The legality of Israel’s attack on Mavi Marmaris
Posted on Wednesday 2 June, 2010
Filed Under Israel
ISRAEL attack on humanitarian aid vessel Mavi Marmaris was ‘perfectly legal, perfectly humane and very responsible’, the country’s ambassador to the US has insisted.
Michael Oren even adds: ‘Israel acted in accord with international law. Any state has the right to protect itself, certainly from a terrorist threat such as Hamas, including on the open seas.’
As I have made clear in the two posts below, this murderous and despicable assault evidences precious little humanity or responsibility. Legality, then, can only be a secondary consideration. But for what it’s worth, let’s consider the point in further detail.
From what specialist lawyers tell me, there is an arguable basis for the action, although as with any legal opinion, other interpretations are possible. However, widespread comparisons to piracy are certainly wide of the mark, as navies by definition cannot commit this crime.
Media interviews have seen Israeli government spokesman Mark Regev cite what he called the San Marino Memorandum in justification. There is no such document.
What everyone assumes he is talking about is the San Remo Manual on International Law Applicable to Armed Conflicts at Sea. You can read it here.
Compiled in 1994, the San Remo Manual represents a contemporary restatement of international law applicable to armed conflicts at sea. It was written under the auspices of the International Institute of Humanitarian Law, which is a respected and long-established non-governmental organisation. But the document does not have the force of law itself.
Section 67 (a) provides: ‘Merchant vessels flying the flag of neutral states may not be attacked unless they are believed on reasonable grounds to be carrying contraband or breaching a blockade, and after prior warning they intentionally and clearly refuse to stop, or intentionally and clearly resist visit, search or capture.’
The conduct of Mavi Marmaris was such that the clause could be read as giving Israel’s move prima facie legitimacy. However, alternative interpretations are possible.
For instance, look at S.42(a), which further states: ‘It is forbidden to employ methods or means of warfare which are of a nature to cause superfluous injury or unnecessary suffering.’
In any case, the stipulations of the San Remo Manual may not be decisive. As I understand matters, it can only be invoked in the case of armed conflict between states, and Israel refuses to recognise either Palestine as a whole or Gaza separately as a state. The attack will only be legal if the blockade itself is legal.
Piracy is defined by article 101 of part VII of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea. This states that piracy consists of ‘any illegal acts of violence or detention, or any act of depredation, committed for private ends by the crew or the passengers of a private ship or a private aircraft’.
As naval ships are not private ships, nothing that they do constitutes piracy in the narrow legal meaning of the term, in any circumstances. But just because Israel has the right to do something, that does not mean that it should go ahead and do it.
As Israeli statesman Abba Eban once famously quipped. the Arabs never miss an opportunity to miss an opportunity. But Netanyahu’s mistake is precisely that he never misses an opportunity to conflate legitimate use of force with a brutal display of strength.
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71 Responses to “The legality of Israel’s attack on Mavi Marmaris”
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I don’t think it has yet to be legally established what term should be applied to a state attacking an aid convoy on it’s way to bring relief to a people living in a open prison. Such is the unprecented nature of this crime.
I think many members of the international community have settled on state terrorism and piracy. Being a good democrat I will go along with that.
“As I have made clear in the two posts below, this murderous and despicable assault evidences precious little humanity or responsibility. Legality, then, can only be a secondary consideration. But for what it’s worth, let’s consider the point in further detail.”
Nice to see that you have made up your mind before considering the facts Dave.
For what its worth, and having considered the facts as presented and sourced it is clear that Israel acted legally, properly and with great restaint.
Peace actvists ? – These Jihadists have about as much conection with peace as Orwells Ministry of Peace.
GW
GW – yours is a minority view but not an uncommon one among the deranged pro zionist community. What level will Israel have to sink to in order for you lot to come to your senses…..no thinking about it there is clearly no level they can sink to that will not get scum like you supporting it.
Legality and war have nothing in common. War is about political and economic interest. Legality is just an opinion on law. It can be twisted either way to suit the view of the protagonists. I cannot recall a war being prevented by legality. Only intervention by the UN can sort out this embargo. The UN should be doing the embargo as they have declared Hamas a terrorist organisation. The UN should be checking the ships for munitions. The UN should have personnel at the ports to ensure the aid is going to the people and not feeding the Hamas machine. Hamas are being squeezed from all sides and do not like it. Some of the humanitarians have turned out to be Islamic protagonists playing into the hands of the Israelis. If the UN move in they will be attacked by Hamas. The honest commentator knows this is all about the intended destruction of the State of Israel.
You may be right, Dave, that, legally, maybe the Israeli military are not pirates according to the letter of the law but then ‘legitimate’ armies aren’t terrorist either, are they, even though their actions are.
For what it is worth, the the San Remo Manual does indeed provide legal justification that a boarding of a neutral vessel at sea can be lawful.
i did not think that was ever under dispute. the question is a quite different one of whether this particular boarding could be lawful in the exact circumstances:
i) the naval blockade of Gaza is not in itself considered lawful in the eyes of many experts, as its impact on the civilian population is disproportionate to the military benefit
ii) the relevent jurisdiction while on the high seas was Turkey, as the ship was Turkish flagged, and specifically Turkey doesn’t recognise the legality of the blockade. This is the important point. Either the Israelis are saying they are at war with Turkey in which case it is Israeli law in play, or they are not at war with Turkey, in which case the actions took place under Turkish jurisdiction, and it is the Turksih law which applies.
iii) the protocols for boarding were not conducted in such a way as to allow Israel to invoke the San Remo Manual as legal justification, as the law of the sea is interpreted in Turkey.
iv) Even if the boardng had been legal the violence used by the israelis was disproprtionate as judged by the relevent standard, which is the Turkish legal code.
If you follow the story as it is developing in the Turkish press, the view of the Turkish gpovernment, and the Turkish legal profession is that the boardings were not legal. Although of course this can only be settled either by Israel clarifying that they are at war with Turkey (taking the issue out of Turkish jursidiction) or by the case being decided by a Turkish court.
We await the Lloyd’s List report.
In the meantime is it not wholly obvious that the way to stop the Flottila was lost long before it began? One *very simple* move: end the blockade of Gaza!
The fact is that, c’est pire qu’un crime, c’est *une faute*.
That the Turkish groups involved are indeed well-known for their forceful reactions. Everyone knows this. The leaves on the trees of Ipswich and the cats in the gardens know this.
I suppose the Israeli intelligence did not?
Andrew Coates. I am sure the Brit,US,Canadian and possibly the Turk Govs knew this was going to happen. This boat was probably monitored ages ago. 7oo people boarding a holiday cruise ship! that has known Islamic fundamentalists onboard can hardly be kept secret. British intelligence would have known exactly where the friends of Palestine Brits were heading for.
If there is evidence that the Brits conspired with a known terrorist group then they should be arrested on return to the UK.
Jonno – Thank you7 for that honarable acolade – I shall wear it with honour. I clasiffy it at the same level as being called a Tory by the RSL !
GW
Hello Zionist Tory scum. Glad I helped you to find your inner self.
JOHNNO. Do you reckon Zionists are Tories!
By the way was Modernity on the flotilla, he seems to have gone very quiet as of late?
Dean. He was the British intelligence officer present!
Dave – It’ll be interesting to see what now happens with the Irish Ship…for which the Irish government has demanded free passage under international law…
“The Irish-owned MV Rachel Corrie, carrying 1,000 tonnes of aid, continued its lonely journey and was last night about 530 miles from the coast of Gaza, where it expects to be intercepted by the Israeli Navy. On board the 1,200-tonne vessel are 19 people — five Irish and six Malaysian passengers together with a crew of eight.”
No doubt Mad Mel will deduce that the Irish are all IRA Muslims (Provisional).
Hardly matters what mad mell says. The ship will be intercepted. The Irish Republic were slow in the uptake in taking on IRA terrorists. In fact an ex PM crook was a gunrunner. It did take a few bombs in their own backyard (Dublin) to waken them up from their docility.
Interesting how the Irish Government forgets thay their own naval fotce has no hesitation in opening fire on vessels whicj will not heave to and allow a search for contreband, and / or evidence of illegal fishing !
Still nothing a couple of 75mm bricks won’t cure.
GW
Nice to see jimmyglesga taking his usual brave anti-terrorist stance above by supporting the Dublin and Monaghan bombings.
Rejoice!!! The brave Turks got the matyrdom they sought! Rejoice!! To be serious for a moment, is Turkey’s endgame to split NATO and the UN? Let’s be honest here, and it’s bloody embaressing for President Obama. if it wasn’t for the BP oil slick, he’d be severely embaressed at home. And after he made a point of saying all those nice things and making kissy-face with the Islamic world, they turn round and do this to him!
A.Socialist. Typical of A Socialist to twist a comment. The bombings were a consequence of the IRA bombings in the North. Most killed were working class non Catholics. It has been admitted by a defector IRA bomber that was the policy. Stop calling yourself a socialist you scumbag. It is idiot IRA facsist pretend socialist apologists like you that devide the the working class. Crawl into your hole scumbag.
SueR. On a lighter note we should be campaigning to have a referendum on Turk entry to the EU. The Islamic nutters are waiting in their tens of thousands to enter Britain. The French will give them free passage!
“To be serious for a moment, is Turkey’s endgame to split NATO and the UN”
So it was Turks dressed as Israeli’s sliding down those ropes.
That is one excuse even Regev has not tried!
Try thinking politically, Dean, and not like a little boy.
Just read the accounts on the Sydney Morning Herald website. Yes, there were people killed who shouldn’t have bee, ie a doctor, a journalist etc but that’s what happens when mayhem breaks out. As Andrew Coates said, the real issue is whether it is right to blockade Gaza, the rest is just so much blather.
SueR…”Rejoice!!! The brave Turks got the matyrdom they sought! Rejoice!!”…. “Yes, there were people killed who shouldn’t have bee, ie a doctor, a journalist etc but that’s what happens when mayhem breaks out.”
Damn right! Spare those (very nice) professional docs and hacks and shoot the bloody lumpen Turks (not nice/muslim/unwashed)…Oh Sue, you do such a neat line in racist (and class-ist) fuckwitery. Always.
I suggest putting future actions like this to my Iraq invasion test – not “Is this legal?” but rather, “Is this a completely insane, needlessly inflammatory, counterproductive plan that’s guaranteed to end with a gigantic pile of corpses?”.
I think it works better as a way of avoiding cracked and deranged military adventures, myself. After all, all kinds of horrible behaviours are legal, but that doesn’t necessarily make them a good idea.
Perhaps Dick should acquaint himself with some facts before he throws accusations around. Another point is have people forgotton the Marxist definition of a state? Unless I’m wrong, it’s ‘a body of armed men’ so you can hardly complain when a state does what a state does. Nine is not a gigantic number anyway, although some other boats are trying to complain that people have disappeared, but did these boats have proper manifests? let’s see.
Were the seven Turkish naval soldiers killed by the PKK on Monday in Hatay province massacred? Or the 46 South Korean sailors drowned when their ship was sunk last week?
Dean. The UN have always been split. NATO will not split.
Richard Harris. The confrontation was deliberately stage managed. The martyrs got what they wanted. I am sure you support them. So what is your problem.
The kid glove policy of Israel is endangering its soldiers all for world opinion. That ship could easily have been sunk along with the fuckwit Islamic Turks. This sending troops house to house to weed out Hamas has to stop. If Hamas launch a missile from an occupied buiding the Israelis should blast it from a distance. Hamas do not give a fuck about their own civilians so why should Israel. Screw world opinion.
“Unless I’m wrong, it’s ‘a body of armed men’ so you can hardly complain when a state does what a state does.”
Yes, you are wrong. A vigilante mob or a gang of the Ku Klux Klan do not constitute a state. Plus, most states tend to avoid boarding ships on the open sea and killing the occupants. That tends to be the preserve of pirates.
Wrong Igor. Pirates board ships to make a profit from stealing the booty and the ransom of the occupants. Strange that you should use the KKK as an example moreso as they are as looney as the Islamists.
Igor,
I wouldn’t bother wasting time debating with Jimmy and SueR, they are total degenerates.
SueR even uses Marx’s ‘definition’ of the state to justify state action! Fucking unbelievable!
JOHNNO. I would not quote from Marx. Hardly relevant and no point. Just kill the enemy that is what matters. I would quote from Churchill.
JOHNNO. It will not be to long before that last bastion of Marxism North Korea becomes a democracy. What will you do JOHNNO take to the bottle perhaps. The little Hitler dictators are falling slowly but surely.
Flying Rodent – I don’t know if this action is so deranged as far as the Israeli state is concerned. They need to keep the siege in place so that Hamas-run Gaza does not seem preferable to the Israeli-checkpointed West Bank, and the state’s existence is based on the illegal refusal to allow refugees to return after the war of 1948. Perhaps the reaction to this action might force them to back off, but over the years the more outrageous their actions have been, the more they have forced the “international community”(aka the US government), with its policy of accepting that Israel’s view of its own security needs is the first priority, more latitude in pursuing its agenda.
Sue R…”the Marxist definition of a state? Unless I’m wrong, it’s ‘a body of armed men’ so you can hardly complain when a state does what a state does”
PRICELESS. Read and weep.
jimmy glesga- “Just kill the enemy that is what matters.”
Where? Aboard the flotilla or in Dublin and Monaghan?
“i would quote from Churchill”
What? Even though he gassed the Kurds??
Total degenerate.
A. Socialist. Yes to your first sentence as already stated. Your second sentence is a load of piss. I would quote from Churchill. Churchill did not gas the Kurds. You pretend degenerate socialist tosser.
Whether Churchill actually did gas them is hard to ascertain, what is clear is that he had no objection to doing so.
“I am strongly in favour of using poisoned gas against uncivilised tribes. The moral effect should be so good that the loss of life should be reduced to a minimum. It is not necessary to use only the most deadly gasses: gasses can be used which cause great inconvenience and would spread a lively terror and yet would leave no serious permanent effects on most of those affected.”
The Socialist Saddam Hussein did use gas against his own population just to try it out for effect. Socialists are rather quite about this.
“Just kill the enemy that is what matters.” I think you, Saddam and WSC are of one mind on this.
RicharD von Q. Have never spoken to either. Do not know their minds. Never will, will I.
Firstly, I said that if we apply Marx’s dictum on the nature of state power, we should not be surprised when states attack groups or other states. That is not a justification: although I know some people in this fetid atmosphere will regard the mere raising of a point as an endorsement. Secondly, i don’t know if Churchill said what was attributed to him, but assuming he did, I would like to know when exactly he said it? My own grandfather was very badly gassed in the First World War, in fact it took him a decade to get over it and it had implications for the rest of his life, many men never did recover, so I wonder if it was in that context that Churchill said there were instances when he would be prepared to use it? Not that he was not a barbarous, imperialist swine, (I’m sure he was), but I would like to know more about the circumstances.
James Glasgow:
“The Socialist Saddam Hussein did use gas against his own population just to try it out for effect. Socialists are rather quite about this.”
Bollocks, Labour MP’s Jeremy Corbyn and George Galloway raised the issue in Parliament, when all were silent over the West’s support for Hussein.
I should correct myself:
Bollocks, Labour MP’s Jeremy Corbyn and George Galloway raised the issue in Parliament, when all, apart from socialists, were silent over the West’s support for Hussein.
Sue R
He said this in the context of a revolt against the British mandate in Iraq in 1920.
Just to be clear: Gassing people is wrong, whether it’s British Tommies, European Jews or Kurds. it is not nice.
Also re: Sue R
it seems pretty certain that he said it, that was a quote from a War Office memo, what’s debatable is whether British forces actually ever implemented his recommendations
He probably did say it, all I am asking is for the date, I think you will find that will be relevant. We used it against the German troops on the front line, I was just looking at a site of World War I paintings and there were paintings of gassed German troops, so yes, gas was used, but I think for whatever reason, Europeans armies pulled back from using it on each other after the First World war. I am pretty sure they also ratifies treaties outlawing its use as well. There’s a very famous propaganda picture by John Singer Sergeant of a line of blinded British soldiers after a gas attack. It’s called ‘Gassed’. I don’t think gas was used at all in the Second World war in any of the theatres of war, maybe it wasn’t necessary or maybe war had become more humane(joke).
Just seen the comment about the British Mandate. i think we can assume that gas was NOT used, otherwise we would have heard about it.