WASHINGTON (JTA) — The Zionist Organization of America called for an investigation of Turkey’s role in last week’s flotilla incident.
Israeli commandos raided an aid flotilla headed for Gaza trying to breach an Israeli maritime blockade in the early morning on May 31. Nine activists aboard the main ship were killed and seven Israeli soldiers were wounded in the subsequent melee.
"The ZOA calls for an investigation of Turkey, the country in which the organization assisting Islamist terrorists and responsible for the flotilla is based; from which the flotilla set sail; and whose government wrongly assured that the flotilla cargo had been duly inspected and found to consist purely of humanitarian supplies and included no weapons," the ZOA said in a June 1 statement.
There have been conflicting accounts, backed by video, of which side started the brawl.
While it has been established that activists on board the main boat attacked incoming troops, it is not yet clear if the tools they used — pipes and other heavy objects — were stored for weapons use or were found objects.
Israeli commandos commandeered five other boats in the flotilla without incident.
A number of nations, including Turkey, have called for an investigation.
Israel, which had offered to dock the ships in its own ports and then to deliver the humanitarian goods, says the Gaza blockade is necessary to isolate Hamas, the terrorist group that controls Gaza.
