Why is Israel Terrified of a Ship Full of Women?
The Stalled Voyage of St. Mariam
By RANNIE AMIRI | August 27, 2010
The bloody wake left by the Mavi Marmara after the May 31 Israeli commando raid has not deterred 50 female activists from trying to break the four-year-old siege of Gaza. To hear Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak speak of their planned relief effort, one would think the very existence of Israel was at stake.
The women plan to set sail aboard the Saint Mariam, a Bolivian-flagged cargo ship named in honor of the Virgin Mary, a figure sacred to both Christians and Muslims. Although they intend to depart from Tripoli, Lebanon, the crew is not only composed of multi-faith Lebanese but foreign nationals as well, including a group of nuns from the United States. So as not to give Israel pretext to attack, Hezbollah deliberately did not sponsor the mission nor were any members allowed to participate.
Its cargo? Books, toys, medical instruments and supplies, and most importantly, anticancer medication.
The ship cannot sail directly from Tripoli to Gaza since Lebanon and Israel remain technically at war (and Israel controls Gaza’s territorial waters) and thus must pass through a third country first. The Mariam was scheduled to leave for Cyprus last Sunday but authorities in Nicosia, capitulating to Israeli pressure, prohibited use of its ports for vessels departing to Gaza. Without the green light from Cyprus, Lebanon’s Transport and Public Works Minister Ghazi Aridi was forced to cancel the voyage until another country with whom Lebanon enjoys maritime relations could be found. Negotiations with Greece are now under way.
Barak, however, was outraged at the very notion that Lebanon would even consider allowing the Mariam to sail, characterizing its mission as “… a provocation intended to aid a terror organization.”
He went on: “The ship that is preparing to sail from Lebanon has nothing to do with humanitarianism … If the ship insists on arriving, in opposition to the current blockade, Israel will be forced to stop it and bring it to the port of Ashdod.”
The Israeli delegation to the United Nations submitted a formal complaint to both the Secretary-General and the Security Council, indicating Israel reserves the right to use “all necessary measures” to prevent the Mariam—and the toys and medications it carries—from docking in Gaza.
No rational person believes the all-women crew presents a physical or armed threat to Israel, either by their persons or cargo.
So why is Israel so terrified of the Mariam?
It has nothing to do with the activists, Hezbollah or even Hamas. What it does involve is ensuring the continuation of collective punishment of Gazans, who continue to wither under a four-year material and economic embargo.
It is why innocuous items like wheelchairs, crutches, books, crayons, or even chemotherapy pose such a threat; any relief provided to Palestinians not under the direct jurisdiction of Israel jeopardizes its role as sole arbiter of deciding whether to enforce or relax punishment of civilians. Only the occupying power has this right.
Collective punishment is an illegal and heinous form of warfare, and Gaza’s Palestinians have suffered from it as retribution for overwhelmingly electing Hamas to govern in the January 2006 parliamentary elections.
If the Mariam is allowed to sail and Israel cannot find justification to stop the nuns, doctors, lawyers, journalists, human rights workers and a pop star aboard from landing—if they are permitted to break the siege—then the Gaza shore could soon become inundated with ships, vessels and relief flotillas from the world over. And the myth of Israel as invincible regional superpower would, yet again, be shattered.
This is why Israel is terrified of a ship full of women, and why they are being demonized.
Rannie Amiri is an independent Middle East commentator. He may be reached at: rbamiri@yahoo.com
7 Comments »
Leave a reply to Doug P. Cancel reply
Featured Video
Suzanne Humphries – Dissolving Illusions
or go to
Aletho News Archives – Video-Images
From the Archives
Revisionist History Books Banned by Amazon
By Michael Hoffman • Unz Review • August 25, 2018
On August 13, 2018 Amazon banned Judaism’s Strange Gods: Revised and Expanded, which was published in 2011 and sold by Amazon for the past seven years. Along with the much larger study, Judaism Discovered, (sold by Amazon since 2008), it has had an international impact both as a softcover volume as well as a digital book circulating on the Amazon Kindle.
Sales to India, Japan and the Middle East were rapidly growing. The digital Kindle format is particularly important for the free circulation of books because it bypasses borders and customs and hurdles over the prohibitive cost of shipping which the US Postal Service imposed on mail to overseas destinations several years ago (eliminating economical surface mail).
Amazon has also banned The Great Holocaust Trial: The Landmark Battle for the Right to Doubt the West’s Most Sacred Relic (sold by Amazon since 2010).
These volumes maintain a high standard of scholarly excellence, had a majority of favorable reviews by Amazon customers, are free of hatred and bigotry and have sold thousands of copies on Amazon. Out of the blue we were told that suddenly “Amazon KDP” discovered that the books are in violation of Amazon’s “content guidelines.” Asking for documentation of the charge results in no response. It is enough that the accusation has been tendered. The accused are guilty until proved innocent, although how proof of innocence is presented is anyone’s guess. There is no appeals process. This is what is known as “Tech Tyranny.”
There is a nationwide purge underway that amounts to a new McCarthyism — blacklisting and banning politically incorrect speech and history books under the rubric of “hate speech” accusations, initiated in part by two Zionist thought police organizations, the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) and the Anti-Defamation League (ADL). It’s a flimsy pretext for censoring controversial scholarly books that can’t be refuted.
In addition to our books being hate-free, we note that there are hundreds of hate-filled Zionist and rabbinic books brimming with ferocious bigotry for Palestinians, Germans and goyim in general, which are sold by Amazon. … continue
Blog Roll
Recent Comments
papasha408 on The Empire of Lies: How the BB… loongtip on US Weighs Port Restrictions on… Bill Francis on Chris Minns Defends NSW “Hate… Sheree Sheree on I was canceled by three newspa… Richard Ong on Czech–Slovak alignment signals… John Edward Kendrick on Colonel Jacques Baud & Nat… eddieb on Villains of Judea: Ronald Laud… rezjiekc on Substack Imposes Digital ID Ch… loongtip on US strikes three vessels in Ea… eddieb on An Avoidable Disaster Steve Jones on For Israel, The Terrorist Atta… cleversensationally3… on Over Half of Germans Feel Unab…
Aletho News- Israeli military superiority undermines US interests: Report
- Pentagon’s claim of China’s ICBM a pretext for US to upgrade nuclear power: FM
- US’ ‘100x More Powerful’ Battleship Dreams Vs. Hard Reality
- Trump Debuts the Next US Navy Ship Disaster
- Ukraine: Does Europe Work for a Stalled Conflict?
- EU country seizes gold and luxury watches from ex-Ukrainian prosecutor general – media
- Zelensky Says Some US Security Guarantees to Ukraine Will Not Be Made Public
- Ukrainian investigative journalist ‘kidnapped’ by draft officers
- Australia evaluates purchase of Israeli AI-powered weapons used in Gaza: Report
- US war hawk senator calls for seizure of Russian oil tankers
- If Americans Knew
- Int’l NGOs may be blocked from Gaza starting Jan. 1 – Not a Ceasefire Day 74
- From Churches to ChatGPT: Israeli Contracts Worth Millions Aim to Influence U.S. Public Opinion
- Who is the Pro-Israel Clique behind TikTok’s US Takeover?
- Medical Crisis in UK Prisons – 800 Doctors Warn of ‘Imminent Deaths’ Among Palestine Action Strikers
- The New York Times ignores an essential part of the Jeffrey Epstein story — Israel
- Trump’s Gaza grift and starving children – Not a Ceasefire Day 73
- Anti-Palestinian Billionaires Will Now Control What TikTok Users See
- Israel is directly responsible for babies freezing to death – Not a Ceasefire Day 72
- U.S. Pastors Become Willing Ambassadors for Israel’s War
- The 2028 Presidential Candidates – TrackAIPAC Scoresheet
- No Tricks Zone
- Merry Christmas Everybody!
- Two More New Studies Show The Southern Ocean And Antarctica Were Warmer In The 1970s
- Der Spiegel Caught Making Up Reports About Conservative America (Again)
- New Study: 8000 Years Ago Relative Sea Level Was 30 Meters Higher Than Today Across East Antarctica
- The Wind Energy Paradox: “Why More Wind Turbines Don’t Always Mean More Power”
- New Study Reopens Questions About Our Ability To Meaningfully Assess Global Mean Temperature
- Dialing Back The Panic: German Physics Prof Sees No Evidence Of Climate Tipping Points!
- Astrophysicist Dr. Willie Soon Challenges The Climate Consensus … It’s The Sun, Not CO2
- Regional Cooling Since The 1980s Has Driven Glacier Advance In The Karakoram Mountains
- Greenland Petermann Glacier Has Grown 30 Kilometers Since 2012!
Aletho News 
“Why is Israel Terrified of a Ship Full of Women?”
Because they know that the West is a feminist domain.
The outrage for 19 men killed on the Navi Marmara would pale in comparison if Israel kills even only 1 woman of that ship.
Thats why they scared. On the Mavi Marmara, a ship 98% composed of MEN, they knew the could SHOOT AND KILL. On this ship, composed 100% of women, they know THEY CANT SHOOT otherwise the Feminist West, who thinks the life of a woman has more value than the life of a man, will react like it never did before against Israel.
LikeLike
Israel is far from afraid of a womens boat or a mans boat, get a life guys, seriously!!
This is my country you are talking about here and I know we are not afraid of you idiots or any other, so grow up!
LikeLike
Israel Muse,
Israel is a political country. The land belongs to the Palestinians, not to you and the jews. Your country is in Georgia by the name of Khazar. Check your origin. Get a life, dead seriously !!!!!!!!!!
LikeLike
Ok,but please STAY in your filthy,Marxist/Fascist state.
LikeLike
The explanation of the author of the article as to why they don’t want the ship there, in my opinion, ‘is the correct one’. It is not ‘rocket science’ at all…
LikeLike
“Then he listed those things that Zionists do not fear: They do not fear military power – they’ve more than enough of their own and anyway, they know that anyone who has military power is far more likely to support them rather than oppose them. They do not fear anti-Semitism — on the contrary they feed on it to create sympathy for their cause. They do not really fear denouncers of Holocaust exploitation — the Norman Finkelsteins and the Peter Novicks — so long as they do not challenge the Holocaust itself. After all, the fiercest critic of something can (albeit often unwittingly) become its staunchest guardian — (If Norman Finkelstein says it, it must be true.) They do not even fear anti-Zionism, since Zionism, like Jewish power itself, has the wondrous ability to transform itself into anything it wants — left/right, religious/secular, one-state/two-state — all provide fertile ground for Zionism and Jewish particularity. Nor do they much fear attacks on the founding myths of Israel — that is, all of them except one. Finally, they do not even fear being called Judeo-Nazis. On the contrary, being labeled by one’s adversaries as a Nazi merely affirms that “Nazi” is the very worst thing imaginable.
He then told his audience what Zionists do fear: They fear the weapons of those who have nothing left to lose — the poor and the weak. They fear the stones and suicide bombers of the Palestinian Intifada — and they fear the weapons of that other intifada — the words of the revisionists.”
from The Holocaust Wars by Paul Eisen
LikeLike
Israel is a communist/ apartheid country ….these are not legit jews …they are ashkenazi jews from the Soviet Union.
The land belongs to the Palestinians.
LikeLike