I am in a good mood, are you? Because I believe the flotilla succeeded. We had a huge wave of publicity over the fact that a bunch of peaceable activists were simply trying to get into Gaza by boat and the Israeli gov’t flipped out and pulled international strings to stop them. Last year they had to kill 9 people, this year they had to muscle the American and Greek governments. Yesterday, I am told, the New York Times ran a big piece about the flotilla with two photographs. So all this hysteria is undermining the image of democracy, openness, and in the end the focus must be on What is Israel trying to hide behind the ghetto walls? Here is Noam Sheizaf on the next campaign, for people to fly into Ben Gurion this week, and Israel is already flipping out. Excerpt:

Israel is not yet done with the second flotilla, and a new effort to challenge its control over the travel to and from Palestinian Territories might take place this week – in no other place than the Tel Aviv International Airport

A coalition of organizations has made public [French, PDF] its intention to have hundreds of international activists land at Ben-Gurion airport this Friday, July 8th, and openly declare their wish to visit the West Bank.

Until now, visitors coming in solidarity with the Palestinians had to conceal their destination when questioned at the airport, or risk immediate deportation. A couple of years ago, American scholar Noam Chomsky was denied entry to Israel at the Jordanian border, after declaring his intention to give a lecture at Ramallah’s Bir Zeit University.

The closure over the West Bank works in the opposite direction as well: Many don’t know it, but Israel controls all air and land entries to the West Bank, not only to Gaza.