Palestinian Media Watch has Mahmoud Abbas’s take on the terrorist flotilla:
The significance is that this decision was made in advance. They [Israel] wanted to create a confrontation. They did not want to allow [the ships into Gaza], but were determined from the outset to create a confrontation. They had the opportunity yesterday to relate to these people peacefully, because those who came to Gaza are civilians, peace-seeking people, who did not come to attack. They did not come with weapons or with an army. They came with humanitarian aid. Therefore, it was a decision made in advance, premeditated and with determination to kill and to create a confrontation with these people, and to take them all to ports in Israel. Israel always ignores all international norms, all international laws, all humanitarian laws. [Israel] doesn’t care about anything.
The cynicism and opportunism, as usual, are staggering. The biggest beneficiaries of the Gaza blockade other than Israeli civilians are Abbas, the Fatah Party, and the Palestinian Authority. With the blockade, Israel is keeping bottled up in Gaza the very people who would hang Abbas and his cronies from telephone poles. Abbas is trashing Israel for the very blockade that is keeping him in power.
