Defense Minister Ehud Barak said earlier Monday that the organizers of the Gaza aid flotilla were to blame for the violent events aboard the ship.

Barak voiced regret for the deaths, but called the flotilla a political provocation and said the sponsors of the flotilla were violent supporters of a terror organization.

Israel Defense Forces Chief of Staff Gabi Ashkenazi, meanwhile, said the soldiers were forced by violent activists to respond with live fire.

Deputy Foreign Minister Danny Ayalon said earlier Monday that the organizers of the Gaza aid flotilla have connections to international terrorist organizations such as Hamas and Al-Qaida, and called the aid convoy a violent and provocative attempt to break the blockade on Gaza.

“We couldn’t allow the opening of a corridor of smuggling arms and terrorists,” said Ayalon.

The left-wing activists on board a flotilla carrying aid to the Gaza Strip tried to lynch the Israel Navy commandos

The commandos were equipped with paintball guns but the non-lethal weapons were not enough against activists who charged in with batons.

“They beat us with metal sticks and knives, there was live fire at some point against us.”

source: Ha’aretz

Comment: so now we have it – innocent painball gun toting Israeli commandos were attacked by anti-Semitic terrorists from al-Qaeda with sticks, knives and guns; no, the commandos are not crazed murderers, they are the victims of a mob fully determined to organize a “Kristallnacht at sea”, and maybe a “maritime Holocaust”. Oy veh!!