{"id":7145,"date":"2026-06-08T15:35:48","date_gmt":"2026-06-08T15:35:48","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/pronews.in\/index.php\/2026\/06\/08\/why-was-israel-spared-scrutiny-for-the-1967-uss-liberty-attack\/"},"modified":"2026-06-08T15:35:48","modified_gmt":"2026-06-08T15:35:48","slug":"why-was-israel-spared-scrutiny-for-the-1967-uss-liberty-attack","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/pronews.in\/index.php\/2026\/06\/08\/why-was-israel-spared-scrutiny-for-the-1967-uss-liberty-attack\/","title":{"rendered":"Why was Israel spared scrutiny for the 1967 USS Liberty attack?"},"content":{"rendered":"
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US Representative Thomas Massie set to honour the crew of the vessel on the House floor, bringing attention to the 1967 attack.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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On June 8, 1967, at least 34 US sailors were killed and 171 others were wounded in an Israeli attack on the USS Liberty, a United States Navy technical research ship stationed in the Mediterranean Sea off Egypt\u2019s Sinai Peninsula.<\/p>\n

Israel claimed it was a case of mistaken identity, saying its naval forces thought the vessel was Egyptian. But some of the survivors and researchers have disputed the Israeli version of the incident. They lament that successive governments did little to bring out the truth behind one of the deadliest attacks on the US Navy by its closest ally, Israel.<\/p>\n

This year, the attack has come under renewed attention after\u00a0US Representative Thomas Massie announced he would deliver a speech on the floor of the House of Representatives to honour and memorialise the crew of the USS Liberty.<\/span><\/p>\n

So what do we know about one of the most controversial chapters of the US Navy?<\/p>\n

What happened on June 8, 1967?<\/h2>\n

Israeli air and naval forces bombarded the intelligence-gathering vessel in international waters near the Sinai Peninsula during the 1967 war, when Israel captured Egypt\u2019s Sinai, Gaza and the West Bank.<\/p>\n

The assault began when Israeli jets attacked the vessel, striking the ship\u2019s deck with anti-personnel weapons and armour-piercing bullets.<\/p>\n

This was followed by a devastating strike from Israeli torpedo boats that blew a massive hole in the ship\u2019s starboard side, instantly killing 25 men in the lower research spaces. In total, 34 sailors were killed in the attack.<\/p>\n

The crew had been flying the US flag and had even exchanged waves with low-flying Israeli aircraft earlier that morning, making their identity clear. Israel has long maintained the strike was a tragic error, claiming exhausted pilots mistook the US naval vessel for an Egyptian warship.<\/p>\n

Was there an attempt to cover up?<\/h2>\n

Nearly 60 years on, records related to the attack remain classified, survivors and advocates say.<\/p>\n

Richard Brooks, chief engineer on the vessel, told Al Jazeera in a 2015 interview<\/a> that \u201cit wasn\u2019t a tragic accident\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was a deliberate attack. They knew who we were. They tried to sink us. They wanted us out to either bring the Americans into the war by blaming the Arabs or we picked up some information about their war plans.\u201d<\/p>\n

A naval board of inquiry was hastily convened while the severely damaged ship was dry-docked in Malta, but the proceedings concluded swiftly.<\/p>\n

Ernie Gallo, president of the USS Liberty Survivors Group, dismissed<\/a> Israel\u2019s \u201cmistaken identity\u201d excuse as a lie and accused the US government of complicity for accepting the false narrative. He continues to demand a full official inquiry.<\/p>\n

The US Congress never formally questioned the attack or formed a committee to investigate the tragedy.<\/p>\n

Representative Massie\u00a0has described the incident as an \u201cunprovoked attack by Israel\u201d and noted that several survivors planned to attend his memorial speech as guests in the congressional gallery on Monday.<\/p>\n

Israel\u2019s history of espionage against the US<\/h2>\n

Israel shares close military and intelligence ties with the US, with Washington providing billions of dollars in military assistance for decades. The two countries have coordinated in military operations such as the recent war on Iran.<\/p>\n

The USS Liberty attack remains a dark chapter, but it is not the only instance of Israel taking aggressive action or conducting intelligence operations against the US. Recently<\/a>, the Pentagon\u2019s Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) elevated the counterintelligence threat posed by Israel to its highest level of \u201ccritical\u201d.<\/p>\n

The warning follows reports of Israeli intelligence agencies intensifying efforts to collect information on US military personnel and government officials to intercept policy discussions amid efforts by the administration of US President Donald Trump to reach a deal with Iran. Israel has been against a deal with Iran, as its aim to topple the Iranian government was not realised by the current war.<\/p>\n

Other examples of Israeli espionage against the US include the covert installation of spyware on the mobile phones of US defence personnel operating inside Israel to tap their communications.<\/p>\n

Jonathan Pollard, a US Navy civilian intelligence analyst, was arrested in 1985 and pleaded guilty to passing massive amounts of classified information to Israel. He was released after serving 30 years in prison.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

US Representative Thomas Massie set to honour the crew of the vessel on the House floor, bringing attention to the 1967 attack. On June 8, 1967, at least 34 US sailors were killed and 171 others were wounded in an Israeli attack on the USS Liberty, a United States Navy technical research ship stationed in … Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":7146,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7145","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-travel"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pronews.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7145","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pronews.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pronews.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pronews.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pronews.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7145"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/pronews.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7145\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pronews.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/7146"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pronews.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7145"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pronews.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7145"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pronews.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7145"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}