I’m not sure how much attention the latest flotilla to Gaza attempting to get past the Israeli blockade has gotten in the mainstream press, but Democracy Now! has had continual coverage, for a while getting live updates from their correspondent Jihan Hafiz who was aboard one of the ships. Those updates stopped when Israeli forces boarded the ships. Today she was back in the U.S., speaking live with Amy Goodman.
I’m including both the video and transcript here, for readers’ convenience. Personally I was struck by many things in this interview: the refusal of the Israeli troops and officials to recognize Hafiz as a journalist on assignment, calling her “part of the delegation” and “an activist,” despite their acknowledgement of two other journalists’ status; the insistence by American embassy officials that they were “powerless” in this foreign country, despite close U.S.-Israel ties — and the comparative involvement of Irish and Canadian embassy officials; Israeli guards sniffing her underwear as they went through her bags (presumably searching for drugs or explosives, since the computer chips she’d originally hidden there wouldn’t smell?); the extreme evasiveness over the supposed return of her $20,000 worth of equipment.
On the heels of the conversation regarding a video about what UCLA students don’t know about Israel and the middle east, I found the whole interview troubling and perplexing. True, the delegates on the flotilla knew that they were unlikely to make it through the blockade with their supplies for Gaza. But I’m trying to figure out how this kind of treatment of an embedded, credential-carrying journalist on official assignment says about how the relationship between the U.S. and Israel really works. – amanda
AMY GOODMAN: The Israeli government continues to detain most of the passengers seized in international waters Friday while trying to challenge the Israeli blockade on Gaza. The passengers were on two boats—one from Canada, the other from Ireland—as part of the Freedom Waves flotilla to Gaza. Around 20 activists are believed to remain in custody after refusing to sign statements asserting they had entered Israel illegally. Flotilla organizers have accused the Israeli military of abusing the activists, with allegations of physical assault and the use of tasers.