Thomas Massie, US Congressman, has demanded the US reopen its investigation into the Israeli attack on the USS Liberty in 1967, which he suspects was not an accident.
The attack on the US Navy ship killed 34 service members and injured 171 others.
Massie marked the 59th anniversary of the attack by delivering a speech to the House of Representatives.
The Israeli government has always maintained the incident was a “friendly fire”. However, some crew members from the USS Liberty have argued with that assessment, saying the attack was deliberate.
Their stories question the official version of the events.
Previously, Al Jazeera published audio recordings from the day of the attack. These suggested that the Israeli military knew the ship was American before it launched its attack. However, the mainstream media and Western governments have pretty much ignored this.
Now, in his speech, Massie pointed out the unlimited visibility and the American flag which was flying above the USS Liberty.
Massie also referenced several top diplomatic, intelligence and military officials. These included the former US Secretary of State Dean Rusk and the ex-top General Thomas Hinman Moorer. Both said they believe the attack was deliberate.
Massie said:
None of these distinguished men think this was an accident
They think it was intentional murder by the country of Israel, either as a false flag operation or because they simply didn’t want anybody observing what they were doing that day.
Israeli impunity?
The incident was during the Naksa, or six-day war, where Israel illegally seized the West Bank, East Jerusalem, Gaza, and Syria’s Golan Heights.
As the Canary previously reported:
It began on 5 June, when “Israel” launched surprise attacks against Egypt and quickly entered a conflict involving Jordan and Syria. By the time the fighting ended, six days later, the criminal regime had devastated its Arab neighbours. It had also seized and occupied the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, the Gaza Strip, Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula and Syria’s Golan Heights. Although victory was swift for “Israel,” for Palestinians the effects of the Naksa are ongoing.
In only six days, the IOF forcibly displaced 300,000 Palestinians from Gaza, the West Bank, and East Jerusalem. Israel had already displaced most of these people in 1948. They spent twenty years rebuilding their lives in refugee camps – just for Israel to uproot them again.
The US sent the USS Liberty into international waters near the area for ‘observation and intelligence collection’.
However, on June 8, 1967, Israeli jets opened fire and dropped napalm – an incendiary weapon – on the USS Liberty. They then torpedoed the vessel.
In his speech, Massie pointed out that Israeli jets had been seen surveilling the vessel the day before the attack and:
were intent on leaving no survivors.
Decades later, in 2003, Ward Boston, a US Navy official and adviser to the court of inquiry, released sworn testimony that the lead investigator had been pressured to rule the incident a case of mistaken identity.
‘Certain’
However, a Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) assessment, which was released in 2006, claimed that Israeli pilots “failed to identify” the USS Liberty as a US ship.
Then, in a 2007 article, Ward Bostonwrote:
Israel claimed it was an accident. Yet I know from personal conversations with the late Admiral Isaac C. Kidd — president of the Court of Inquiry — that President Johnson and Secretary of Defense McNamara ordered him to conclude that the attack was a case of “mistaken identity”.
The ensuing cover-up has haunted us for forty years. What does it imply for our national security, not to mention our ability to honestly broker peace in the Middle East, when we cannot question Israel’s actions – even when they kill Americans?
The authorities only gave Boston and Kidd one week to gather evidence. A proper court inquiry would have taken at least six months. Boston added:
We boarded the crippled ship at sea and interviewed survivors. The evidence was clear. We both believed with certainty that this attack was a deliberate effort to sink an American ship and murder its entire crew.
Boston was “certain” the Israeli pilots and commanders knew the ship was American. He said:
I saw the bullet-riddled American flag that had been raised by the crew after their first flag had been shot down completely. I heard testimony that made it clear the Israelis intended there be no survivors. Not only did they attack with napalm, gunfire, and missiles, Israeli torpedo boats machine-gunned at close range three life rafts that had been launched in an attempt to save the most seriously wounded.
Crucially, the cover-up started right at the very top. Boston concluded:
Admiral Kidd told me that after receiving the President’s cover-up orders, he was instructed to sit down with two civilians from either the White House or the Defense Department, and rewrite portions of the Court’s findings. He said, “Ward, they’re not interested in the facts. It’s a political matter and we cannot talk about it.” We were to “put a lid on it” and caution everyone involved never to speak of it again.
After his speech, the USS Liberty Veterans Association, a group of survivors who have been calling for accountability in the case, praised Massie on social media.
Featured image via*Al Jazeera English/Youtube*
By HG
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