Activists on board the flotilla raided by Israeli commandos this week are poised to broadcast their own footage of the deadly operation to counter edited Israeli-released footage, one of them said yesterday.

"We have to get back to the US and show this to the entire world," Iara Lee, a US-Brazilian documentary-maker who was among the hundreds of activists detained then released by Israel, told Brazil's Globo television network.

She said her images - contained on three memory cards hid in her underwear to escape confiscation by the Israelis - were "exclusive" and high quality.

"We were the only ones with a professional camera," Ms Lee said from Turkey, to where she had been deported from Israel with nearly 500 other activists.

Video footage released so far of the raid has included a live internet feed from the flotilla the Israelis quickly disconnected, and excerpts released by the Israeli military that include images of Israeli soldiers being hit by stick-wielding individuals after dropping from helicopters.

Israeli soldiers who seized the flotilla on Monday confiscated all cameras, computers and telephones they found, according to the released activists and journalists on board, some of whom accuse Israel of editing the expropriated images to suit its own version of events.

Israel and the activists are giving contradictory accounts of what happened on the ships, blaming each other for initiating the violence that resulted in the Israeli commandos killing at least nine activists.

Israel asserts that its soldiers were met by live fire as they dropped on to one of the ships, and shot back in self-defence. Officials showed a box of weapons they said had been seized from the ship that contained knives, batons and slingshots, but no firearms.

The activists say the commandos started shooting as soon as they arrived, prompting the defensive beatings from those on board the Turkish ship Mavi Marmara, where most of the violence occurred.

Israel is resisting calls for an international inquiry into the raid.

Ms Lee described the Israeli military operation Monday as "Apocalypse Now"-style "carnage" and an "act of piracy" on her Facebook page.

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