Are defending the USS Liberty.

The point of the citation is that the Israelis are entirely capable of blowing up a ship of their own citizens, or attacking their biggest ally.
No one who isn't blinded by 55 years of censorship can recognize that.

Now, do desperate nations and people do desperate things? Of course. And they give up the moral high road.

"On the other hand, many people believe that it is no coincidence that the American ship was only 13 miles away from Al Arish, at a time when Israel is believed to have been executing hundreds of Egyptian prisoners of war. A war crime officially denied by Israel, in the past decade Israeli and American media have both acknowledged that the executions took place.

"The irony was that there were no Hebrew speakers aboard the ship. The USS Liberty crew was mandated to spy on old enemies: the Russians, not their ally Israel. Whatever the reason, a growing number of people in the US and abroad are accepting the view that Israel bombed the ship intentionally to annihilate any incriminating evidence of their role in the 1967 war."

Arf