That's the headline today on a wire item distributed by the Jewish Telegraph Agency, a news service which bills itself as "The Global News Service of the Jewish People."
The specific threat was contained in a letter Oren Helman, the director of Israel's Government Press Office, addressed to foreign journalists resident in Israel:
As the Director of the Government Press Office, I would like to make it clear to you and to the media that you represent that participation in the flotilla is an intentional violation of Israeli law and is liable to lead to participants being denied entry into the State of Israel for ten years, to the impoundment of their equipment and to additional sanctions. I implore you to avoid taking part in this provocative and dangerous event, the purpose of which is to undermine Israel's right to defend itself and to knowingly violate Israeli law.
The Foreign Press Association in Israel strongly rejected the letter:
"It sends a chilling message to the international press and raises serious questions regarding Israel's commitment to the freedom of the press.
The JTA report notes that several dozen journalists expect to accompany the flotilla, including the prominent Israeli dissident Amira Hass. Hass today filed her first report on the experiences of a group of Canadian activists aboard a ship named Tahrir:
Social activist Stephan Corriveau warned all of us due to set sail on the Canadian ship dubbed the Tahrir - one of the boats participating in the upcoming Gaza flotilla - that we would have no opportunity to bathe during the three-day journey to Gaza but would have drinking water. There was no point in bringing a change of clothes, the Montreal-based Corriveau noted, because there would be nowhere to change, encouraging us to take as little as possible. In the best case scenario, we will make it to Gaza and can buy some clothing there, he said.
There are about 50 of us, men and women, due to sail on the Tahrir, whose name is a reference to the Cairo square where protests earlier this year led to the downfall of Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak's regime. Several hundred other activists, from about 20 countries, and several dozen journalists are currently preparing to set sail for Gaza.
That story, by the way, has been recommended over 350 times on Facebook.
In other news, Ethan Bronner reported today in the New York Times (reprinted here by Times subsidiary the Boston Globe) that Gaza is already in the midst of a mini-economic boom, as a result of the easing of the Israeli embargo on the territory:
Two luxury hotels are opening in Gaza this month. Thousands of new cars are on the roads. A second shopping mall — with escalators from Israel — will open next month. Hundreds of homes and two dozen schools are about to go up. A Hamas-run farm where Jewish settlements once stood is growing enough fruit that Israeli imports are tapering off.
As pro-Palestinian activists prepare to sail in a flotilla aimed at keeping attention on Gaza and pressure on Israel, this isolated Palestinian coastal enclave is having its first period of economic growth since the siege they are protesting began in 2007.
Bronner quotes Palestinian sources that the embargo is over on some 60-70% of the goods that had previously been restricted, that factory production is up, and that the unemployment rate has come down -- down! -- to 25% in the first quarter this year.
Economic difficulties continue, with electricity service irregular, hospitals lacking the resources to perform elective surgery, and large numbers of people living in severe poverty. According to Bonner, three quarters of the population in Gaza receives food aid.
Israel continues to ban the import of construction materials, so there are serious shortages in housing, roads, schools, factories and public works.
Israel prides itself on being a democracy -- prior to the Egyptian and Tunisian revolutions, it could call itself the only democracy in the Middle East -- but one wonders if a state that engages in such repression of a free press can long consider itself such?