These stupid arrogant low life disgusting excuse for a human "white trash" would bring chemical weapons to gaza if they thought for one moment they could get away with it.

I don't understand why such a headline "Israel Lost Flotilla War" appears on your web site without an indication that it is opinion, not news, which at first I thought it was, and why it is first in the list. It is the very kind of piece that Israel doesn't need - smug, know it all, arrogant. Israel's PR issue is deep and complex, which I know from having been involved with trying to improve it from the US for many years. It takes hard work on a one to one basis, rebutting the defamers and making Israel's case, to improve Israel's image, since the negativity has become so ingrained. There is no quick fix as the author presumes to have and the presentation of YNET - usually one of the best in the business - doesn't help.

Israel's government does indeed behave with mind boggling stupidity. It has managaed to provide the Flotilla to Gaza with a lot of publicity. Israel too has attracted attention to the lies it is telling. It is stupid to claim that the activists are transporting weapons to Hamas, when this is obviously not the case. As a matter of fact, time after time, the activists have invited the relevant officials to inspect the cargoes of the different ships. What is another absolute howler is the hoax video blog which a government intern helped to spread. It was a bizarre video in which a gay activist Mark Pax claims that he was prevented from taking part in the upcoming flotilla because of his sexual orientation. It turned out quickly that the video was a hoax and that the "activist" involved was an Israeli actor namer Omer Gershon, who lives in Tel Aviv. A big embarassment for the Israeli government. Asad Gefen's article is spot on.

Sarah you are fabulous. Whenever I read this site i can count on you hitting the nail on the head. When are you going to run the israeli government? the country needs you!! Thanks much.

Israel has to stop and inspect the flotilla from getting to Gaza so it won't potentially bring in weapons. Israel can't just ignore that. The flotilla people will not ALLOW that to happen quietly without a fight and international media attention, whether Israel responds in the media or not. It is far worse if it doesn't because then the only narrative, after the 'peace' activists on board attack Israeli soldiers trying to board and inspect, will be that Israel attacked a ship laden with humanitarian supplies for the residents of Gaza ... JUST LIKE THE FIRST TIME. Israel didn't create attention for the flotilla, the flotilla organizers and the complicit international media did that just fine themselves, and it would've been far worse if Israel hadn't defended its actions, concerns, and brought to light what these people are really doing, while masquerading as providers of humanitarian aid. Anyway, you can tell by this writer's shifty rhetoric that this is actually a false-flag piece, meant to present itself as the concerns of someone who supports Israel, but actually meant to demoralize anyone who actually does. Case in point: "... the Marmara that took part in the previous sail sought to present Israel's brutality to the world (and managed to do so, thanks to our kind assistance,)..." What kind of BS is that? lol Israel was not brutal. israel tried to board and inspect a ship full of turkish terrorists bound for gaza to make sure they were not carrying dangerous weapons like the anti-tank missile that was fired at an israeli schoolbus out of gaza a few months ago, killing a child and a bus-driver. And when they did that they were lethally attacked by swarms of said terrorists as they boarded, using sledgehammers and bats, and responded to deadly force with deadly force, as any police officer would have if only one person was running at them with a sledgehammer, let alone 20, let alone as one of his comrades lay on deck having his head smashed with 15lb blocks of iron by 'peace' activists. In Asaf ... you're a coward spinning (really inarticulate and ineffective) propoganda to demoralize your own people. Thanks for the laugh amigo. :)

Israel has never been able to win the PR argument with on anything. The one thing we know nothing about and the arabs are masters of is PR. With the flotillas, if we ignore one then we ignore another and another and pretty soon the blockade will be totally pointless because we never stop anybody. Then one day somebody is going to bring a shipload full of weapons but we will let them sail right on in there because we have given up on trying to control what gets into Gaza. This idea of burying our head in the sand because we are worried about PR sounds like something you expect to read in a far left supporting Haaretz editorial.

Finally, someone with a brain in his head. Ignore these fools on their boats and you take away their publicity AND their will to continue these trips.

Many before me, explained very well how this flotilla is a failure, thanks to the work of Israel, the IDF, etc. Spending time and energy answering those 'useful idiots' is a waste of resources. Shabbat Shalom to everybody !!!

Do you want to know what's really sad? It's that anybody who claims to be an American could be on the side of the same scumbags who celebrated the attacks on 9/11 and became apoplectic over the death of Osama bin Laden.

Just like you said you have to go google "second Gaza flotilla" to get news about it. You can get news about a tribe found in Brazil if you went out of your way to google it. Most of the world is concerned about what's going in the Arab world. The world doesn't know if radical Islamists are about to take over these countries and is concerned about its oil. The only people who are obsessed about this flotilla and Israel are Islamofascists and Far Left loonies like you who DESPISE Israel and go out of their way to Israeli website just to comment there hoping to bring about its destruction. Unfortunately for you Islamofascists and Far Left loonies the "Arab Spring" will only bring about a wedge and more strife between the Islamic world and the rest of the world. Europe is already voting for Far Right parties and people are no longer as obsessed with Israel as you are.

Is there no one in an editorial capacity at YNet who has any sense? What is the point of headlines such as these? You continually harp on in articles how the world sees the 'warped' view of Israel. Yet you let nonsense like this appear on your website - and in English! Foolish, arrogant journalism. Please put yourselves outside of Israel and consider how these headlines/articles are considered in the world.

This is not by any stretch of the imagination losing the flotilla war. (1) Israel has succeeded in involving a lot of nations, including the UN itself to work against it; (2) Israel has been able to come up with a strategy to deal with flotillas, not only for the present, but for the future as well; (3) participation in the flotilla has diminished considerably, leaving back to carry on, only the die-hard activists who cannot believe nor accept that they are licked. Turkey's withdrawal was a serious blow to them; (4) Israel has learnt the wisdom of removing the need for "aid" in Gaza as a factor, so all the activists have to go on now, is the dishonest and frivolous claim of "illegality of the blockade" which they will lose in any court of law. They have absolutely no justification for their illegal actions; (5) Israel has been able to correctly label the venture as a provocative attempt to breach its maritime borders - a position now widely accepted (as opposed to the last flotilla). All that is left now is for Israel to deal with the remaining die-hard extremists who are determined to go for the rumble on the decks by confronting Israel. I hope this time around, they are captured, tried and imprisoned for their illegal action and that there is some arrangement whereby they serve their time in prisons in their home countries because I doubt that Israel will want them on their soil. It is only fitting that those countries that warned their citizens agree to this arrangement. The supporters of the flotilla, including the leftists are going crazy with the prospect of a possibility that the activists' moment of glory might be snatched from them. Things are really not going in their favour and the most they can do is resort to invective.

....signifying NOTHING. Which pretty much SUMS up the message Ben tries to PORTRAY. And according to Shakespeare, this kind of BRAVADO is like "a tale told by an IDIOT". The BBC World Service RADIO news - no friend of Israel - is a good gauge of what a MAJOR news media considers WORTHY subject matter. Sometime in April, it REPORTED the incident where Israel's FM panned hamas on air while he was in the TOILET. Yet in recent weeks - despite all the HISTRIONICS by the flotilla PROVOCATEURS - BBC radio did NOT have a SINGLE story or even a mention. Just goes to PROVE that Ben's CLAIM of "a lot of publicity" SOUNDS a lot like the noise when Avigdor FLUSHED the toilet during the live interview.

Israel's enemies including leftists at heart are on their last straws.

It is reported only because of the way they seem to accumulate problems, which the French find hilarious. Pro-Arab sentiment is NOT the dominant factor here, quite the reverse. And these not-so-useful idiots contribute to the "ras le bol des Arabes" feeling. So bad oped !

you just have to take a quick look at the european media, papers, tv---nobody is talking about this flotilla. the world has other , far more important problems then a bunch of self-righteous provocateurs.

who is talking about google? we are talking about euronews, major newspapers of major european countries, italy. germany, the uk. the reports are infrequent and drab, nobody is interested in this flotilla. even the turkish media are reserved. go read hürriyet on-line edition--they are busy with other problems.

It is the op-ed section you're in, you know. It is the place where various authors give different opinions. This is what happens in a free press. I happen to agree very much with Mr Gefen's opinion piece.

You are obviously looking at news from cloud cuckoo land on some other planet. The mainstream news channels in both Ireland and Britain are concentrating on Libya and Syria. If the flotilla get's a mention at all, it is way down the pecking order.

Again, your right wing extremist views are obscuring the truth. There is very little publicity about the flotilla in the mainstream Irish and British news media. Only the fascists who call themselves "left wing" think otherwise.

But if they breach our territorial waters, let shit hit the fan. What a disgrace. More people are being shot to death on the Mexican-US border in a month, than in any war here but no one dares to squeal. We're obviously too nice and they feel like they can get away with everything because we're sooo tolerant.

Israel won the PR battle over Fauxtilla. They were measured in their comments and did their best to avoid confrontations and offered means to hand over any legitimate aid to the Gazans. That however is clearly not the objective of the organizers. Instead they want a battle. In Canada, the MSM have been very critical of the Fauxtilla organizers and especially the Canadian Boat. In Canada, it is Israel that won the PR battle.

Do you solve your own problems by ignoring them too? Wish I could do that!

The flotilla never left, most of the people has decided not to go and they are fighting amongst themselves.

I read about a paragraph and a half before my stomach had turned sufficiently to skip right to the comments. If Israel is a brutal monster state that perceives it's "halcyons" as brutal oppression of weak races, then I suggest Mr. Gefen support his misguided opinion with his actions by boycotting Israeli media the next time he has an urge to write a misguided article to the people he is demonizing.

We EXPECT you to take the illogical point of view even if it is indisputably erroneous. You gorge yourself on anything anti-Israel.