Ready! Aim! Shoot Yourself In The Foot!

Sometimes the ability of the government of Israel (GOI) to blunder is nothing less than mind blowing. The deadly confrontation between "peace activists" and the commandos of the Israeli navy is one of those times. To put the matter short, sharp, and accurate, it was a needless, counterproductive blunder which a responsible government never would have contemplated, let alone authorized.

The drama unfolded almost as slowly and compelling in its foreboding as the long, slow, majestically threatening progress of the Royal Navy to the Falkland Islands almost thirty years ago. To a person of a classical bent, the coming of the clash between boatloads of pro-Palestinian propagandists, assorted I-hate-Israel-and-Jews types, and general malcontents and the naval forces of Israel unrolled with the inevitability of Nemesis confronting the hubris laden protagonist in an Athenian tragedy.

The Turkish sponsored maritime cavalcade of unneeded "relief" and "humanitarian" supplies accompanied by terrorists, terrorist apologists, and terror tourists was intended to put GOI on the spot. An uncomfortable, no-way-to-spell-winner sort of spot. The hugely publicized international flotilla departing from points as far removed as Ireland, Algeria, and Turkey was simply bait waved in a most attractive way before GOI. The hope and prayer of the organizers of this exercise in fraudulent humanitarianism was that GOI would take the bait--preferably in the most visible and bloody way possible.

Given the resources available to GOI, there can be no doubt but the information concerning the motives and goals of the flotilla folks was available. Given the vast experience GOI has collected regarding hostile provocations, there can be no doubt but GOI understood what was at stake if the navy was sent in to block the boats and their passengers from reaching Gaza.

There must have been both information and understanding within GOI and the IDF that among the passengers there would be individuals prepared for violence. Eager to go violent should the opportunity present itself.

GOI should have known that blood would flow if Israeli forces boarded any of the vessels, particularly either of the two largest, most passenger packed ones. If ordered in, the commandos would have been entering a red ant nest. At least some of the ants would bite.

The constant warnings issued multiple times per day the past week by GOI were seen by the oncoming "activists" not as a reason to be cowed, but as one of an emboldening nature. The warnings were correctly read as signifying the Israelis would enter one or more ships violently. Those who were primed to respond violently were fully prepared, stoked up, and good to go.

In the wake of the operation, GOI has protested that its troops were met with steel bars, knives, and, at least some firearms. The GOI and IDF spokesmen have stated that their threatened troops used "crowd dispersal methods, including live fire."

Duh!

How drearily predictable. Troops abseil from helicopters in hours of darkness. Troops are met with immediate low scale violence, clubs and knives rather than automatic weapons and RPGs. Troops respond in self-defense. "Activists" die. Outrage erupts from Tehran to Europe. Israel gets big, very black eye in global media and the hordes of politicians and opinion molders for whom Israel has become the blackest of black hats.

Hamas wins. Hezbollah wins. Even the hapless Palestinian Authority wins. On the margins, Iran wins; Syria wins: Islamists everywhere win.

Wow! GOI made one shrewd move here. Right on the heels of being branded by 188 countries as a sort of nuclear brigand, Israel now looks as if it has once more adopted the role of Goliath while the role of poor, little, ole David goes to the minions of Hamas and their external supporters.

Game, set, and match to the bad guys.

One has to wonder what sort of mental pathology infected the presumably mature, intelligent, and responsible members of GOI and the senior ranks of the IDF. Did they really, really believe that so much lethal hardware would be smuggled into Gaza among the air conditioners, aspirin, generators, and one-size-fits-all burkas as to present a threat to Israel?

Of course there were warlike stores on board the humanitarian fleet. Even if weapons were conspicuous in their absence, the cement and other building supplies would more likely go to the construction of bunkers for Hamas' security forces than for civilians displaced during Cast Lead.

Or, did the Deep Thinkers and Grand Strategists of GOI really, really convince themselves that Israel would suffer such a blow to its credibility should the "activists" make it to Gaza as to so embolden Hamas and other Islamist jihadist groups as to be the equivalent of a major defeat in the battle for public opinion throughout the world? Is the current situation somehow preferable? Is it more in keeping with the national and strategic interests of Israel that GOI and the IDF be portrayed as a collection of blood drenched thugs interchangeable in all respects with the Waffen SS?

An unfortunate ground truth is that public opinion in Europe and even the US has shifted slowly but with increasing speed away from Israel and to the Palestinians. The shift commenced during the First Intifada when TV cameras gave fine images of Palestinian kids confronting M-16 toting IDF personnel. The shots of the IDF shooting real bullets or Shin Bet operatives conducting beatings moved opinion to the side of the Palestinians.

There is an even more unfortunate ground truth acting in tandem with that of opinion shift. In recent decades the image and not the substance, the appearance rather than the reality is the critical factor in war and diplomacy as it is in domestic politics.

The realities of the First or Second Intifadas matter nothing as compared to the images conveyed, the perceptions manipulated by these images, and the actions forced on governments by the collective impact of the perceptions. GOI must be aware of this as its members must know perfectly well the imperatives contained in the twin ground truths mentioned.

Even if the collective memory of GOI is too short to recall the two Intifadas, it must comprehend the impact of Operation Cast Lead. The compelling justifications for this legitimate act of self-defense including the supine reaction of the UN to repeated GOI requests for action count as nothing against the images and perceptions captured, manipulated by forces quite hostile to Israel.

Regardless of its military or political successes, Operation Cast Lead was a disaster for Israel in the most critical venue, that of public perception and opinion. The same calculus applies to the IDF descent upon the "humanitarian flotilla."

The reality that those on board landed the first blow or fired the first shot does not matter in the slightest. Nor does it matter in the least that the commandos fired in self-defense or to rescue comrades captured by the "activists."

All that matters is the existence of ten, or fourteen, or sixteen corpses. The cadavers of those "activists" unfortunate enough to be in the impact zone are the symbols of victory. Victory for Hamas and its ideological ilk.

The sorrow and pity in this latest defeat for Israeli interests is found in its quite unnecessary nature. Unlike Operation Cast Lead, there is and can be no compelling justification (unless an atomic bomb, or, less impossible, a flask of anthrax is found on board one of the ships) for the assault and its predictable results.

As the sequelae of this defeat are played out in the weeks and months to come, GOI must keep in mind the reason for any and all negative effects. Any gangrene which sets in for the national and strategic interests of Israel will be the result of a self-inflicted wound.