"The USS Liberty incident was an attack on a United States Navy technical research ship, USS Liberty, by Israeli jet fighter planes and motor torpedo boats, on June 8, 1967, during the ongoing Six-Day War. The combined air and sea attack killed 34 crew members (naval officers, seamen, two Marines, and a civilian), wounded 171 crew members, and severely damaged the ship. At the time, the ship was in international waters north of the Sinai Peninsula, about 25.5 nmi (29.3 mi; 47.2 km) northwest from the Egyptian city of Arish.[1]"
There’s always one.
One wonders why?
Either the Israelis are bloodthirsty monsters or the Liberty was engaged in activity that it wasn’t supposed to.
Yep, that was another time when the hearts of Americans were firmly behind Israel, but the government was not. OTOH, the attack on the Liberty did probably cause some people to turn against Israel, at least for the time being.
Also, Amerian troops aboard the ship waved at the IDF pilots, when the pilots banked and opened fire. Thinking that the Israelis didn't recognize the ship as American, the American troops lowered the flag on the ship and put up a bigger one..... the Israelis banked and opened fire again.
The ship released the lifeboats and on the third strafe, the Israelis blew the lifeboats out of the water. The ship drifted into water that was too shallow to deploy the ditch bags (containg Top Secret radio intercepts and other classified) and were in danger of floating into water too shallow to scuttle the ships.
The ship's captain requsted F-16 support from American stationed in Saudi Arabia; the response was the jets were en-route. The Israelis left the area to avid air to air conflict with American pilots. Fortunately, the Israelis never realized that the F-16s did not receive runway/tower/air space clearance from the Saudis.
The USS Liberty was able limp to port. And since it was no longer under threat, the classified information was not ditched and that is how we came to know of thecircumstances regarding the Six-Day War.
A gag order was placed against the entire crew of the USS Liberty. The Israelis claimed they mistook the ship for an Egyptian one.......that was not comparable in size or appearnce to the USS Liberty. US servicemen that were wounded, blinded, maimed, and the families of those killed, filed a lawsuit against the Israeli government but could not proceed because of the offical gag order...... the captain of the USS Liberty broke his silence on his deathbed something like 20 years after the incident.
All of that said, yes the US and Israel have a strong binding history of friendship; however, they look after and protect Israel's nterests first and foremost. They cannot be faulted for this, every country does this and should do this as a sovereing nation.... including the United States.
While the US was on the receiving end of this attack, Israel obviously felt it was in protection of their interests to destroy an American spy ship (which is what it was). Likewise, Israel cannot expect the US to put the interests of Israel above our own. The US has a duty first and foremost to US inteests..... including the tens of tousands of US troops in th region. Now, the powers that be may allow Israel use of US controlled airspace if it wil not hinder US interests.... but no one should just assue it so.
FYI.... source of info for this post is Body of Secrets: Anatomy of the Ultra-Secret National Security Agency by James Bamford.
It is a very well researched and informative book concerning some of the US' intelligence successes and failures.