Survivors of US warship sunk by Israel in 1967 remember victims, slam persisting govt. cover-up

Snapping salutes during the commemorative event at the Arlington National Cemetery near Washington, DC -- led by the president of the USS Liberty Veterans Association, Larry L. Bowen – some 50 men and women gathered this week around a stone slab with six names on it, Military.com news outlet reported.

According to the report, Israeli munitions ripped through the Belmont-class research ship with strafing fire, napalm and torpedoes as it patrolled Mediterranean waters performing signal intelligence -- "spy" -- missions during the 1967 Six-Day War between the Israel regime and a coalition of Arab countries.

The attack, which left 34 Americans dead and 174 others injured, has been veiled in controversy since it happened, with survivors, and even some former senior intelligence officials, pointing to a deliberate bombardment by the US-backed Israeli regime’s forces and a subsequent American dismissal of the attack to pardon its ally.

"For 55 years, we've tried to honor the crew, with little to no support from our government, just like the lack of support we received when we were under attack," Bowen emphasized in remarks during the commemorative ceremony.

"Our government has tried to cover the entire attack up as a mere accident. Nothing could be further from the truth," he further insisted as quoted in the report.

"Heroism was the order of the day, and every man who could help, stepped up to help," he then noted.

“The story of the USS Liberty has teetered on the border of erasure and notoriety for decades,” the report went on to underline. “The ship had one of the most highly decorated naval crews in US history, earning one Medal of Honor for the ship's commander, Capt. William L. McGonagle, and hundreds of other commendations from the attack.”

“Yet even after the mid-2000s, when the National Security Agency declassified bits and pieces of the event, some of which contradicted previous official accounts of the attack, the ship's history is still inconvenient for the US government,” according to the ship's survivors cited in the report.

Throughout the ceremony, between the speakers and murmurs within the crowd, the discontent with the alleged cover-up and lack of recognition by the US government was palpable.

Among those attending the remembrance event was a Liberty survivor and Navy signalman -- identified as Joe Meadors -- who was barely in his twenties during the attack. Now, in his 70s, he says he remembers that afternoon clearly.

"I was up on the signal bridges," he said. "Watching the first attacking aircraft and their wings light up with machine guns, side by side. I'll never forget."

He remembers the reconnaissance flights earlier in the morning and says that a "spy" on board told him "not to worry about it," the Israelis were reporting that they had identified the ship as American.

"Some of them were low enough that we could wave to the pilots, and then the deck plating would rattle," he said.

"Parents deserve to know the truth, Americans deserve to know the truth about what happened," said Meadors. "We're fed up with it."

The attack

In the early hours of June 8, 1967, an Israeli warplane took off on a routine reconnaissance patrol over the Mediterranean, according to a review of the incident conducted by the Israeli military forces. The plane identified a ship 70 miles west of Gaza, but could not determine its country of origin.

Eighteen minutes after the Liberty was first seen, the Israeli aircraft identified it as a US Navy ship, yet the marker remained red on the board of Israel's Central Coastal Command until 9 a.m. when it was switched to green, indicating the ship was indeed "neutral." But as Syrians battered Israel's front lines and Egyptian submarines prowled the sea, the green marker, according to the Israelis, became an afterthought.

By the evening of June 8, the Liberty -- which was armed with only a handful of .50-caliber machine guns -- was nearly sunk. A barrage of torpedoes slammed into the ship's hull as Israeli aircraft dropped napalm and strafed her deck repeatedly. The attack lasted two hours, according to Bowen.

Dozens of Americans were killed, and the questions of why and how hung over the survivors, and public and defense officials in the wake of the attack and the brief war.

Barely 20 days later, the Navy said it had an answer to what had happened or, rather, a partial one: The Liberty was doing its duty, the attack was unprovoked, Israel had "ample time" to identify the ship, but the US could not identify the reason for the attack, according to a 1967 Department of Defense press release. The US government has never publicly blamed Israel for anything other than an accident.

The Liberty's survivors insist that the Israeli regime had to have known that the vessel was American -- flying an American flag -- and the attack was made without warning or justification.

In 2005, the USS Liberty Veterans Association submitted a report to the Pentagon asking for a formal investigation, unsatisfied by the Navy's 1967 inquiry. The report, summarized by the survivors, in part said that their radios were jammed, preventing distress frequencies from reaching superiors; the Israeli aircraft attacking the Liberty were unmarked; and the planes deliberately strafed their life rafts, anticipating that the sailors would abandon ship.

"We the surviving crew members will not let the cover-up continue as long as we live," said Bowen.