Israeli commandos killed 10 people on Sunday night after storming a convoy of ships that were defying an Israeli blockade by carrying aid to Gaza. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu cancelled a trip to Washington and is returning to Israel.

The convoy had left from Cyprus on Sunday carrying concrete and other supplies, headed for the Gaza strip in violation of an Israeli blockade on the region imposed after the Islamist Hamas took power in 2007.

So far, Israel claims its soldiers were attacked, while the people on the flotilla—a multinational group backed by the Free Gaza Movement—claim to have been resisting passively. According to the aid organization, the civilians on board were asleep when the soldiers rappelled onto the boat; according to the IDF, the commandos were met with "pre-planned resistance."

It seems likely that we'll never get a good sense of exactly what happened on the boat, but you can expect two things today: A lot of emotionally-charged arguments about who was at fault, and why; and a lot of ill-informed opinions about how this will affect the complicated politics of the region.

[BBC]