Global General

Israel proposes inquiry with foreign observers

(Agencies)
Updated: 2010-06-03 22:36

Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu delivers a televised address at his office in Jerusalem June 2, 2010. Defending Israel's enforcement of its blockade of Gaza, Netanyahu said on Wednesday it was vital for the country's security and would stay in place. [Agencies]

JERUSALEM - Israel, deflecting a UN demand for an international investigation, proposed on Thursday an Israeli inquiry with the participation of outside observers into its lethal seizure of a Gaza-bound Turkish ship.

Israel's foreign minister, Avigdor Lieberman, embraced a US suggestion in an effort to calm a global furore over the killing of nine pro-Palestinian activists in Monday's naval commando operation.

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Turkish and foreign pro-Palestinian activists from the ship arrived in Istanbul to a hero's welcome and levelled charges of "war crimes" and unjustified killings at the Israeli marines who stormed the cruise liner Mavi Marmara.

In the occupied West Bank, US Middle East envoy George Mitchell said the "tragedy of the last week" must not undermine indirect negotiations he is mediating between Israel and the Palestinians, which he said were making some progress.

The head of a Turkish charity that organised the flotilla of ships carrying relief supplies in an attempt to break Israel's blockade of the Gaza Strip said activists had grabbed guns from 10 soldiers in self-defence and thrown the weapons overboard without having fired them.

"We told our friends on board: 'We will die, become martyrs, but never let us be shown... as the ones who used guns'," said Bulent Yildirim, chairman of the Foundation for Human Rights and Freedoms and Humanitarian Relief.

Israeli officers say their men opened fire to save their lives and that two of the ship's passengers shot at them with pistols seized from marines.

But Yildirim, who was aboard the Mavi Marmara, said: "By this decision, our friends accepted death, and we threw all the guns we took from them into the sea."

The United States, less outspoken than most of Israel's enemies and friends over the incident, backed calls from the European Union, Turkey and the United Nations for some form of international inquiry.

US Vice President Joe Biden suggested an Israeli probe with international involvement.