American Legion calls for full investigation into Israel’s attack on the USS Liberty In a historic move, the American Legion, at its national convention in Reno on Thursday, August 24, 2017, approved Resolution 40 calling for the first full U.S. government investigation of Israel’s 1967 attack on the USS Liberty. Gunnery Sergeant Bryce F. Lockwood (USMC, ret.) was on hand during the entire convention working for passage of the resolution, which originated earlier this year from Post 40 in Seattle in the American Legion Department of Washington (state). Lockwood was awarded the Silver Star for “conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity in action in connection with the unprovoked and unexpected armed attack on U.S.S. LIBERTY (AGTR-5), in the Eastern Mediterranean, on 8 June 1967.” Lockwood said there were a lot of “handshakes, hugs, and some tears” after the vote. The American Legion’s resolution brings the nation’s largest veterans organization back on the side of the USS Liberty survivors, family, and supporter in calling upon the “115th United States Congress to publicly, impartially, and thoroughly investigate the attack on the USS Liberty and its aftermath and to commence its investigation before the end of 2017, the 50th anniversary year of the attack.” The resolution also aligns the Legion with the Veterans of Foreign Wars, which, in 2013, adopted Resolution 423 at their national convention calling for the attack to be investigated. The Liberty was a U.S. Navy electronics ship operating in international waters in the eastern Mediterranean when it was attacked by Israeli forces, killing 34 and injuring at least 174. The ship’s commander received the Congressional Medal of Honor and the crew is one of the most decorated for a single engagement in U.S. Navy history. The claim is sometimes incorrectly made that the attack has already been investigated. However, a one-week-long Naval inquiry was only tasked with investigating crew performance during the attack, and Congress has never investigated it, as reported in the July 1997 issue of The American Legion Magazine and elsewhere. For more information go to http://gtr5.com/faq-1.htm or see http://www.usslibertyveterans.org/ . See key resolution documents at https://tinyurl.com/LibertyResDocs or https://spaces.hightail.com/space/XPJEuQ2VKu.
For immediate release
Contact:
Email: [email protected] Tel:916-913-9460
Ernest Gallo, President of the Liberty Veterans Association: Tel: 386-446-6855
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