In Bid to Quell Anger Over Raid, Israel Frees Detainees
By MICHAEL SLACKMAN
NYT
JERUSALEM — Israel worked Wednesday to defuse rising international anger by agreeing to a rapid release of all detainees — including those suspected of attacking its soldiers — taken after the deadly nighttime raid of six ships seeking to break its blockade of the Gaza Strip.
By early Thursday, planes carrying hundreds of activists, along with the bodies of the nine killed in the raid, flew to Turkey and Greece, as others were released through Jordan. Hundreds of relatives and well-wishers cheered outside the airport as they landed in Istanbul, Turkish television showed, while the deputy prime minister stood atop a bus, declaring that “diplomacy had resulted in success for now” but that “these murders” would be pursued “within the scope of law.”
The release seemed most immediately aimed at repairing dangerously eroding ties with Turkey, Israel’s main ally in the Muslim world, as demands continued to intensify around the world to end a blockade that critics say has kept Gazans isolated and impoverished.
And in fact the homecoming seemed to deflate some anger in Turkey, which had made the release of hundreds of its citizens its main demand after at least four Turks were killed by Israeli commandos in the raid. The Turkish foreign minister, Ahmet Davutoglu, who had spoken earlier with Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, sought to ratchet down tensions, saying, “It was time that calm replaces anger.”
(More here.)
NYT
JERUSALEM — Israel worked Wednesday to defuse rising international anger by agreeing to a rapid release of all detainees — including those suspected of attacking its soldiers — taken after the deadly nighttime raid of six ships seeking to break its blockade of the Gaza Strip.
By early Thursday, planes carrying hundreds of activists, along with the bodies of the nine killed in the raid, flew to Turkey and Greece, as others were released through Jordan. Hundreds of relatives and well-wishers cheered outside the airport as they landed in Istanbul, Turkish television showed, while the deputy prime minister stood atop a bus, declaring that “diplomacy had resulted in success for now” but that “these murders” would be pursued “within the scope of law.”
The release seemed most immediately aimed at repairing dangerously eroding ties with Turkey, Israel’s main ally in the Muslim world, as demands continued to intensify around the world to end a blockade that critics say has kept Gazans isolated and impoverished.
And in fact the homecoming seemed to deflate some anger in Turkey, which had made the release of hundreds of its citizens its main demand after at least four Turks were killed by Israeli commandos in the raid. The Turkish foreign minister, Ahmet Davutoglu, who had spoken earlier with Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, sought to ratchet down tensions, saying, “It was time that calm replaces anger.”
(More here.)
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