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I take the blockade business personally. If I visit Israel in the near future, I do not want my flight interrupted by a rocket smashing into the plane as we descend for a landing at Ben Gurion Airport.

Israeli leaders and their supporters in the United States have kept cool heads in the wake of the blockade confrontation.

The Israelis were right to seize the Mavi Marmara, they were right to fight anyone who interfered, they were right to reject an international inquiry and they are right to maintain the blockade.

Israel's quandary is so basic and fundamental. Any one of these ships could carry rockets and other weapons, which Hamas will employ to attack Israel. What does it take for Turkey, Europe, and these "peace activists" to understand this?

Israeli officials and their supporters in the United States are correctly focusing on a string of key issues: the seagoing blockade, the question of blame, warnings to future would-be intruders and the sponsoring group's ties to Hamas. In this vein, some assumptions about the raid's outcome and Israel's goals need clarification.

Hamas has been building an arsenal and firing thousands of rockets into southern Israel for years. Israel cannot tolerate the import of weapons into Gaza. Weapons are already sent from Egypt to Gaza through a tunnel system, but the blockade by sea prevents the entry of more weapons.

Even the oft-criticized New York Times editorialized: "[Prime Minister Binyamin] Netanyahu has rightly refused to abandon the sea blockade of Gaza. He cannot do that until Hamas stops rocketing Israeli cities and towns."

Netanyahu's firm stance is already paying off. On June 22, Iran announced it was sending two ships to bring humanitarian supplies to Gaza. Four days later, on Saturday, Iran recalled the ships.

Cooperation from the Obama administration could have factored into Iran's reversal. In the interim, a State Department spokesperson urged would-be peace activists to avoid Israel's blockade.

According to the State Department's Web site, a spokesperson said during a news conference, "Direct delivery by sea is neither appropriate nor responsible, and certainly not effective, under the circumstances. We, along with our partners in the Quartet, urge all those wishing to deliver goods to do so through established channels so that their cargo can be inspected and transferred via land crossings into Gaza. There is no need for unnecessary confrontations."

Netanyahu plans to use Israel's investigation of the incident to telegraph to the world where the blame belongs: the sponsors of the flotilla and their helpers, according to media reports. The sponsors and participants of the flotilla were warned that they could unload humanitarian goods in Israel, and Israel would transport the goods to Gaza.

Instead, the ships pressed on to Gaza and one -- the Mavi Marmara -- refused to stop. Israel claims that the commandos were attacked and they fired back to protect themselves, killing nine of the passengers. Turkish leaders were swift to condemn Israel before any hard information could be established.

The Turkish government under Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan has been repeatedly accused of facilitating the confrontation to carve out a leadership role in the Muslim world, at Israel's expense. Netanyahu is bound to alert the international community to these deeds.

In Washington, D.C., members of both the House and Senate signed letters to President Obama in support of Israel's role and charged that the Turkish Humanitarian Relief Foundation, known as IHH, is tied into Hamas. Ostensibly a charity organization, IHH helped fund the Mavi Marmara.

The Senate missive, signed by 83 senators, calls on Obama to add IHH to the U.S. terrorist list "after an examination by the intelligence community, the State Department and the Treasury Department."

No matter what IHH's terrorist links, its members committed an act of war in attempting to breach Israel's blockade. That should be sufficient to make them eligible for placement on the terror list, which would make it a crime to raise money for the cited group.

Some New York-area members of Congress -- in coordination with Jewish advocacy organizations -- want Mavi Marmara passengers denied visas to prevent them from speaking in the United States, according to the New York Daily News.

Some assumptions about the circumstances were misplaced. Media reports noted that Israel laid siege to Gaza to make Hamas vulnerable to citizen pressure, limit weapons, and win the release of Gilad Shalit, who was captured by terrorists in a cross-border raid more than four years ago. Such outcomes would be nice, but Israeli leaders would be foolish if they expected any of this as likely to occur. Still, one does not reward its enemies for being hostile.

Most galling is hearing words like "botched" and "disastrous" to describe the raid. The commandos botched nothing. They were charged with the mission of stopping the ships. They did exactly that. Is it their fault that some passengers attacked them? They prevented the ships from proceeding any further. Mission accomplished.

Bruce S. Ticker is a freelance journalist in Philadelphia. He blogs at www.Jewishconcerns.blogspot and can be reached at bticker@comcast.net.