From Salon:

Late last night, Israel attacked a flotilla of ships in international waterscarrying food, medicine and other aid to Gaza, killing at least 10 civilians on board and injuring at least 30 more (many reports now put the numbers at 19 dead and 60 injured).  The Israeli Defense Forces is claiming that its soldiers were attacked with clubs,  knives and “handguns” when they boarded the ship without permission, but none of the Israeli soldiers were killed while two are reported injured.  Those on the ships emphatically state that the IDF came on board shooting.  AnIDF spokesman said:  ”Our initial findings show that at least 10 convoy participants were killed.”

The six-ship flotilla was carrying 10,000 tons of humanitarian aid along with 600 people, all civilians, which included 1976 Nobel Peace Prize laureate Mairead Corrigan Maguire of Northern Ireland, European legislators and an elderly Holocaust survivor, Hedy Epstein, 85.  In December, 2008, Israel, citing rocket attacks from Hamas, launched a 22-day, barbaric attack on Gaza, bombarding a trapped population, killing hundreds of innocent civilians (1,400 Palestinians and 13 Israelis were killed), and devastating Gazan society.  A U.N. report released earlier this month documented that, as a result of the blockade imposed on Gaza by Israel and Egypt (the two largest recipients of U.S. aid), “[m]ost of the property and infrastructure damaged . . .  was still unrepaired 12 months later.”

Read the rest here.