1. What Happened on the Mavi Marmara? An Analysis of the Turkel Commission Report
- Author:
- Norman Finkelstein
- Publication Date:
- 01-2014
- Content Type:
- Journal Article
- Journal:
- Turkish Journal of Middle Eastern Studies
- Institution:
- Sakarya University (SAU)
- Abstract:
- On 31 May 2010, Israeli commandos killed nine Turkish citizens aboard the Mavi Marmara, the flagship vessel of a humanitarian flotilla headed for besieged Gaza. The Israeli attack evoked international outrage, which caused Israel to appoint an official commission of inquiry chaired by former Israeli Supreme Court Judge Jacob Turkel. In January 2011, the Turkel Commission released a 300 page report that allegedly established what happened in the course of the Israeli assault. In fact, and unsurprisingly, the report was a grotesque whitewash of Israeli actions. Nonetheless this mendacious report effectively shielded Israel from further international scrutiny. A panel of inquiry created by UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon to resolve differences between Turkey and Israel over the Mavi Marmara killings “fully associated itself” - in the bitter words of the Turkish representative on the panel - with the the Turkel report’s findings. To date, no independent researcher has exposed in detail the dishonesty and fraud of the Turkel report. The purpose of my article is to fill this gap.
- Topic:
- Humanitarian Crisis
- Political Geography:
- Turkey and Israel