JERUSALEM: Israeli armed forces chief Gabi Ashkenazi on Wednesday defended his troops’ use of lethal fire when they stormed a Gaza-bound aid flotilla in May, killing nine pro-Palestinian activists.
Giving sworn testimony to a five-member Israeli commission of inquiry, Ashkenazi said the naval commandos who rappelled onto the deck of the ship only opened fire after a soldier was shot by one of the activists.
"Today it is clear to us that as soon as the first soldier had descended to the ship, a second soldier was shot," he told the panel in a public session of the hearing. "The soldiers opened fire only where necessary."
He said that the wounded man returned fire at his attacker, despite having been hit in the stomach.
"He simply pulled out his gun and shot the shooter," Ashkenazi said.
He rejected Turkish charges that some of the dead had been shot "execution-style" at point-blank range, saying that shots had been fired at close range as part of a life or death struggle.
"There was an instance when a soldier was being attacked with an axe," he said. "Somebody with an axe…that is life-threatening."
No guns were found aboard the ship but the military has previously said that activists seized at least one firearm from the soldiers during the clashes.
Ashkenazi said that ballistics tests carried out on spent ammunition retrieved from the scene indicated that the activists had at least one firearm of their own but had likely thrown it overboard.
The general’s testimony on the May 31 operation, in which eight Turkish and one US-Turkish activist were killed, follows that of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Monday and Defence Minister Ehud Barak on Tuesday.
The deadly naval raid sparked an international outcry and severely strained relations with Israel’s once-close Muslim ally Turkey. It also led Israel to ease its four-year closure of Gaza to allow in all purely civilian goods.
The commission chaired by retired Israeli judge Yaakov Tirkel, which is joined by two international observers, is only mandated to look at the international legality of the raid and the blockade of the Hamas-run territory.
It will not be quizzing officials about the decision-making process.
Clashes erupted on board one of the six-ship flotilla when Israeli commandos rappelled onto the deck and were immediately surrounded by scores of activists whom the commandos said attacked them with knives and clubs.
Ashkenazi said in his testimony that commanders had foreseen a violent reception for the troops and that the military’s main error in preparing for the mission had been in not deploying in greater force.
Barak had on Tuesday said that organisers of the voyage had been seeking a fight.
"The flotilla of May 31 was a planned provocation," he said."The image that emerged… was that the organisations (behind the flotilla) were preparing for armed conflict to embarrass Israel."
Netanyahu meanwhile accused Ankara of looking to gain from a high-profile confrontation between Turkish activists aboard the flotilla’s lead ship and the soldiers who seized the vessels in international waters.
Although parts of the hearing are conducted in public, much of Ashkenazi’s testimony on Wednesday was expected to take place behind closed doors.
He is the only military officer scheduled to appear.
An internal army inquiry has already acknowledged that there were "errors" in the planning and execution of the operation but did not find any culpable negligence.
Separate investigations are being carried out by the United Nations and Turkey.
