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Generational Dynamics Web Log for 6-Jun-2010
6-Jun-10 News -- Anger at Israel grows over Gaza blockade

Web Log - June, 2010

6-Jun-10 News -- Anger at Israel grows over Gaza blockade

Egypt to strip citizenship from men married to Israeli women

Turkey threatens to cut diplomatic relations with Israel

Diplomatic relations between Israel and Turkey continue to plummet sharply, as forensic evidence from last week's confrontation emerges.

Turkey is claiming that Israel could not have fired solely in self-defense in last week's military confrontation with the "Freedom Flotilla" that was blocked by the IDF (Israeli Defense Forces) from reaching a harbor in Gaza.

Autopsies on the nine Turkish men who were killed on the boat Mavi Marmara during the confrontation indicated that most of them were shot several times, usually to the head at close range, according to the Guardian. The autopsies were conducted by the vice-chairman of the Turkish council of forensic medicine.

Pro-Palestinian activists on the ship are disputing Israel's story altogther, claiming that IDF commandos opened fire first and had a "shoot to kill policy."

The Israeli are insisting that they had were caught by surprise when the activists attacked the soldiers with knives and steel rods, and that they only fired in self-defense. They point out that someone firing quickly in self-defense may well shoot the same person more than once.

However, public anger against Israel is growing substantially, as large crowds in the capital, Ankara, protested at the Israeli embassy.

Turkey's ambassador to the U.S., Namik Tan, says that high emotions and massive protests and Turkey, Turkey may be forced to cut all ties with Israel. Washington Post

However, an unnamed top official in Israel's foreign ministry is quoted by Haaretz as saying that Israel will not apologize and that "the Turkish demand for an official apology was mainly an excuse to allow Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan's to cut diplomatic ties with Israel."

A personal attack of this kind on a foreign leader of a country is infuriating to the citizens of that country, and raises tensions enormously. There is certainly now a decent probability that Turkey will cut diplomatic relations with Israel within the next week or two.

Israel diverts Rachel Corrie humanitarian aid boat

The new 'humanitarian aid' boat, the Rachel Corrie, tried to reach a Gaza port on Saturday, as we reported yesterday.

As the boat neared Gaza waters, the Israeli navy intercepted the boat, and forcibly diverted it to the Israeli port of Ashdod. Both sides exhibited restraint, and there was no violence. Israel said that it would unload the aid and transfer it to Gaza, according to the Guardian.

Egypt to strip citizenship from men married to Israeli women

An Egyptian court has ruled that the country's Interior Ministry must stript the citizenship from men married to Israeli women. The children will also lose their citizenship. The court decision cannot be appealed, according to the Associated Press.

Tens of thousands of Egyptian men are married to Israeli women. In many cases, the couples met when Egyptian men started visiting Israel to work after the 1979 peace treaty.

However, the court ruling is based on a 1976 law that revokes citizenship of Egyptians who married Israelis who have served in the army or embrace Zionism as an ideology.

What's bizarre about the ruling is that it specifically targets Israeli women, including Arab Israelis, irrespective of religion (Jewish, Christian or Muslim). Furthermore, the ruling does not target non-Israeli Jews.

The ruling is related to Egypt's national security, according to Al-Jazeera. The lawyer who brought the original case to court celebrated the decision and said he wanted to prevent the creation of a generation who are "disloyal to Egypt and the Arab world". He said that the children of such marriages "should not be allowed to perform their military service."

The deteriorating situation in the Middle East

If the intention of the "Freedom Flotilla" organizers was to thoroughly raise Mideast tensions and substantially increase the chance of war in the near future, then they succeeded.

However, the events of the past week are not the CAUSE of the deteriorating relations, though they may be the TRIGGER.

The anger at Israel among Turks and Egyptians has been increasing for years, especially since last year's war between Israelis and Hamas in Gaza. Thus, if this event hadn't occurred, then something else would have triggered the same answer.

From the point of view of Generational Dynamics, the Mideast is headed for a major war, re-fighting the genocidal war between Jews and Arabs that followed the partitioning of Palestine and the creation of the state of Israel in 1948.

What's interesting about the situation in Turkey is that the Turks may be moving to reclaim the role that Attaturk gave up in 1924, when he decalred that Turkey would be a secular state. For several years, Turkey has been moving away from secularism and moving towards becoming a Muslim religious state. Furthermore, Turkey is making a point of championing the Palestinians, according to the CS Monitor.

It may be that Turkey is moving, intentionally or not, towards restoring the Caliphate in Istanbul, becoming the religious leader of all the Muslims on the Arabian peninsula. This is a rapidly developing situation, so we may have answer soon.

Additional Links

President Lee Myung-bak said that "There is absolutely no possibility of a full-scale war on the Korean peninsula." This is a severe case of denial. Associated Press

In an implied criticism of China, U.S. Secretary of Defense Robert Gates challenged China to deal realistically with North Korea, and to develop more durable military ties with the U.S. Associated Press

(Comments: For reader comments, questions and discussion, see the 6-Jun-10 News -- Anger at Israel grows over Gaza blockade thread of the Generational Dynamics forum. Comments may be posted anonymously.) (6-Jun-2010) Permanent Link
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Generational Dynamics Web Log for 6-Jun-2010 6-Jun-10 News -- Anger at Israel grows over Gaza blockade

Turkey threatens to cut diplomatic relations with Israel

Israel diverts Rachel Corrie humanitarian aid boat

Egypt to strip citizenship from men married to Israeli women

The deteriorating situation in the Middle East

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Generational Dynamics Web Log for 6-Jun-2010
6-Jun-10 News -- Anger at Israel grows over Gaza blockade