Israel Navy Opens Fire on Gaza Aid Flotilla II

[ColdClimate]

Guess you never played worms armageddon, then

 

[BurnEmDown]

The points you seem to be missing is that it is practiced by an incredibly small number of people and hardly anybody is actually affected by it. The "victims" are typically hardcore Israelis who live in Kibbutzes right along the border who do anything they can to incite any reaction from the Palestinians, so they can continue this brutal policy of apartheid against the Palestinians.

I am assuming you know exactly the reasons for the people living in the "Kibbutzes" (mind you, Kibbutzes are only in the north and very few are in the south, but we're talking about near-Eilat south, not near-Gaza south, the people near Gaza live in regular old towns and cities) and that you know for a fact that they are doing it just to spite the Hamas and to make them attack them. They are, as you suggest, putting their lives on the line to spite the Hamas into attacking Israel, and so are to blame for the whole thing. I hope you realize just how absurd that is.

Then why are honey and livestock not allowed in? Clerical error?

Honey and spices and all things which aren't basic commodities aren't allowed in since only the Hamas and few people who are financially secure will get them. It's basically like giving someone who wants food, only sauce, without the food to put the sauce on. People who will get basic things such as frozen food, vegetables, and bread, will not be able to afford luxuries such as honey or spices, which aren't quite needed to survive or live a basic life. And those who can get honey or spices or other luxuries, don't need the help of humanitarian aid.

Livestock aren't allowed in because it is a lot harder to transport them, frozen foods or milk or whatever you can get from livestock is allowed in, basically only the final product, since final products are much easier to transfer. Thus, Israel helps people who who want to donate to Gaza by minimizing large spendings on this which will be harder to transfer. Basically it's a question of efficiency, this is also the reason why fresh meat isn't allowed and frozen food is, frozen food is easier to donate and would do much better for the people of Gaza.
Or in other words, 10 KG of frozen meat > 5KG of fresh meat.

Ever tried Gandhi-style pacifism? It works. The point is, how much are you¹ willing to sacrifice? Are Israelis willing to accept a state that isn't just for pure Jews? Are the Arab nations² willing to accept that not destroying Israel isn't necessarily the same as the end of the world?
Are both sides willing -and capable- of behaving like adults?

I think both sides just aren't ready to accept that peace is the best solution. Israel isn't a state purely for the Jews, it is mainly for the Jews but it's not like non-Jews can't live here, in fact Jews are only 80% of the population, much less than most ethnic countries (Portugal, Japan, etc.).

Gandhi - style pacifism won't work, since as long as a violent group of people will want to destroy Israel they will succeed if Israel doesn't defend itself.
Might isn't right, but right alone doesn't make right either, or in other words:
"War doesn't decide who is right, only who is left".

 

[Takhisis]

Livestock aren't allowed in because it is a lot harder to transport them, frozen foods or milk or whatever you can get from livestock is allowed in, basically only the final product, since final products are much easier to transfer. Thus, Israel helps people who who want to donate to Gaza by minimizing large spendings on this which will be harder to transfer. Basically it's a question of efficiency, this is also the reason why fresh meat isn't allowed and frozen food is, frozen food is easier to donate and would do much better for the people of Gaza.
Or in other words, 10 KG of frozen meat > 5KG of fresh meat.

Really? If you bring in breeding cows then you'd do away with the necessity of bringing in meat... long-term, it'd be much less troublesome.

I think both sides just aren't ready to accept that peace is the best solution. Israel isn't a state purely for the Jews, it is mainly for the Jews but it's not like non-Jews can't live here, in fact Jews are only 80% of the population, much less than most ethnic countries (Portugal, Japan, etc.).

Gandhi - style pacifism won't work, since as long as a violent group of people will want to destroy Israel they will succeed if Israel doesn't defend itself.
Might isn't right, but right alone doesn't make right either, or in other words:
"War doesn't decide who is right, only who is left".

It has never been tried. Also, Gandhi-like maturity hasn't ever been tried either.

 

[ColdClimate]

Gandhi - style pacifism won't work, since as long as a violent group of people will want to destroy Israel they will succeed if Israel doesn't defend itself.
Might isn't right, but right alone doesn't make right either, or in other words:
"War doesn't decide who is right, only who is left".

Just saw this, to my surprise...

Palestinians test out Gandhi-style protest


By Heather Sharp
BBC News, West Bank

It is strangely quiet. About 40 mainly Palestinian protesters face off with a line of armed Israeli soldiers over coils of razor wire.

They calmly explain they want access to land Israel has confiscated to build its West Bank barrier. Chanting begins, followed by impassioned speeches in Hebrew, English and Arabic.

"You soldiers standing here, blocking Palestinians from walking on their own land, you need to think about what you're doing," lectures one young woman. "What will you tell your children?" asks an older man.

The troops stare impassively ahead.

'Excuse to shoot'

Beit Jala is one of a growing number of Palestinian villages holding regular protests against Israel's occupation of the West Bank.

Many end with Palestinian youths throwing stones and Israeli troops firing tear gas and sometimes rubber-coated bullets.

But organisers in Beit Jala, such as Ahmad Lazza of the Holy Land Trust who trains protesters in non-violent tactics, are determined to keep things peaceful.

This is partly out of personal belief, and partly about avoiding escalation with Israeli soldiers.

"You don't want him to feel threatened, because it is a very good excuse for him to shoot you," he says.

Protesters in the area have recently chained themselves to olive trees to protect them from Israeli bulldozers and rebuilt a destroyed garden on land cleared for the barrier - which Israel says is for security, but Palestinians see as a land grab.

They have also forced their way into the main checkpoint keeping Bethlehem Palestinians from Jerusalem.

Big change

In the past, Mr Lazza says, Palestinians had a "bad impression" of non-violent resistance, which had become associated with pacifism and concessions to Israel.

But recently, he has seen "a big change".

Palestinian Authority (PA) officials have started attending protests, holding up regular demonstrations in the villages of Bilin and Naalin as models of "popular resistance", and calling on Palestinians to boycott goods produced in Israeli settlements in the West Bank.

This month PA Prime Minister Salam Fayyad defied Israeli rules and ploughed a furrow on West Bank land controlled by the military, as well as citing the Indian independence and American black civil rights struggles.

Martin Luther King III, the eldest son of the American civil rights activist, is visiting Ramallah on Wednesday, a week after one of the grandsons of Indian independence leader Mahatma Gandhi.

Rajmohan Gandhi urged the Palestinians to appeal to the sense of justice in Judiasm

Rajmohan Gandhi spoke passionately about his grandfather's belief in non-violent struggle to a packed hall, urging Palestinians to appeal to the principles of justice in Judaism.

"Never, never, never, never lose your patience," he entreated. "Never lose your faith in ultimate victory."

But despite giving him a standing ovation, few in the audience would completely adopt Gandhi's purist approach.

"I came to promote non-violent resistance," said Mahmoud Ramahi, secretary general of the Palestinian Legislative Council, and a member of the Islamist movement Hamas.

"We support all types of resistance - non-violent, economic, political and armed resistance," he said - apparently missing the point of strictly peaceful campaigns.

Hind Awad, 22, a campaigner for an international boycott of Israel, said non-violent methods had historically been a "major tool" of the Palestinians.

"I also think that under international law, armed struggle is just, for people that are living under occupation," she added.

A recent poll suggested that nearly half of Palestinians support armed struggle.

Many of these, like Hossam Khader, a long-standing activist with the Fatah movement which dominates the PA, believe Israel would not have agreed even to negotiate without years of Palestinian militant activity.

He disagrees with suicide attacks against civilians inside Israel, and backs a two-state solution. But he says Palestinians "have the right to resist" soldiers and armed settlers by military means.


Popular protest "is good", he says, "but it will change nothing".

"I can go and I can shout… but the wall is still the wall, the settlements are still the settlements."

Even Rajmohan Gandhi says the Palestinians face a "much tougher battle" against US-backed Israel, than the Indians, with strong international support, did against British colonial rule.

But he is not convinced by suggestions that some cultures are more suited to non-violence than others - often made in connection with the culture of heroism around Palestinian armed struggle and those considered "martyred" during it.

"In India too, there were many occasions when non-violence was not strictly observed," he says. "Gandhi had to fight against it, it's not as if Indian culture was terribly favourably disposed to non-violence."

Staying put

But Gandhi's message has nevertheless penetrated far-flung corners of the West Bank.

Najmadeen al-Husseini, 62, lives squeezed between the West Bank barrier and an Israeli settlement near the Palestinian village of Qatana.

He can only access his land through a huge military gate.

Without Israeli permission to build, he lives with his children and grandchildren - 17 people in all - in a three-bedroom house.

He is an example of a concept in Palestinian culture, known as "sumud" in Arabic.

It translates as "steadfastness" - and is usually understood to mean staying put on your land, living with dignity despite adversity.

"I was born here. My parents are buried here. I will stay on my land even if they kill me," he says.

In his view, two decades of negotiations have yielded little, yet "military resistance will get us nowhere… what are Kalashnikovs against tanks?"

"If the world supports us, peaceful resistance will get us something back," he says.

"Whatshisname… Gandhi… the world supported him, and he kicked the British out of India," he says.

'A nuisance'

But if you ask Israelis about a possible wave of non-violent Palestinian protest, most say they will believe it when they see it.

Anshel Pfeffer, military correspondent for the Israeli newspaper Haaretz, says the demonstrations so far have been little more than "a nuisance" for the Israeli military.

He says the Palestinian Authority is "walking a tightrope" between boosting its credibility among Palestinians and maintaining its security co-operation with Israel, and is therefore wary of supporting protests too strongly.

Moshe Maoz, a left-wing Middle East expert from Hebrew University, said genuinely peaceful Palestinian protests could improve international and Israeli perceptions of Palestinians.

But if stones - which the Israeli military frequently points out can be lethal weapons - are thrown, this provides a "pretext to say we shouldn't talk to them because they are violent", he adds.

The numbers attending protests remain relatively low, and advocates of total, Gandhi-style non-violence are even fewer.

But Ahmad Lazza still sees huge potential:

"We believe that non-violence is stronger than militant action, once we have a big mass of people. Once people want something, nothing can stop them."

So I guess some are giving it a shot!

 

[Takhisis]

Go Gandhites go!

 

[asbestos]

Guess you never played worms armageddon, then

I didn't realize Israeli grand strategy was based on a video game.

Honey and spices and all things which aren't basic commodities aren't allowed in since only the Hamas and few people who are financially secure will get them. It's basically like giving someone who wants food, only sauce, without the food to put the sauce on. People who will get basic things such as frozen food, vegetables, and bread, will not be able to afford luxuries such as honey or spices, which aren't quite needed to survive or live a basic life. And those who can get honey or spices or other luxuries, don't need the help of humanitarian aid.

Coriander is allowed. Livestock feed is allowed and is definitely a luxury considering there aren't any livestock.

Livestock aren't allowed in because it is a lot harder to transport them, frozen foods or milk or whatever you can get from livestock is allowed in, basically only the final product, since final products are much easier to transfer. Thus, Israel helps people who who want to donate to Gaza by minimizing large spendings on this which will be harder to transfer. Basically it's a question of efficiency, this is also the reason why fresh meat isn't allowed and frozen food is, frozen food is easier to donate and would do much better for the people of Gaza.
Or in other words, 10 KG of frozen meat > 5KG of fresh meat.

Livestock aren't just eaten. They produce eggs, milk, wool and other affects more cheaply than importing them. They're also important to an agrarian economy, which by the way has completely collapsed in Gaza.

 

[dirtyparrot]

Honey and spices and all things which aren't basic commodities aren't allowed in since only the Hamas and few people who are financially secure will get them. It's basically like giving someone who wants food, only sauce, without the food to put the sauce on. People who will get basic things such as frozen food, vegetables, and bread, will not be able to afford luxuries such as honey or spices, which aren't quite needed to survive or live a basic life. And those who can get honey or spices or other luxuries, don't need the help of humanitarian aid.

Livestock aren't allowed in because it is a lot harder to transport them, frozen foods or milk or whatever you can get from livestock is allowed in, basically only the final product, since final products are much easier to transfer. Thus, Israel helps people who who want to donate to Gaza by minimizing large spendings on this which will be harder to transfer. Basically it's a question of efficiency, this is also the reason why fresh meat isn't allowed and frozen food is, frozen food is easier to donate and would do much better for the people of Gaza.
Or in other words, 10 KG of frozen meat > 5KG of fresh meat.

I'm sorry but the rationale for this blockade is deeply flawed, since by imposing this blockade only fosters to create a black market from which Hamas can benefit from taking a cut from things.

Something that is worth mentioning as well is that from my understanding, people from Gaza can't export their goods as well, limits a good bit what they can afford.

Edit: I'm talking about the tunnels going to Egypt to bring goods that can't be obtained otherwise, from which Hamas takes a cut of the stuff coming through.

 

[BurnEmDown]

Really? If you bring in breeding cows then you'd do away with the necessity of bringing in meat... long-term, it'd be much less troublesome.

Except in Gaza you'd hardly have a place to support these livestock. Remember - it's one big city with very few farmlands. It might be good to import livestock to the places where it's possible to support it and grow it, and thus Gaza will be able to support itself just a little more, but it might have just happened. Keep in mind that the list is changing sometimes, and sometimes Israel lets some things through which aren't always allowed. I think Israel should let more through for example spices and honey, but still keep a maximum of how much is let through each week.

Coriander is allowed. Livestock feed is allowed and is definitely a luxury considering there aren't any livestock.
Livestock aren't just eaten. They produce eggs, milk, wool and other affects more cheaply than importing them. They're also important to an agrarian economy, which by the way has completely collapsed in Gaza.

I'm sure there are livestock in Gaza, in the outskirts of the city where there is a little farmland and space to support them, it's just that livestock isn't allowed in, due to the reasons I wrote above.
Also note that I counted all the goods provided by livestock other than meat in one of my latest posts as well, I said that final products are easier to transfer than raw materials or supplies which must be worked on as well.

I'm sorry but the rationale for this blockade is deeply flawed, since by imposing this blockade only fosters to create a black market from which Hamas can benefit from taking a cut from things.

Something that is worth mentioning as well is that from my understanding, people from Gaza can't export their goods as well, limits a good bit what they can afford.

Well, most of the humanitarian aid reaches Gaza directly into the hands of various humanitarian aid groups operating there. This means that if the Hamas wants to get their hands on these supplies, it must attack the humanitarian aid groups, basically stealing directly from the people, and thus the people won't support them.

 

[Steph]

So, you are saying that the Palestinians in Gaza are not smart enough to decide if there is room or not to support lifestock, and the decision has to be taken by Israel?

 

[ColdClimate]

Well, the Gaza strip *used* to have some good farmland....

Gaza desperately short of food after Israel destroys farmland


Gaza's 1.5 million people are facing a food crisis as a result of the destruction of great areas of farmland during the Israeli invasion.

According to the World Food Programme, the UN's Food and Agriculture Organisation and Palestinian officials, between 35% and 60% of the agriculture industry has been wrecked by the three-week Israeli attack, which followed two years of economic siege.

Christine van Nieuwenhuyse, the World Food Programme's country director, said: "We are hearing that 60% of the land in the north - where the farming was most intensive - may not be exploitable again. It looks to me like a disaster. It is not just farmland, but poultry as well.

[...]

The FAO estimates that 13,000 families who depend directly on herding, farming and fishing have suffered significant damage. "Before the blockade and the attack," said Ahmad Sourani, director of the Agricultural Development Association of Gaza, which runs programmes with charities such as Britain's Christian Aid, "Gaza produced half of its own food. Now that has declined by 25%. In addition, a quarter of the population depends on agriculture for income. What we have seen in large areas of farmland is the destruction of all means of life.

"We have seen a creeping process of farmers being forced out of the buffer zone around Gaza's border. Before 2000 we could approach and farm within 50m of the fence. After Israel's evacuation of the settlements in 2005, the Israeli army imposed a buffer of 300m. Although it is elastic, now there are areas, depending on the situation, where farmers cannot reach their farms in safety within an area of over a kilometre. It is indirect confiscation by fear. My fear is that, if it remains, it will become de facto. Bear in mind that 30% of Gaza's most productive land is within that buffer zone."

The wholesale destruction of farms, greenhouses, dairy parlours, livestock, chicken coops and orchards has damaged food production, which was already hit by the blockade.

Buildings heavily damaged during Israel's Operation Cast Lead included much of its agricultural infrastructure. The Ministry of Agriculture was targeted, the agriculture faculty at al-Azhar university in Beit Hanoun largely destroyed, and the offices of the Palestinian Agricultural Relief Committees in Zaitoun - which provides cheap food for the poor - ransacked and vandalised by soldiers who left abusive graffiti.

Although international and local officials are still gathering figures, they believe that scores, perhaps hundreds, of wells and water sources have been damaged and several hundred greenhouses have been levelled, as well as severe damage inflicted on 60,000-75,000 dunums of Gaza's 175,000 dunums (44,000 acres) of farmable land.

As well as the physical damage done by Israeli bulldozers, bombing and shelling, land has been contaminated by munitions, including white phosphorous, burst sewerage pipes, animal carcasses and even asbestos used in roofing. In many places, the damage is extreme. In Jabal al-Rayas, once a thriving farming community, every building has been knocked down, and even the cattle killed and left to lie rotting in the fields.

In al-Atatra, Ahmad Hassan, 65, the overseer of an orchard that once had hundreds of lemon and orange trees, surveyed an area flattened by bulldozers. "This was the well," he said, showing a pile of bulldozed concrete. "We can clear the ground in two weeks. Then what? The well is gone. The pump has been destroyed. And where will the trees come from to replant the land?"

Van Nieuwenhuyse said: "Already, the price of meat has tripled since the Israeli operation began. What is more worrying is the situation over vegetables. Protein we can help with, but before this there were already deficiencies in the diet. Now they will have to rely on Israel."

It was a view echoed by Hassan Abu Etah, the deputy agriculture minister in Gaza. "It has all been hugely damaged. And it affects all of Gaza, not simply the farmers. We produced some of what we needed. It makes you wonder whether they wanted to change Gaza from production to consumption."

In the heavily damaged village of Khuza'a, near Khan Younis, Salam Najar surveyed the no-go zone that extends from the last houses in the village to the border fence where Israeli farmland begins. "Most of the families here have farmed that side. Now no one feels safe to go there. They have destroyed it all."

It's pretty impressive that an area as densely populated as Gaza used to be able to able to produce half its own food. Now it has to import more food than ever and at last count, 70% of households in Gaza are 'food insecure'. Shame...

 

[Patroklos]

Really? If you bring in breeding cows then you'd do away with the necessity of bringing in meat... long-term, it'd be much less troublesome.

Cattle require grazing land, feed, and water. It is not efficient to raise cattle in Gaza when all the resources used to support them could instead be diverted to the population itself.

 

[BurnEmDown]

So, you are saying that the Palestinians in Gaza are not smart enough to decide if there is room or not to support lifestock, and the decision has to be taken by Israel?

I didn't say anything about the Gazan people, only about their city which mostly can't sustain livestock. Please don't twist my words and make it sound like that, I didn't say anything bad about the Gazan people.

 

[Formaldehyde]

I am assuming you know exactly the reasons for the people living in the "Kibbutzes"...

They don't exactly make a big secret out of it:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kibbutz

Kibbutzim also played a role in defining the borders of the Jewish state-to-be. By the late 1930s when it appeared that Palestine would be partitioned between Arabs and Jews, kibbutzim were established in outlying areas to insure that the land would be incorporated into the Jewish state. In 1946, on the day after Yom Kippur, eleven new "Tower and Stockade" kibbutzim were hurriedly established in the northern part of the Negev to give Israel a better claim to this arid, but strategically important, region. The Marxist faction of the kibbutz movement, Kibbutz Artzi, favored a binational state over partition, but advocated free Jewish immigration, which the Arabs opposed.

Kibbutzniks fought bravely in the 1948 Arab-Israeli War, emerging from the conflict with enhanced prestige in the nascent State of Israel. Members of Kibbutz Degania were instrumental in stopping the Syrian tank advance into the Galilee with homemade gasoline bombs. Maagan Michael manufactured the bullets for the Sten guns that won the war. Maagan Michael's clandestine ammunition factory was later separated from the kibbutz and grew into TAAS (Israel Military Industries).

Kibbutzim also continued to play an outsize role in Israel's defense apparatus. In the 1950s and 1960s many kibbutzim were in fact founded by an Israel Defense Forces group called Nahal. Many of these 1950s and 1960s Nahal kibbutzim were founded on the precarious and porous borders of the state. In the Six-Day War, when Israel lost 800 soldiers, 200 of them were from kibbutzim. The prestige that kibbutzniks enjoyed in Israel in the 1960s was reflected in the Knesset. When only 4% of Israelis were kibbutzniks, kibbutzniks made up 15% of Israel's parliament.[8]

In his history of Palestine under the British Mandate, One Palestine, Complete, "New Historian" Tom Segev wrote of the kibbutz movement:

The kibbutz was an original social creation, yet always a marginal phenomenon. By the end of the 1920s no more than 4,000 people, children included, lived on some thirty kibbutzim, and they amounted to a mere 2.5% of Palestine’s Jewish population. The most important service the kibbutzim provided to the Jewish national struggle was military, not economic or social. They were guardians of Zionist land, and their patterns of settlement would to a great extent determine the country’s borders. The kibbutzim also had a powerful effect on the Zionist self-image.[22]

That is, unless you think the concept of heavily armed "farmers" who drive tanks and other mechanized vehicles on a regular basis is typical outside of Israel.

 

[BurnEmDown]

This is regarding the history of the Kibbutzim. These days no one settles Kibbutzim on the borders of Israel, and most of them are made for pure agricultural needs, not border defense or anything.

 

[MobBoss]

Then why are honey and livestock not allowed in? Clerical error?

I got curious about this and decided to figure it out. What I found out is that both sugar and fertilizer are used in the homemade rocket production done in Gaza. Apparently, sugar is a component of the rocket fuel and fertilizer is often part of the warhead.

Could be the reason why some of the things we think are no big deal are not being allowed through. Because some Palistinian Mcgyver is making rockets and warheads out of them....

 

[Formaldehyde]

Swimming season is open in Gaza. Those who are caught wearing wetsuits will be executed on sight:

http://www.todayonline.com/World/ED...itants-killed-near-Gaza-coast-by-Israeli-navy

JERUSALEM - Israeli naval forces killed four Palestinian "commandos" wearing wetsuits in waters off Gaza yesterday over suspicions that they were planning an attack by sea, but a militant group said they were members of its marine unit who were training at the time they were hit.

This come as Israel copes with the diplomatic fallout over a bungled deadly raid on a Gaza-bound aid boat exactly a week ago. Yesterday, United States Vice-President Joe Biden said Washington was eyeing "new ways" to deal with Israel's blockade of the Hamas-ruled enclave.

And Ankara, still furious over the death of eight Turkish nationals in the raid, vowed that normalisation of ties with Israel would be out of the question if the Jewish state refused to accept an international inquiry into the attack.

In yesterday's incident, Palestinian witnesses said they saw Israeli forces firing on a vessel off the coast of central Gaza. Israel's military said it had attacked "a squad of terrorists wearing diving suits" on their way to launch an attack.

But, survivor Abu Al Walid said that while there were seven members of militant group Al Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades on board, there were "no arms in the boat", and that they had been engaged in "swimming training". Two had escaped and one was still missing, he said. The group is a violent offshoot of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas' Fatah faction.

Shortly afterwards, Israel mounted an air strike in northern Gaza, which left an armed Hamas militant wounded, Palestinian sources said.

As international anger grows over Israel's Gaza blockade, Iran's Red Crescent said it had decided to send three ships and a plane loaded with aid to the territory this week. It added that the aircraft carrying 30 tonnes of medical supplies would fly to Egypt, from where the aid would be delivered to Gaza.

Meanwhile, Malaysia's Prime Minister Najib Razak denounced Israel as "world gangsters" who should face the International Criminal Court over the flotilla attack. Agencies

 

[MobBoss]

Swimming season is open in Gaza. Those who are caught wearing wetsuits will be executed on sight:

http://www.todayonline.com/World/ED...itants-killed-near-Gaza-coast-by-Israeli-navy

Yeah, because we all know that the Al Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades is just a swim club actually.

 

[ColdClimate]

I got curious about this and decided to figure it out. What I found out is that both sugar and fertilizer are used in the homemade rocket production done in Gaza. Apparently, sugar is a component of the rocket fuel and fertilizer is often part of the warhead.

Why does this preclude livestock then? The 'fertilizer' you get out of them is certainly not the same stuff you use for the warhead (ammonium nitrate)....

 

[BurnEmDown]

I've given a reasonable explanation I think as to why livestock is forbidden, just on this page.

 

[Formaldehyde]

Yeah, because we all know that the Al Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades is just a swim club actually.

And how do you think they knew that ahead of time? Omniscience?