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http://gazatvnews.com Report for CPS Gaza Mission 20/07/11 — Attacked Again by Israeli Navy.
The Oliva left the port at 8:20 am this morning. There were 3 press teams accompanying us and their members were divided amongst the Oliva and 2 hasakas. When we set out for sea we had 10 other vessels with us, 8 of which were carrying fishermen and the other 2 were carrying the media crew. Representatives from The Guardian, Egyptian Satellite Channel (ESC) and Malaysian Television documented today’s events. As usual, we were well within the 3 mile limit when we saw the first warship. They paced us for a few minutes and then started circling us, similar to what they had done on Sunday, except they made sure to keep a further distance today. Although this was supposed to intimidate us, we stayed in the area, hoping that maybe a few fishermen would be able to do some fishing. Realistically, we were too close to shore and the turbulence was disrupting all fishing operations. Another warship showed up to join in the intimidation charades and both ships started sounding their sirens at us for no apparent reason other than to scare us away from the area. After a few minutes of this, the hasaka boat carrying the reporter from Malaysian TV and the ESC crew decided to go back to the port. The cameraman from Malaysian TV was on the Oliva along with me, Joe and Captain Salah and the hasaka carrying the crew from the Guardian remained at sea with us. Reporter Harriet Sherwood from the Guardian-Jerusalem Office was live-tweeting everything as it happened, you can follow her and read her tweets here: http://twitter.com/#!/harrietsherwood After the two warships circled us for about 30 minutes, one of them turned west and started to move away from the area. We saw a third ship appear to the north of us, heading south with it’s water canon running. It drove towards us quickly and once reaching a distance of about 200 meters the other ship that had been circling us turned and drove south. The two warships that were originally harassing us watched from approximately 1 mile away as the third boat moved towards us and began hitting the Oliva and crew with its water canon. It’s clear the Israeli Navy is after the Oliva, they’ve had enough of us. As I said in a previous post I wasn’t sure how sustainable the project would be. For a while we were able to offer some sort of protection to the fishermen and they were encouraged to defy Israel’s illegal blockade. I know for a fact that Oliva’s presence was making some kind of a difference at sea because several fishermen have told me that there were days where the Oliva would head back to port and they would stay at sea longer to continue fishing and the Zionists had waited until after the Oliva left to open fire on their boats. For a few days it seemed that the press was providing the Oliva with some form of protection from attacks but having the press present for every mission is even less sustainable than the CPS Gaza/Oliva project itself. The ship that was attacking the Oliva today steadily pelted us with high pressure streams for about 20 minutes. We’ve known since Thursday that their intention is to sink or capsize the Oliva, either for the purpose of arresting the crew or simply putting a hitch in our operation in the hopes that we will not return to sea or at least will not be able to return to sea until the boat can be replaced. It became very difficult to steer the boat, the crew, captain and cameraman were ducking. The Zionists were aiming the water canon directly at the head of anyone who tried to stand up and take control of the wheel. At one point the Zionists rammed its side into the Oliva–still pelting us with water. After this the captain ordered us to exit the boat and we all boarded a hasaka. From the new point of view, away from the forced of the water, I was able to see a large maniacal clown poster on the side of their ship–another twisted form of intimidation. The captain stayed on the Oliva for a while longer. The boat was half-way full with water when we exited it and back at the port we found out that the fan of the engine had fallen off, presumably when the warship knocked itself into us. Some Palestinian fishermen took over the Oliva and Captain Salah boarded a different hasaka. We stayed at sea observing the warship and waiting to escort the Oliva back to the port. The Israelis shouted repeatedly in Arabic for the Oliva to stop, “wa-qef Oliva! wa-qef Oliva! Oliva, wa-qef! wa-qef al-safineh!” This translates to “Stop, Oliva! Stop, Oliva! Oliva, stop! Stop the ship!” The Palestinians that had boarded the Oliva and had taken control over it did not stop but rather helped to tie ropes attaching the boat to two hasakas which proceeded to tow it away from the Israelis. Salah re-boarded the Oliva and all of the men on board started bailing out the water as the smaller boats towed them to the port. The crew and the Oliva managed to escape once again. It’s interesting that after the crew left the boat, the Israeli Navy seemed more concerned with the Oliva itself than with the people that were on it. We already know from previous interactions with them that they would like to arrest us, however some of us think that they prefer to drive us off of the boat and simply destroy the boat or tow it to Ashdod without having to deal with arresting and deporting internationals. If they arrested us they would be forced to deal with explaining why the arrests took place in territorial waters that they do not claim jurisdiction over in their weak attempt to pretend that it’s “no longer occupied.” There’s no doubt about it, the Israelis want the Oliva gone. They know that our presence has helped to empower the fishermen and encourage them to defy the illegal blockade. They know what we do out there and they’ve made it clear that they don’t like it and they’ve had enough. Several press representatives have asked if our intention is simply to antagonize the Israeli Navy. I don’t care what it appears that we are doing, the fact is that when this campaign started we had very little up-close interaction with the Israelis and were somewhat effective in helping to make the fishermen feel like they had a safe area to fish. We do not go out to sea to antagonize the Israelis, we don’t even have to reach 3 nautical miles before encountering them; they wait for us and taunt us along with the fishermen, hoping that we will do something antagonistic that might excuse the use of force against us. Our goal in continuing to go out to sea is to try, in spite of the Zionists’ actions, to provide our service in documenting their crimes at sea in the hopes of deterring their harassment against the fishermen. The Zionists seem to be less and less concerned with people observing and reporting their crimes as they had no problem attacking us today in the presence of media. It raises the questions of to what extent will we actually be able to continue to help the fishermen and how CPS Gaza might improve its tactics. The crew and some project supervisors will meet tonight to discuss our next mission and what should be done from here. If we can manage to fix the engine fac and some other damage to the gears then we will go out to sea tomorrow morning. I know I’m late on updates about the tunnels and the mental health center but whenever these things happen to the Oliva, my attention and work time gets monopolized. I’ll have that other stuff up within the week.
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