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Global BDS Against Israel Is Working - by Stephen Lendman
In July 2005, a coalition of 171 Palestinian Civil Society organizations created the Global BDS movement for "Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions against Israel Until it Complies with International Law and Universal Principles of Human Rights" for Occupied Palestinians, Israeli Arabs, and Palestinian diaspora refugees.
The Tel Aviv-based Reut Institute (RI) provides "real-time strategic decision-making" support in areas of national security and socioeconomic policy. Its new report titled "The Gaza Flotilla: The Collapse of Israel's Political Firewall" suggests it's working. It followed an earlier one on "creating a political firewall" against Israel's "delegitimization challenge," recommending sabotage and subterfuge against growing global forces it fears, not an equitable solution it rejects.
Focusing now on the Gaza Flotilla, it called it "the tip of the iceberg" attempt along with the BDS movement and Durban conference against racism to cause "tangible and significant damage to Israel." Unmentioned was how expert Israel is in self-inflicting it by decades of occupation and crimes of war and against humanity.
Clearly they're having an effect, RI saying opposition "momentum is gaining," its aim "to delegitimize Israel in order to precipitate its implosion, inspired by the collapses of" apartheid South Africa and the Soviet Union. Calling the challenge global, systemic and political, RI blames two cooperating forces:
-- the Iran/Hamas/Hezbollah "Resistance Network;" and
-- the "Delegimization Network" based in cities like London, Brussels and San Francisco.
Their "constantly adapting" strategy requires Israel to adopt "a comprehensive systemic treatment" of the challenge it faces.
RI gave its version of the Gaza Flotilla interdiction, specifically against the Mavi Marmara mother ship, a "grave incident devlop(ing) during the takeover (when) Members of the Turkish IHH organization attacked Israeli forces with knives and metal bars, and in some cases with live fire. In the ensuing confrontation, nine Israeli soldiers were injured and nine Turkish activists killed."
An earlier article discussed the truth, not RI's revisionism, accessed through the following link:
Israeli commandos (trained killers), planned and executed a premeditated attack in international waters against nonviolent, unarmed humanitarian activists, trying to deliver essential to life aid to besieged Gazans - to break Israel's attempt to suffocate and starve them.
RI ignored the crime, focusing instead on world outrage, including anti-Israeli demonstrations in dozens of major cities, increased BDS efforts, international investigations, and the "stronger perception of cooperation between Israel's Arab citizens and the Resistance and Delegitimization Networks." Turkey also "exploited" the incident, "deepen(ing) the crisis with Israel."
Israel followed with two inquiry commissions, an IDF one under reserve Major General Giora Eiland and another under retired Supreme Court Judge Jacob Turkel, both mandated to whitewash the crime, what RI won't admit, instead saying:
"The mandates of both commissions reflect the mindset that mistakes surrounding the Gaza Flotilla were technical-operational or tactical-political in nature. The commissions are thus focused on the reasonableness of the actions taken by decision-makers on existing laws, regulations, and accepted practices."
In addition, RI is conducting its own inquiry, "based on a methodology of systemic policy analysis and on its conceptual framework for confronting the delegitimization challenge....to contribute to understanding the strategic significance of the event and to suggest principles for preventing similar occurrences in the future."
