Gaza Flotilla: Is This a New Theory of "Direct Action"?

There are a great number of people who will have many more informed -- and obsessed -- opinions on the Gaza flotilla than I do, but even so, I have a few questions. The flotilla was led by the pro-Palestinian Free Gaza Movement and a Turkish organization, Insani Yardim Vakfi, which some have claimed has ties to terrorists.

I'm concerned about the groups that call themselves peace and solidarity groups, however, who say they do not use terrorism, and who may use direct action, but generally don't directly use *violent* direct action. I have a question for them.

Is this a new theory of "direct action," which you wrap in humanitarian action in order to make the cause more appealing and distract from any violence or provoking of violence with the humanitarian mission?

If so, I have considerable moral queasiness about the mixing of humanitarian action with direct action, which is violent action, or non-violent action designed to provoke the use of force by authorities for the sake of a cause. I also question the extremist notion of "direct action" in the first place, for this cause or any cause -- it comes out of the theories of Marx and Lenin about revolutionary struggle, and advocates a theory that "the end justifies the means" which I find unacceptable. There is a long history of *non-violent* direct action in the United States, but this idea of wrapping in a humanitarian mantle the calculated actions that will produce a use of force strikes me as a recent -- and immoral -- innovation (I tend to think "direct action" itself is immoral, given its calculated "ends justifies the means" credo, but I'd likely find disagreement there, as many people think "direct action" can be justified if the cause is urgent enough).

Humanitarian groups spend a great deal of time distinguishing their errand of mercy from the operations of state combatants and the causes of armed militants. They are non-violent in their credo. There is disagreement, of course, as some non-governmental organizations, often those that get government aid, are willing to take armed escorts.

And human rights groups generally refrain from using or advocating violence regarding their own movement or other social movements, but this consensus, once espoused by Amnesty International's definition of "prisoners of conscience," is breaking down. We saw with Amnesty International's conflict with its gender adviser (who ultimately resigned) the appearance of a notion of "defensive jihad", i.e. militant Islamists could use violence in opposing what they saw as overwhelming force. There's a discussion to be had about the difference between that notion of "defensive jihad" and the always-disputed definition of terrorism, but these flotilla participants were not invoking any concept of "defensive jihad" when they went out (that we know of).

It's important to note as well that outside these more radical "solidarity" groups driven by different ideologies than universal human rights, that by and large, there is a sense among NGOs, that you do not mix military action with humanitarian and human rights action. No major organized humanitarian organization was involved in this Gaza flotilla, possibly because they may have wished to avoid appearing with an action that planned a violent confrontation. There were no CARE packages on this ship.

The various European, Turkish and other leaders of this operation make it very clear that the humanitarian mission -- bringing tons of food, construction supplies, and wheel-chairs -- was in fact a kind of cover for their overwhelming purpose which was to demonstrably break the military blockade imposed by the state of Israel on the Occupied Territories.

In a statement quoted by Associated Press of Greta Berlin of Free Gaza, an organizer of the action, says:

"What we're trying to do is open a sea lane between Gaza and the rest of the world," Greta Berlin said in Cyprus. "We're not trying to be a humanitarian mission. We're trying to say to the world, 'You have no right to imprison a million and a half Palestinians.'"

Since when do unarmed people's movements open up sea lanes? That's an act that usually you can only accomplish by war, not by "non-violent direct action".

I'll set aside the arguments that people in Gaza are "imprisoned" or, as is often said rhetorically, "in an open-air prison"; whatever truth might be found about those *results* the *path for how they got in this predicament* is being wilfully ignored with rhetorical statements like Berlin's: they got there due to a blockade that was in response to Hamas' use of terrorism and shooting of missiles into Israeli territory. 

Berlin isn't trying to make an argument for a new form of direct action that uses humanitarian missions, however. She is explicit here that in fact she's not really on a humanitarian mission, although she has chosen the symbol of a boat laden with humanitarian assistance as the prop for her direct action. She appears not to be morally troubled by this mixture of political direct action and the humanitarian mission; I am. If you don't want aid to be politicized -- and it is the belief of these activists that Palestinians are not receiving sufficient food, and that it is deliberately withheld for political reasons -- then don't exploit an aid mission for political ends yourself.

The entire feel of this action for me was something like people going off to fight in the Spanish Civil War. That is, they didn't exactly take up guns explicitly, but they felt they were nobly going off to fight a cause, where they knew they'd more than likely face gunfire and arrest. Tapes have emerged that appear to show even training with the use of weapons and a planned violent response. What was really the intent, and how informed were the leaders of the intents of all the participants?

The expectations of the leaders of the flotilla, unlike the expectations of those now dead, is easy to find on the Internet:

At commondreams.org you can read the missive of Ann Wright, one of the participants before the ship set sail. Here's the headline: 

"Breaking the Israeli Siege of Gaza May Lead to an Attack at Sea, Detention Camps and Deportation".

Reading how calculated the staging of this incident was, you have to wonder at a lot of the commentary that indicates shock or surprise of the response they got from Israel. Here's what Ann Wright tells us *before* the trip about how she believes events will unfold:

In less than 48 hours, the Israeli Navy will probably fire U.S. made ammunition and rockets in international waters over the bows of two U.S. flagged boats and one Greek boat with U.S. citizens aboard as well as citizens from 13 other countries and over the bows of the Turkish 600 passenger ship.