Karine A

The Karine A is a 4,000-ton ship seized by the Israeli Defence Force on January 3, 2002, while carrying 50 tons of military equipment. The IDF claimed the ship was owned by the Palestinian Authority, and that the arms were bound for their use.

The equipment included Katyusha rockets, mortars, sophisticated explosives, sniper rifles, bullets, mines, anti-tank missiles, as well as over two and a half tons of pure explosives. According to Maj. Gen. Yedidya Yaari, the commander of the Israeli Navy, they were packed in 83 crates in waterproof plastic and attached to buoys, to permit their drop-off and retrieval at sea. Most of the arms were from Iran. Their total price is unknown, but it is probably around US $15 million.

The mission began at 04:45 of January 3 in the Red Sea, 300 miles from Israel. Israeli Navy[?] commandos, backed by combat helicopters and aircraft, surprised the crew and took over the vessel without firing a single bullet. The ship was taken to Eilat the night of January 4.

Lt. Gen. Shaul Mofaz, chief of staff of the Israeli Army announced in a Tel Aviv news conference on January 4 that the army had seized the ship while General Anthony Zinni was meeting with Yasser Arafat to promote negotiations between Israel and the Palestinian Authority.

On a news conference on January the 6th conducted by Ariel Sharon, Shaul Mofaz, Binyamin Ben-Eliezer[?] and Yedidya Yaari, the ship and its contents were presented, and some information was spilled as to its supposed senders. They've announced the ship was acquired by Adel Mughrabi, a close associate of the Palestinian president, Yasser Arafat, with the assistance of the Palestinian Naval Police Commander Juma'a Ghali and his executive Fathi Ghazem. The ship was manned exclusively by servicmen of Palestinian naval police. Foreign news agencies were allowed to interview the ship's captain, Omar Akkawi, a day later. He did not deny that his destination was Gaza Strip, but could not spill any new light on the ship's senders.

According to Lloyd's List the listed owner of the vessel is Ali Mohamad Abass, an Iraqi national based in Yemen, who had purchased the Karine A from a Lebanese company in August 2001.

The United States had been involved in tracking the vessel, but did not participate in the seizure. Initially, U.S. officials told The New York Times they had no evidence the arms were bound for the Palestinian Authority and thought the Lebanese Hizballah a more likely destination. However the earlier rumors that a Hizballah man was on board proved false, and a week later the White House declared that it had sufficient evidence to believe that the ship was aimed at the Palestinians.

External links and references

• Israel Seizes Ship It Says Was Arming Palestinians, The New York Times, January 5, 2002 (http://www.nytimes.com/2002/01/05/international/middleeast/05MIDE)
• A Reuters interview with the ship's captain, Omar Akkawi (http://www.reuters.com/news_article.jhtml?type=worldnews&StoryID=497498&fromEmail=true).
• Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs briefing (http://www.mfa.gov.il/mfa/go.asp?MFAH0l0k0)