Prof. Gerald Steinberg on BBC World Service, May 31, 2010

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Prof. Gerald Steinberg on BBC Europe Today, June 1, 2010

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Transcript of BBC World Service, May 31, 2010

Julian Marshall: “So where does the truth lie? I’ve been speaking to Professor Gerald Steinberg in Israel, he runs a website called NGO Monitor and to Dr. Arafat Shukri who chairs the European campaign to end the siege on Gaza – one of the groups that organized the convoy of boats. I started by putting to him the allegation that the convoy was more to do with provocation than peace.

Dr. Arafat Shukri: “Simply this is not true. Israel has been preparing themselves for attacking us. Israel did not allow this aid to get into Gaza, like the cement, the building material, all the things that were on board. If they allowed such material to get into Gaza, there is no need for us to go in the first place.”

Marshall: “Professor Steinberg, the very existence of a blockade in Gaza lends itself to what we’ve seen on the high seas in the past twenty-four hours…”

Professor Gerald Steinberg: “The very existence of a very vicious and violent war against Israel, particularly since the Hamas takeover – that’s certainly the reason for the blockade. I think that having these kinds of exchanges, which are very simplistic, avoids what I think is one of the main issues, and that is the abuse of moral rhetoric: human rights, humanitarian aid, peace processes. These were once called “peace activists.” To use that framework, that moral framework to justify what are clearly immoral acts – that’s a much bigger and wider problem.

Marshall: “But how can you classify the delivery of humanitarian aid supplies to Gaza in the kind of language that you’ve been using?”

Steinberg: “This is a military situation, and groups that use humanitarian frameworks and say that they are bringing medical aid in order to be part of that military confrontation is fundamentally immoral, and that is something I’d like to hear Dr. Shukri address.”

Shukri: “Well, actually, this is very cheap Israeli propaganda. They just want to show everybody who is supporting the Palestinians as a terrorist. This is simply not true. We are in a humanitarian mission. We’ve got parliamentarians from different parts of Europe who came with us on board to deliver this humanitarian aid.”

Marshall: “But you have to admit that you are also seeking to highlight the Israeli blockade of Gaza.”

Shukri: “This is our right: to highlight the issue of people who are besieging Gaza for around four years. Because it is illegal and brutal on the lives of the people there.”

Marshall: “Professor Steinberg, Israel may find these convoys delivering humanitarian supplies to Gaza annoying. Why the confrontation, the loss of life on this particular occasion?”

Steinberg: “What we saw in the video is people who claim to be peace activists, who claim to act in the name of morality, in a ship flying a Turkish flag from a group called IHH, which has close connections with jihadist groups, that attacked the Israeli soldiers coming down one at a time. This was not a violent attempt to take over the ship or to injure people…”

Marshall: “In international waters.”

Steinberg: “The point is that this is part of a state of war. And with all the criticism that exists from European officials, who, unfortunately, have a very simple-minded approach – this was clearly designed to be the end of a confrontation in a peaceful manner and the Israelis were ambushed.”

Marshall: “Could I just ask, Dr. Shukri, do you issue instruction to those who take part in these convoys to remain passive at all times? To not offer resistance?”

Shukri: “Yeah, definitely. This is the training. We tell them that we are in a humanitarian mission: if you want to resist, you have to be passive in your resistance. But the Israeli Army in such a move, shooting at them, some people would defend themselves by using the acts or something which might appear in the videos.”

Marshalls: “Professor Steinberg, I mean, could I put it to you that, over a period of years, that Israel has perhaps come to look upon any activist who aligns himself or herself with the Palestinian cause as representing some sort of threat to Israel itself?”

Steinberg: “I think that is an exaggeration for two reasons. Number one there is clearly a political dimension to the military and terrorist war that is being waged against Israel and many of the people who call themselves activist are part of the process and when Israel defends itself, these activist immediately scream “war crimes.” We saw it in Jenin, the false massacre claims, and I think that needs to be addressed. The other flaw with that kind of argument is that many of these people are in fact, I saw the term today, I think its useful to use, they are suicide activist, they are martyrs for the Palestinian cause. They want to bring on the violence.”

Marshall: “Dr. Shukri, given the kinds of confrontations there has been over the past 24 hours, will you continue with these convoys to Gaza?”

Shukri: “We think what we are doing is legal, in the eyes of the Professor here, he portrayed all the NGOs working to help the Palestinians are a kind of extremists, including Amnesty and Oxfam, which is utterly untrue.“

Marshall: “Dr. Arafat Shukri who chairs the European Campaign to end the siege on Gaza, I was also speaking to Professor Gerald Steinberg in Israel who runs a website called NGO Monitor.”

Transcript of BBC Europe Today, June 1, 2010

BBC: To Jerusalem where we can speak to Professor Gerald Steinberg.

He’s the director of a group called NGO Monitor.

I wonder what you made of those comments there from Omar Faruk ...

Professor Gerald Steinberg: Organisations that support terrorist groups, whether Al Qaida, Hezbollah, or Hamas, don't usually come out and say that we work closely with these groups [IHH, ISM, etc.] The process is very complex. They hide the money and the sources of their support. Beyond the investigation and the raid [by Turkish security agencies] that you mentioned in 1997, where bomb making material and weapons were found, we also have the case that the United States, the US Treasury Department has designated the umbrella organization which is the Turkish Union of the Good, which IHH is a partner member of that organization, they have designated them as being part of the global terrorist network.

That broader umbrella group has transferred funds to the families of Hamas suicide bombers. This is a US government organization, this is not an Israeli organization, and it's not a rumour, or an artificial creation.

So, this is part of the problem.

What we really have here in this flotilla is --  maybe the term “perfect storm” is useful, certainly in terms of the way Israel looks at it, --- a huge disaster.

On the one hand you have a very militant Turkish government which is allying itself now with Iran and Syria and Israel’s paying the price for this.

They are the ones who helped promote and support this flotilla and we heard the angry words. Then we have the abuse of human rights, of humanitarian aid as part of political warfare.

Not just the IHH, but also we have this organization called the International Solidarity Movement with the Palestinians and we have people like Caoimhe Butterly [an ISM militant from Ireland], people who have been involved in supporting terrorist infrastructure in the Palestinian areas since 2002-2003. And ISM spokesperson Greta Berlin is very well known for her very virulent anti-Israel and anti-Jewish statements. They all work together.

BBC: I take your view but on board those ship were a number of elected politicians from fairly moderate parties within Europe and the condemnation has not just been from Turkey, the British, for example, have been saying that it's an outrage.

The, uh, NATO has, the UN has. We’ve also been hearing many commentators within Israel have described the raid as a mistake and a failure.

Do you think the military could have handled this better?

Steinberg: I think we should distinguish between the deliberate provocation and the failure of the Israeli military to find a proper way, a successful way of dealing with it.

Certainly this was a failure. There’s no question about it, you wouldn't be talking to me now, there wouldn't be 9 or 10 dead people. It was clearly a failure.

But we see the images. We see the images of the soldiers coming down one at a time. They could have done a lot more damage if they were interested in creating this kind of provocation.

They were beaten up. They feared for their lives, I think legitimately, and that they would be lynched. One soldier was thrown overboard. We all see the images.

Israelis are very very aware of, cognisant of what has happened to soldiers who are captured by Palestinians and tortured.
Gilad Shalit is still held, four years, in Gaza after he was kidnapped on Israeli soil.

And the international human rights community, groups like Amnesty, Human Rights Watch, all of these groups are completely silent on his fate.

So if there are European politicians on these boats in what you describe as from moderate parties then they clearly do not understand the situation that they are in, they have been captured by the Palestinian narrative, which makes Israelis always aggressors and Palestinians always the victims, and that is a big part of the problem which Israel frankly has not successfully learned how to deal with.

It is part of political warfare.

BBC: Ok, Professor Gerald Steinberg thank you for joining us from Jerusalem.