Do Members Of #Flotilla2 Even Know What They Are Getting Themselves Into?

Al Jazeera reports on the final preparations of the flotilla.

One thing they are supposedly learning is how to be non-violent, which would be a welcome change from last year when The passengers aboard only one ship, the Mavi Marmara, attacked the IDF soldiers boarding the ship.

So far, so good.
But the members of the Flotillas got a class on international law--or at least what they thought it should be:

On Thursday, some 30 newcomers assembled in the hotel restaurant for a crash course in international and maritime law.

...The briefing continued with a session on possible Israeli responses to the challenge of the blockade of Gaza.

"If they attack the flotilla in international waters, then there will be nothing legal about that. We will, however, not at any moment enter Israeli territorial waters," De Jong [Anne de Jong, a Dutch veteran of the first flotilla ] said.

In last year's attempt to reach Gaza, the Israeli Navy made initial contact in international waters, about 190km northwest of Gaza and 130km off the coast of southern Lebanon.

Whoever told De Jong that being on board the first flotilla makes you an expert on international law was badly mistaken.

Israel is completely within its rights under international law to stop the flotilla inside international waters before it actually breaches the blockade.

Last year, a Reuters article addressed the issue Is Israel's naval blockade of Gaza legal?

WHAT ARE INTERNATIONAL WATERS?

Under the U.N. Convention of the Law of the Sea a coastal state has a "territorial sea" of 12 nautical miles from the coast over which it is sovereign. Ships of other states are allowed "innocent passage" through such waters.

There is a further 12 nautical mile zone called the "contiguous zone" over which a state may take action to protect itself or its laws.

"However, strictly beyond the 12 nautical miles limit the seas are the "high seas" or international waters," Roche said.

The Israeli navy said on Monday the Gaza bound flotilla was intercepted 120 km (75 miles) west of Israel. The Turkish captain of one of the vessels told an Istanbul news conference after returning home from Israeli detention they were 68 miles outside Israeli territorial waters.

Under the law of a blockade, intercepting a vessel could apply globally so long as a ship is bound for a "belligerent" territory, legal experts say.

More than that, according to international law expert Wolff Heintschel von Heinegg:

If they attempt to breach Israel’s blockade, they must follow all of Israel’s orders. They are required by international law to comply with all Israeli demands.

You would have thought that under the circumstances, the organizers of the flotilla would make sure the people who joined in knew exactly what they were getting themselves into.

You would be wrong.

Are they even aware that members of the IHH, the group with terrorist ties whose members attacked the IDF in last year's flotilla--that IHH members are likely to be aboard a number of the ships in this year's flotilla?

Do you think they participated in that class on non-violence?

Technorati Tag: Israel and Gaza Flotilla.