[AChimp]

Those aid workers were just looking to start shit and got what they deserved, IMO. They knew that they would be boarded (that's the point of a blockade) and they went with the express purpose of running the blockade. It doesn't matter if they were only carrying food and medicine; nothing gets in (that's the point of a blockade).

Since the soldiers were told that there would be no resistance, and all the small boats had surrendered peacefully already, why would they have been expecting trouble from the last boat? Seems to me like the people on that boat wanted to provoke a fight. The "we were just defending ourselves" excuse is just bullshit because:

a) they knew that it was the Israeli Army, not Air Pirates repelling down from helicopters that were flown from their secret volcano island base.

b) they would have been questioned, inspected, steered to an approved port where their cargo would be unloaded and eventually be delivered to Gaza.

It also doesn't matter that they were in international waters. They were close to the Israeli border and they had already announced on websites and stuff that they fully intended to to cross.