poses to not only Israel, but to the entire free world in continuing the War on Terror, one has only to look at the Hamas takeover that just occurred in Gaza to understand the role the ISM played in making it happen, and how that participation has escaped the eye of mainstream media. For years, the Israelis strove to stop weapons smuggling tunnels from Egypt that brought arms and missiles into Gaza to be used to kill Israelis. The border area with Egypt, mainly the town of Rafah, and the border area that is known as the Philadelphi Corridor, also became hangouts for ISM anarchists and communists from foreign countries to interfere with anti-terrorist operations of the Israeli army to prevent those weapons transfers. It was during this time the fates of useful idiots and avowed anarchists like Rachel Corrie from the US, and Tom Hurndall from the UK, provided enough adverse publicity in worldwide media that Israel eventually relinquished control of the Egyptian border under pressure from the Europeans and the US State Department. ISM activist and anarchist Joseph Smith, a.k.a. Joseph Carr, who was intimately involved in developing propaganda during the deaths of both those young people, and who attributed Corrie's death as "well worth the price of the revolution," is now an active part of the ISM's upcoming flotilla plan. Carr's photos and contributions can be found on the Free Gaza recruiting website.
Such interference and propaganda in the past allowed Hamas to arm itself for not only attacking Israel as it is still doing today, but also eventually taking complete control of Gaza from Fatah, deemed a US ally. The ISM, by promoting continual publicity to worldwide media, claiming Israel was destroying houses on the Rafah border and in the Philadelphi Corridor, as well as the committing phony "human rights abuses," eventually accomplished the goal of forcing Israel to open the Egyptian border to new flows of weapons and terrorists. Israel's attempts to simply try to protect its citizens resulted in diplomatic pressure being brought to bear by the Quartet and Condoleeza Rice to open up that border enabling the smuggling of Kassem rockets now falling on the heads of Israeli civilians at an alarming rate, in the hundreds. You don't see any ISM "peace activists" acting as human shields in Sderot to protect Israelis from missiles that kill them and their children that only provide a 15 second warning before striking. Now, the ISM is directing its war effort masquerading as a "peace effort" in this new direction: the sea.
The ISM flotilla was announced at almost the same time as a statement released by Ayman al-Zawahiri, Bin Laden's second-in-command advising Gaza's new Hamas leadership that al Qaeda considers its ally. "Provide them (Hamas) with money, do your best to get it there, break the siege imposed on them by crusaders and Arab leader traitors," said al-Zawahri, addressing Muslims around the world. "Facilitate weapons smuggling from neighboring countries."
It would appear the ISM is doing just that with its newest project.
The ISM communiqu states that some of the ISMers will fish at sea with Palestinian fishermen and travel back and forth to breach Israeli security procedures. One can be sure the ISM will start running media stories of Palestinian fisherman not being allowed to ply their trade or bring food to their fellow Arabs as the ISM works to enable the smuggling of weapons via sea that the Israeli Navy has already had to stop on many occasions. One can be certain that new propaganda will be disseminated about the big, bad mean Israelis depriving innocent Palestinian fishermen of plying their trade as ISM activists strive to stop Israel from protecting its southern border from Hamas in Gaza.
The ISM communiqu continues that they will resist arrest at sea if the Israeli navy tries to stop their entry.
A description of the passengers states there will be "Palestinians, Israelis, Americans, Europeans, Africans and Asians…rabbis, imams, Christian and Buddhist clerics, British MPs, entertainment celebrities and internationally journalists " although it is unlikely given the direct support for Hamas the trip entails that the ISM will be able to muster such an eclectic group. The article then dissembles and states that nobody will be assured a place on board any of the sea vessels. It is doubtful one will see Hollywood lefties defying Israeli warships among the dedicated anarchists and communists of the ISM.
Of note among the names of those to definitely be on board are the same names and faces of the ISM who have over the years shown their unrelenting hatred for Israel and the USA, including ISM co-founder Huwaida Arraf, Greta Berlin, an L.A.-based ISM activist banned from Israel, Sylvia Cattori, a publicist for the ISM, Uri Davis, Hedy Epstein, Kathy Kelly, an ISM coordinator for high school tours in the USA by the ISM, Paul LaRudee and Alison Weir. LaRudee was recently caught and deported from Israel for suspected connections to Hamas after he was exposed here on FPM, then went to Lebanon to work for Hezbollah during last summer's war. Weir has disseminated pamphlets claiming the Jews perpetrated the Holocaust on themselves to create the Jewish state. Epstein has been proven to lie about her being a Holocaust survivor on US campuses to compare Israel with the Nazis of World War II. Davis, an Israeli quisling, has appeared at the UN Durban conference to disrupt nonpolitical meetings by the Israelis discussing the environment. Berlin and Kelly have been banned by the Israeli government due to their previous subversive activities in the West Bank and are actively involved in ISM organizing in the US.
Of interest is the announcement that Greenpeace has allegedly been giving advice to the ISM on how to deal with encounters at sea. One has to wonder why the environmental group that protects whales would be interested in helping an organization that is working openly with Hamas, a terrorist organization whose charter calls for the annihilation and elimination of Jews anywhere in Israel. Past national conferences held in the USA promoted the idea of linking the environmental movement to the Palestinian conflict against Israel due to its ready donor pool. Apparently it succeeded in the case of Greenpeace. Donors to Greenpeace should take note.
In matters of security, the ISM missive states, "If Israel wishes to harm our mission we expect them to try and plant arms on board. Therefore, before boarding, all participants, vessels and supplies will undergo a security check by qualified personnel (sic) from an internationally recognized NGO to verify that no dangerous items are brought aboard. Since we will not be entering Israeli territory (technically the sea around Gaza is under Israeli territorial control per the Oslo Accords until a final peace settlement) we will not allow Israeli authorities to perform such inspections." Translate that to mean if weapons being smuggled are found, the ISM will just say the Israelis planted them. The ISM is already notorious for working with Palestinian NGO's that consistently show they work with the "Palestinian revolution" and who have refused to sign US State Department directives that their US aid money cannot be used for terrorism.
The communiqu continues to say the ISM will hire competent crewmembers and equipment and hopes to purchase rather than lease the boats involved to avoid "cancellation by others"
On the question of such cancellation, one has to ask what the US State Department has to say about this latest ISM planned action. Federal criminal code statue 18 USC 2339 b specifies it is illegal to conduct training sessions designed to aid terrorist groups operating against allied countries in the War on Terror. Despite this, the ISM mission states about its passenger list that "All will undergo a training program and be selected according to the interests of the mission, such as a mix of persons and expertise." Paul LaRudee's Norcal ISM routinely "trains" ISM activists to go to the West Bank under hidden identities to interfere at checkpoints to keep out terrorists.
In addition, Presidential Executive Order 13224, issued in September 2001, blocks property and prohibits transactions with persons who commit, threaten to commit, or support terrorism.
Although the federal government has a directive from US Treasury that private US citizens are not allowed to do business with the Hamas terrorist government, the US State Department recently gave a waiver to ISM affiliated group Interfaith Peace Builders to visit Gaza last summer. That group may have conned State into thinking they were meeting to promote peace and understanding, but its leadership came back to the US to launch another propaganda tour on US campuses and elsewhere with no condemnations of terrorism or suicide bombings and encouraging the deportations of Jews from areas in the West Bank just as was done in Gaza.
One seriously has to wonder if the State Department is not behind promoting such events, or if they are at minimum looking the other way. Given Presidential Executive Order 13224, clearly the ISM purchasing ships to aid known terrorist groups is a violation of US law. The passports of US citizens like Huwaida Arraf and Paul LaRudee should be revoked by the US State Department given these individuals' past admissions of their work with terrorist organizations that have also killed American citizens. Arraf, who claims to be a third year law student but somehow has unlimited time and funds to travel the world and even the halls of congress attacking Israel for the ISM, and LaRudee, who claims to be a simple piano tuner who rubs elbows with major terrorist organizations, should certainly come under State Department scrutiny over who is funding their activities for such activities and travel. The ISM routinely trains volunteers who were deported from Israel to apply for new passports under different names to get past Israeli border controls. The State Department, although aware of this illegal practice, keeps looking the other way. Joseph Smith/Carr who is involved with the ISM flotilla is known to have falsified identities for such activities on passports by the Diplomatic Security Service that is responsible for State Department regulations, yet the federal agency chooses to do nothing about it. Passport revocation may be effected when the person obtained the passport fraudulently, when the passport was issued in error, when the person's certificate of naturalization was cancelled by a federal court, or when the person would not be entitled to a new passport under 22 CFR 51.70 (a) or (b).
Readers who wish to take action should contact their local law enforcement and ask them to contact the US State Department for information on how to revoke the passports of these people, as requests from local law enforcement are taken more seriously.
Individual Americans who are offended by these activities can take immediate action where the State Department refuses to do so. Letters should be written to the Cypriot mission in Washington, D.C. asking its government to ban such a flotilla from organizing in its ports. At the same time, write your congressman and complain about our State Department that always finds excuses to allow the ISM to roil the war against Israel indefinitely from here in the US and demand action be taken. It wouldn't hurt to write President Bush also to ask him to have the US Sixth Fleet intervene and turn back the ISM at sea if they get that far before they can create an international incident off the coastline of Gaza.
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