Multiple legal assessments of the Gaza flotilla raid were published subsequent to the event. International law experts (and non-lawyers) differed over the legality of the action by Israel. The force necessary to respond to violent resistance and whether the force that was used was proportionate were disputed. Approximately one year after the event, the UN investigative committee for the 2010 Flotilla to Gaza concluded that (1) the blockade was legal, based on the principle of self-defense, (2) Israel was "justified in stopping vessels even outside its territorial waters," (3) Israel's decision to board the vessels with such force was "excessive," (4) Israeli forces "faced significant, organized and violent resistance from a group of passengers" that required them to use force for their own protection, and (5) the loss of nine lives was "unacceptable." It recommended that Israel immediately report its use of force to the United Nations Security Council for resolution as specified in Chapter VII of the United Nations Charter. Some, such as law experts Harvard Law School Professor Alan Dershowitz, Chicago Law School Professor Eric Posner, and Johns Hopkins International Law and Diplomacy Professor Ruth Wedgwood, said that the naval blockade, the boarding in international waters, and the use of force were in accord with long-standing international law. Dershowitz compared the blockade with the U.S. blockade of Cuba during the Cuban Missile Crisis and Posner with the Coalition blockade of Iraq during the first Gulf War. The United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, the International Committee of the Red Cross, the National Lawyers Guild's International Committee, Istanbul Bilgi University's Law Department Dean Turgut Tarhanlı and other experts have concluded that the blockade was itself illegal, or agreed with University of Dundee international law professor Robin Churchill that the boarding on the high seas was illegal even if the blockade were lawful, or agreed with international law professor Said Mahmoudi that the use of force was disproportionate and the raid was therefore illegal even if the blockade and the boarding in international waters were lawful. An investigation by a panel of legal experts convened by the UN determined that the use of force by the Israeli military was disproportionate, that the Israeli military violated international law, and found clear evidence sufficient for war crimes prosecutions under the Fourth Geneva Convention - which defines humanitarian protections for civilians in a war zone and prohibits total war. The issue of possible violation of international law was discussed at the UN Security Council. The United States blocked a draft resolution criticizing Israel proposed by Turkey, the Palestinians, and Arab nations.
Legality of blockade
Arguments opposing legality of blockade The United Nations Charter requires that nations avoid the use of force when settling external conflicts, and that human rights be respected with regards to internal conflicts. Nations which use force in self-defense are required to immediately report these measures to the United Nations Security Council so that it can fulfill its role of ensuring peace. The United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, Navanethem Pillay, has condemned Israel's blockade of Gaza on multiple occasions, calling it "a direct contravention of international human rights and humanitarian law. It must end now”. The "United Nations Fact Finding Mission on the Gaza Conflict" in its Goldstone Report said:
1733. The Mission ... considers that the series of acts that deprive Palestinians in the Gaza Strip of their means of subsistence, employment, housing and water, that deny their freedom of movement and their right to leave and enter their own country, that limit their rights to access a court of law and an effective remedy, could lead a competent court to find that the crime of persecution, a crime against humanity, has been committed.
The International Committee of the Red Cross said that Israel's blockade violated the Geneva Conventions and stated that it constituted a collective punishment imposed in clear violation of Israel's obligations under international humanitarian law. Dr. Turgut Tarhanlı, dean of the Istanbul Bilgi University's Law Department, cited the concept of innocent passage, under which vessels are granted safe passage through territorial waters in a manner which is not "prejudicial to the peace, good order or the security" of the state. He said that:
the Convention on the Law of the Sea stipulates that a coastal state may consider intervention if a ship is engaged in arms and drug smuggling, the slave trade or terrorist activities. However, the case with the aid boats is totally different. They set sail in accordance with the Customs Act and are known to be carrying humanitarian aid, not weapons or ammunition. According to the Convention on the Law of the Sea, Israel was not entitled to launch a military operation against the boats and activists. With regard to the Gaza–Jericho Agreement, Diana Buttu, a Palestinian-Canadian lawyer and former spokesperson for the Palestine Liberation Organization, said that Israel declared the Oslo Accords dead in 2001, and actually breached the agreements, so that a call to the applicability of the Gaza-Jericho Agreement is not plausible. Douglas Guilfoyle, a lecturer at University College of London since 2007 who authored Shipping Interdiction and the Law of the Sea in 2009, told Aljazeera that, while a blockade is a recognized tool of warfare, a close look should be taken as to whether there was proper notification of the Gaza blockade, and whether it inflicted "excessive damage to the civilian population in relation to the concrete military advantage expected". Amnesty International, in a report dated June 1, 2010, included the opinion that "As a form of collective punishment, Israel's continuing blockade of Gaza is a flagrant violation of international law." The European Parliament, in a June 14, 2010 resolution, called the Gaza blockade "collective punishment in contravention of international humanitarian law" and demanded its immediate cessation.
Arguments supporting legality of blockade
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