However many ships took part — or didn’t — there is one key fact about this year’s so-called Gaza Freedom Flotilla that overrides all others: This outrageous provocation has nothing to do with freedom for Gaza and everything to do with deligitimizing Israel.

So far, flotilla organizers have come off like the gang that couldn’t sail straight.

Thanks to Israel’s skillful manipulation of maritime insurance companies, as well as many national governments condemning the flotilla, only 10 ships gathered in Greece hoping to set sail for Gaza — down dramatically from the several dozen organizers had hoped for.

Moreover, as of midweek, only one vessel had made it out of port and was waiting in international waters — perhaps in vain — for others to join it. Because no one knows if that ship, or others, possess weapons, the Israeli navy needs to be ready for violence. While Israel will surely stop any boats that get near Gaza, we are confident there will be no repeat of the last year’s deadly debacle.

On another front, activists stymied on the piers of Greece now plan to descend on Ben Gurion International Airport on Friday, July 8, for what they call a “flytilla,” bringing their anti-Israel hysteria into the heart of the country. Here again, Israeli security forces plan to put the kibosh on any disruptions.

The stated aim of these activists is to end what they call the siege of Gaza. We ask: What siege? Goods have been entering Gaza by the truckload for more than a year. Months ago, Egypt opened the Rafah crossing, which also expanded the flow of goods and services into Gaza.

Even the spokesman for UNWRA, the unabashedly anti-Israel United Nations agency responsible for Palestinian welfare, admits “people were never starving in Gaza.”

The real aim of these subversives is to rattle the Jewish state, to build global momentum against Israel using every P.R. stunt in the book.

For proof, look no further than Adam Shapiro, a Jewish-born board member of the Free Gaza Movement, which co-sponsors the flotilla. He was caught on film saying, “Free Gaza is but one tactic of a larger strategy to transform this conflict from one between Israel and the Palestinians to one between the rest of the world and Israel.”

This takes cynicism to a new low. Israel and her friends will not sit still for it.

There is a reason why Israel’s blockade of Gaza remains in place. Without it, the threat of arms shipments from Iran to Hamas is very real. Yet the flotilla folks seem not to get this — or if they do, they apparently approve.

Israel is the one under siege, but through determination, skill and the support of Jews around the world, Israel will survive these latest outrages, whether by sea, by air or even by land.