I accuse! – Letting Israel off the hook

Finkelstein’s bitter animosity towards Israel hardly qualifies him to be judge and jury, or to pronounce there were “murders” when no investigations regarding the Mavi Marmara reached such a conclusion. However whatever one thinks about Finkelstein’s politics his arrogance and chutzpah cannot be doubted in his decision to assume the mantle of the great Emile Zola with his use of the title J’accuse.

Dear Jaye,

I suggest you read the book before pronouncing on it. I also suggest that you read Finkelstein’s previous book: Gaza: An Inquest into its Martyrdom. On page 174 of that book, he quotes the UN Human Rights Council’s Report of the UN Fact-Finding Mission: “the circumstances of the killing of at least six of the passengers were in a manner consistent with an extra-legal, arbitrary and summary execution”. I would call that murder – wouldn’t you? So it isn’t true that none of the investigations regarding the Mavi Marmara reached the conclusion that the passengers were murdered. But in fact, in I Accuse!, as befits a legal document, Finkelstein never uses the word “murder” (though I use it in my review); he is careful to write about “accused war criminals” etc. The blurb refers to “alleged Israeli war crimes”. In his book Gaza, however, one of the chapters on the Mavi Marmara is called “Murder on the High Seas” — but then that book is not a legal document (and nor is my review).

Re “Finkelstein’s bitter animosity towards Israel”: see the Conclusion of his book Beyond Chutzpah: On the Misuse of Antisemitism and the Abuse of History (which I also suggest you read). Finkelstein’s final comment here on Dershowitz’s The Case for Israel is:

“The biggest fraud is the title itself. Dershowitz hasn’t written the case for Israel. How can anyone genuinely concerned about the Israeli people counsel policies certain to sow seeds of hatred abroad and moral corruption within? What he has in fact written is the case for the destruction of Israel.”

Unlike Dershowitz and other apologists for Israel’s destructive and self-destructive policies, Finkelstein is genuinely concerned about the Israeli people as well as the Palestinian people.

Re the title of his new book: see Wikipedia on the use of the word J’Accuse:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/J%27Accuse%E2%80%A6!

“J’accuse! has become a common generic expression of outrage and accusation against someone powerful”.

Best wishes,

Deborah

Dear Jaye,
Thank you for drawing my attention to the lack of clarity in the first sentence of the second paragraph of my review. To avoid confusion, I have asked the JVL Website Editor to change “ten murdered, scores injured” to “ten killed (one died in 2014, after four years in a coma), scores injured”. This is not because I repudiate the word “murder” but because I don’t want to give the impression that this is Finkelstein’s word in I Accuse, when it isn’t. As I wrote before, he is careful not to use the word “murder” in a legal document, though he does use it in his previous book, Gaza, which is not a legal document.

You are also correct to point out that my citation from the UNHRC report does not mention ten but refers to “at least six”.

But after these two somewhat narrow points, I am afraid my agreement with you ends. I am baffled by your assertion that my quotation from the UNHRC Report doesn’t “mention murders”. Can you explain the difference between “an extra-legal, arbitrary and summary execution” and murder?

You also claim that I leaned on a purportedly biased UNHRC report. Let’s then look at the available forensic evidence. As you refuse to read the book before pronouncing on it, I am presenting evidence to you here as it is laid out in I Accuse:

1) “The HRC Report noted that one passenger was shot in the face ‘at point blank range….while he was lying on the ground on his back’; a second passenger was shot ‘in the back and chest at close range while he was lying on the deck’; a third passenger was ‘attempting to photograph Israeli soldiers” and “received a single bullet to his forehead between the eyes’; a fourth and fifth passenger were shot (one of them in the head) as they sought shelter; a sixth passenger, who ‘had been….helping to bring injured passengers into the ship to be treated’, was shot three times, including ‘in the back of the head’.

2) “The [Israeli ]Turkel Report itself recounted in grisly detail the findings of an ‘external examination’ by Israeli doctors, according to which all the dead passengers suffered multiple bullet wounds and five were shot in the neck or head; for example – quoting the Israeli examination – ‘Body no. 2’ contained ‘bullet wounds…on the side of the head, on the right side of the back of the neck, on the right cheek, underneath the chin, on the right side of the back, on the left thigh. A bullet was palpated on the left side of the chest’; while ‘Body no. 9’ contained ‘bullet wounds in the area of the right temple/back of the neck, bullet wound in the left nipple, bullet wound in the area of the scalp-forehead on the left side, bullet wound on the face (nose), bullet wound on the left torso, bullet-wound on the right side of the back, two bullet wounds in the left thigh, two bullet wounds as a result of the bullet passing through toes four and five on the left foot’.”

3) “none other than the Prosecutor herself noted that there was ‘information indicating that one of the deceased was shot in the forehead while taking photos and that another was filming with a small video camera when he was first hit with live fire. The autopsy report and some witness accounts further suggest that this latter individual was already lying on the ground wounded when the fatal shot was delivered. There is also information available suggesting that another man killed was engaged in helping to bring injured passengers inside the ship to be treated around the time when he was shot. Additionally, one witness claims that, even after he and others waved white flags to indicate their surrender, IDF soldiers continued shooting and subsequently at least two men were shot and killed. Similarly, according to other witness statements, IDF soldiers kept shooting even after attempts had been made to surrender and/or individuals were already wounded’.” (4.5.3)

As we have seen, the UNHRC report concluded that “the killing of at least six of the passengers were in a manner consistent with an extra-legal, arbitrary and summary execution” or, in layperson’s language, they were murdered.

You are convinced that “the UNHRC is intent on Israel-bashing”. But an objective assessment of the available evidence would appear to substantiate the UNHRC’s findings.

Incidentally, if passengers weren’t killed at point-blank range, the Turkel Commision could have proved it by releasing the “video recordings that were made by cameras installed in the helmets of the IDF combat personnel who operated on the Mavi Marmara” (quoted in the book from the Turkel Report). Finkelstein comments: “One wonders – or does NOT wonder – why Israeli authorities kept this footage under wraps”. (4.5.3.1)

Best wishes,

Deborah