When trying to grasp the enormity of the challenge in tracking and intercepting the Gazan-bound Iranian arms ship Klos-C, it is helpful to note that, unlike land masses, which are fastidiously parceled into neat domains of sovereignty, the oceans and seas of the world are anarchic zones, where, in author William Langewiesche’s description, “the resilient pathogens of piracy and terrorism flourish.”
Oceans cover three-quarters of the earth, and are home to 40,000 large merchant vessels bearing nearly 90 percent of all international trade. Those ships, Langewiesche wrote in the The Atlantic in 2003, “truly embody the anarchy of the open ocean: they are possibly the most independent objects on earth, many of them without allegiances of any kind, frequently changing their identity, and assuming whatever nationality, or “flag,” allows them to sail as they please.”

Panama, a country of 3 million people, he noted, is the largest maritime nation on earth. It was also the flag on the Klos-C, packed with missiles from Iran according to the Israeli military, before it was intercepted about 100 nautical miles southeast of Port Sudan.

From the statements of officials, like Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who said a secondary goal of the interception had been to expose Iran’s true face, it seems the operation was about more than stopping missiles, it was about painting Iran and Hamas in as harsh a light as possible, not unlike was done to Yasser Arafat in 2002, after the Karine-A arms shipment was uncovered.

Read the article in full at Times of Israel