"Mavi Marmara Appeal Could Set Legal History"

"Mavi Marmara Appeal Could Set Legal History" (INN).

In what may establish a groundbreaking legal precedence, the United States Court of Appeals is scheduled to hear the case of American biologist Alan Bauer, who filed suit in 2011 in the Federal court in Manhattan seeking to impound 14 vessels which were outfitted to be used in the 2010 Mavi Marmara Flotilla - which set off from Turkey in order to break the Israeli blockade on the Gaza Strip - on the grounds that the funding for the ships was raised illegally in the United States.

Dr. Bauer, who was seriously wounded with his son in a 2002 Palestinian suicide bombing attack in Jerusalem, explained that "when the US Chief Prosecutor refused to pursue the matter on his own, I decided to invoke my right as an American citizen to seize the flotilla."

The plaintiff had alleged that the ‘Free Gaza’ Movement', along with other US-based anti-Israel organizations, had raised the funds in the US to outfit the ships, contending that this action, in being used for hostilities against a US ally, constituted a violation of American law.  

Bauer rested his claim on the rarely used 18th century “informant statute” (18 USC, Section 962), which allows that a plaintiff (referred to as an “informer”) is entitled to privately seize vessels outfitted in the US for use against a US ally.

The appeal claims that the respective regulations on neutrality and booty, having been in existence for more than 200 years, have been recognized by both Congress and the Courts, and that the domestic legal status of locus standi (the right or capacity to bring an action or to appear in a court) allowed for seizure of the vessels. They have submitted that the previous court hearing the case erred in its interpretation that the respective neutrality and booty regulations did not apply in this instance.Read the full story here.

Hmmm....I still say PM Benjamin Netanyahu should never have apologized to Islamist Turkey.