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Following are details on
the massacre recounted by the distinguished former U.S.
Congressman from
Illinois, Paul Findley:
The day of the attack
began in routine fashion, with the ship first proceeding slowly in
an
easterly direction in
the eastern Mediterranean, later following the contour of the
coastline westerly
about fifteen miles off the Sinai Peninsula.
On the mainland, Israeli
forces were winning smashing victories in the third Arab-Israeli
war in nineteen
years. Israeli Chief of Staff Yitzhak Rabin, announcing that the
Israelis
had taken the entire
Sinai and broken the blockade on the Strait of Tiran declared: “The
Egyptians are
defeated.” On the eastern front the Israelis had overcome Jordanian
forces and captured
most of the West Bank.
At 6 a.m. an airplane,
identified by the Liberty crew as an Israeli Noratlas, circled the
ship
slowly and departed.
This procedure was repeated periodically over an eight-hour period.
At 9.a.m a jet appeared
at a distance, then left. At 10 a.m. two rocket-armed jets circled
the ship three
times. They were close enough for their pilots to be observed
through
binoculars. The planes
were unmarked. An hour later the Israeli Noratlas returned, flying
not more than 200
feet directly above the Liberty, and clearly marked with the Star of
David. The ship’s
crewmembers and the pilot waved at each other. This plane returned
every few minutes until
1 p.m. By then, the ship had changed course and was proceeding
lmost due west.
At 2.00 p.m. all hell
broke loose. Three Mirage fighter planes headed straight for the
Liberty, their rockets
taking out the forward machine guns and wrecking the ship’s
antennae. The mirages
were joined by Mystere fighters, which dropped napalm o the
bridge and deck and
repeatedly strafed the ship. The attack continued for over 20
minutes. In all, the
ship sustained 821 holes in her sides and decks. Of these, more
than
100 were rocket size.
As the aircraft departed, three torpedo boats took over the attack,
firing five torpedoes,
one of which tore
a 40-foot hole in the hull, killing 25 sailors. The ship was in
flames,
dead in the water,
listing precariously, and taking water. The crew was ordered to
prepare
to abandon ship.
As life rafts were lowered into the water, the torpedo boats moved
closer and shot them to
pieces. One plane concentrated machine-gun fire on rafts still on
deck as
crewmembers there tried to extinguish the napalm fire. Petty Officer
Charles
Rowley declares,
“They didn’t want anymore to live.”
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