This week marks the 47th anniversary of the infamous yet almost
forgotten attacks by an ostensible ally on a virtually-defenseless United States
Navy technical research ship, the USS Liberty.
On that bright summer day, June 8, 1967, the nation of Israel launched a series of unprovoked air and sea assaults on the Liberty while it sat in international waters off the Sinai Peninsula during the 6-Day War in that region.
Those bloody attacks resulted in the deaths of 34 American crewmen, severely wounded 174 others, and caused millions of dollars in damage and came after more than nine hours of close surveillance by Israeli Air Force planes during which pilots circled the ship at low level thirteen different times to determine its identity before initiating the treachery against a ship representing the only true ally Israel had on the planet.
Clearly marked and displaying a 13 foot long American flag after initially flying a standard flag which was shot down by Israeli Mirages, it constituted a literal impossibility for those pilots to misidentify the Liberty.
In addition, nearby Spanish, Lebanese, and German radio operators heard and recorded the Israeli pilots advising their headquarters that this was in fact an American ship and not Egyptian, advisories disregarded by their HQ commanders who still authorized the attacks.
When the sorties, assisted by an Israeli torpedo boat and repeated strafing, failed to sink the Liberty, the Israeli government concocted elaborate excuses to cover their despicable crime, all of which were contradicted by survivors, and none of which accounted for the strafing of lifeboats filled with crewmen.
To this day, Israel has never had the common decency to apologize to the United States, to the American people, to the courageous Liberty Captain William L. McGonagle, or to the survivors or relatives of those sailors they killed.
In 1968 and under pressure, they grudgingly paid paltry sums to the wounded ($20,000) and relatives a year later ($100,000) for what they absurdly contended was “an honest mistake.” In 1980, after rejecting our demands for over $17 million in compensation for damages they inflicted on the Liberty, they added insult to injury by coughing up a meager $6 million, plus interest.
Most if not all those compensations were paid for by American taxpayers in the form of foreign aid.
Incidentally, by sheer happenstance, I met and interviewed a Liberty survivor in 2009. Petty Officer 3rd Class Americo “Rick” Aimetti substantiated all of the above and firmly believes Israel knew exactly what it was doing, that it attacked an ally, and that the Israeli pilots and gunboat captain were fully aware the Liberty was a flagged American ship.
As the late-Secretary of State Dean Rusk wrote. . . (Read more at http://www.genelalor.com/blog1/?p=37604.)
On that bright summer day, June 8, 1967, the nation of Israel launched a series of unprovoked air and sea assaults on the Liberty while it sat in international waters off the Sinai Peninsula during the 6-Day War in that region.
Those bloody attacks resulted in the deaths of 34 American crewmen, severely wounded 174 others, and caused millions of dollars in damage and came after more than nine hours of close surveillance by Israeli Air Force planes during which pilots circled the ship at low level thirteen different times to determine its identity before initiating the treachery against a ship representing the only true ally Israel had on the planet.
Clearly marked and displaying a 13 foot long American flag after initially flying a standard flag which was shot down by Israeli Mirages, it constituted a literal impossibility for those pilots to misidentify the Liberty.
In addition, nearby Spanish, Lebanese, and German radio operators heard and recorded the Israeli pilots advising their headquarters that this was in fact an American ship and not Egyptian, advisories disregarded by their HQ commanders who still authorized the attacks.
When the sorties, assisted by an Israeli torpedo boat and repeated strafing, failed to sink the Liberty, the Israeli government concocted elaborate excuses to cover their despicable crime, all of which were contradicted by survivors, and none of which accounted for the strafing of lifeboats filled with crewmen.
To this day, Israel has never had the common decency to apologize to the United States, to the American people, to the courageous Liberty Captain William L. McGonagle, or to the survivors or relatives of those sailors they killed.
In 1968 and under pressure, they grudgingly paid paltry sums to the wounded ($20,000) and relatives a year later ($100,000) for what they absurdly contended was “an honest mistake.” In 1980, after rejecting our demands for over $17 million in compensation for damages they inflicted on the Liberty, they added insult to injury by coughing up a meager $6 million, plus interest.
Most if not all those compensations were paid for by American taxpayers in the form of foreign aid.
Incidentally, by sheer happenstance, I met and interviewed a Liberty survivor in 2009. Petty Officer 3rd Class Americo “Rick” Aimetti substantiated all of the above and firmly believes Israel knew exactly what it was doing, that it attacked an ally, and that the Israeli pilots and gunboat captain were fully aware the Liberty was a flagged American ship.
As the late-Secretary of State Dean Rusk wrote. . . (Read more at http://www.genelalor.com/blog1/?p=37604.)
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