Turkey’s Next Move Will Be To Marshal Sentiment Against Israel at United Nations

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UNITED NATIONS – After initiating and aiding a provocation that resulted in the deaths of at least ten of its citizens, Turkey will next move to marshal world opinion and attempt to harness it to promote Prime Minister Erdogan’s regional goals, which increasingly resemble those of Hamas, Hezbollah, Syria, and Iran.

The Turkish government supported, guided, and aided the so-called “humanitarian” flotilla, condemned Israeli “piracy” after Monday morning’s violent clashes, and is now planning to further isolate Israel diplomatically. By early afternoon, when Turkey’s foreign minister, Ahmet Davutoglu, informed the Security Council that the events on the Mediterranean at dawn Monday were nothing less than a “black day in the history of humanity,” it was clear to all here that the botched Israeli operation is becoming a major escalation in the growing confrontation between Israel and Turkey.

Mr. Erdogan, who cut short a visit to Latin America today, used words like “crime” and “piracy” to describe Israel’s role in the action. Those were strong words for Turkey, a NATO member and formerly Israel’s closest ally in the region. The adjectives were repeated time and again this evening by a number of Security Council members, including from European countries.

“I’m not sure any international lawyer would be able to defend such words” at this stage, said one senior Council diplomat, who declined to join the fray. Over two months after the sinking of the Chenoan, the diplomat noted, China and other members of the council are preventing the council from even discussing the unprovoked torpedo attack on the South Korean ship, even though a multinational investigation has credibly established North Korea’s role as aggressor.

By contrast, Turkey hastily – and successfully – called a council meeting Monday, in which it and other council members condemned Israel even as the fog of war still obscures most of the facts of the fatal confrontation and the sequence of events that led to it.

At least ten of the activists on the Turkish ship Marmara, which participated in a six-ship flotilla whose organizers declared they were attempting to break Israel’s naval blockade of Gaza, ended up dead. Israeli commandos launched from navy ships and helicopters an operation designed to take over the flotilla vessels after telling their captains to return to their port of origin or risk confrontation.

Armed with metal pipes, clubs, knives, concoction grenades, and, according to the soldiers, also at least one gun, Marmara activists assaulted the soldiers immediately after they landed on the ship’s upper deck. The Israelis were ill-prepared for violent confrontation and received faulty intelligence, which had them believe their mission would involve civil crowd control, rather than an violent engagement.

Members of the elite Israeli naval unit Shayetet 13, as well as young navy cadets, were outnumbered by the Turkish men, who – as seen on video footage accessible on the Web – punched and stabbed them, threw one of them overboard and injured another by dropping him down to a lower deck.

Fearing a “lynching,” as they later described the incident, the soldiers requested permission from their higher-ups to use live ammunition. Only then they were able to take control of the ship. By then at least ten activists were dead, more than 30 injured, and at least 10 Israeli soldiers suffered injuries. Several were in critical condition.

Israel later escorted all the ships on the flotilla to its southern port of Ashdod, where officials begun to conduct the originally-planned deportation and sifting of the ships’ cargo. That is designed to determine whether it contains arms – before it can be delivered to Gaza, by Israel and through the officially-sanctioned passages into the Strip.

At the council, only America called for restraint from automatically scoring Israel. American diplomats, led by Deputy Ambassador Alejandro Wolff, a veteran, watered down Turkey’s original demand to “condemn” Israel “in the strongest terms” and to request the U.N. Secretary General to establish an independent investigation.

As I write this, the council remains deadlocked over language for a statement that would be read by the rotating president (until midnight it would be Lebanese ambassador Nawaf Salam) and become part of the council’s annals. At least for one day, America signaled that it might resume its traditional role as Israel’s protector at Turtle Bay against unreasonable demands. But Turkey, which remains opposed to any sanctions on Iran, may yet increase its attempts to unite council members against Israel.


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