Tag: Global Actions

Free Gaza Movement to set sail again

To view the Free Gaza Movement website click here

On October 28, 2008, the Free Gaza Movement will set sail again for Gaza. On board will be a Nobel Peace Prize winner, five physicians, a member of the Israeli Knesset, and a member of the Palestinian Legislative Council. The boat will again carry 26 passengers and crew to the port of Gaza.

“We’ve spent the past month making sure that our boat is better and stronger, because the weather is getting more severe. Since we promised the people of Gaza we would return, we wanted to make sure we would return safely”, said Derek Graham, first mate on board the boat.

Mairead Maguire, the 1976 Nobel Peace Prize winner for her work for peace in Northern Ireland and one of the passengers on board stated, “We sail to Gaza to show the people we love and care for them. What less can we do whilst our governments remain silent and inactive in face of such preventable suffering of the women and children of Gaza and Palestine.”

Also on board is Mustafa Barghouti, a member of the Palestinian Legislative Council and Jamal Zahalka, , a member of the Israeli Knesset (parliament). Both Palestinians are determined to forge alliances with their countrymen in Gaza, something they have not been able to do, because Israel has closed all land borders to this besieged people.

On this occasion the siege-breakers will deliver 6 cubic meters of medicine, as a gift from the European Campaign to End the on Siege on Gaza. Dr Arafat Shoukri, head of the Campaign stated, “This is just the first consignment of medical supplies we hope to deliver. Our choice of medicines has been in response to a specific request from the health authorities in Gaza. Many basic items such as cough syrup for children are non-existent in the territory and we are happy to make them available. Our Campaign will also dispatch a number of medical specialists to the Gaza to assist in the worsening humanitarian crisis brought on by the siege.”

Greta Berlin, one of the organizers reiterated the goals of the Free Gaza Movement, “We intend to break Israel’s blockade as often as we can. This second trip is just one of many we intend to organize over the next year. We have lawyers, members of Parliament and other professionals already on our passenger lists for upcoming voyages.”

Maan: Free Gaza II initiative comes from Yemini activists

To view original article, published by Maan News Agency on the 14th September, click here

Gaza – Ma’an – A boat from Yemin with a crew of from around the Arab world will set sail in the wake of the Free Gaza ships and work to widen the cracks in Israel’s siege on Gaza.

Palestinian lawmaker Jamal Al-Khudari who is also head of the Popular Campaign against the Siege announced the voyage of the second ship, which was inspired by the success of the Free Gaza experiment on Sunday.

Al-Khudari spoke with the Secretary General of the National Committee to Support Issues of Arab and Islamic nations Sa’id Abdel Mo’men An’am earlier in the day. An’am said the crew will launch with the permission of the Yemini government and representatives from the popular committee against siege.

“Yemeni people all support the besieged Palestinian people in Gaza,” An’am said, “and we seek to help break the blockade.”

Al-Khudari applauded this step, saying the committee is ready and prepared to coordinate for the boat to cross easily and arrive to the beach of the Gaza Strip. He called this step an important move in continuing the momentum created by the first ship of activists. He applauded the Yeminis for heeding the calls of the popular committee to consider the holy month of Ramadan the “month to break the blockade,” and encouraged other Arab nations to “put words into action” and follow the Yemini’s initiative.

Egyptian activists in Ismailia : “Police is still stopping us and we attend to stay there till tomorrow”

Egyptian Committee Against the Gaza Siege: At 8am this morning (10th September), a first group from the Egyptian Committee Against the Gaza Siege, mainly Labor Party’s members, left Cairo in 4 micro-buses with food and medicine to go and try to break the criminal siege of Gaza.

Photos from www.newspalestina.blogspot.com

When they arrived at Ismailia, located at 100 km from Cairo and 30 km from the Suez Canal, the Sinai entrance, the Egyptian police stopped the convoy and took away the driving licences of the drivers, preventing them to go forward

More than 150 people got outside the buses with Palestinian and Egyptian flags and chanting slogans in support of the Palestinians.

A second convoy of 5 buses with around 200 activists left Cairo at 1 pm and has been also stopped at Ismailia.

Many people coming from Alexandria and many other towns have been stopped before reaching Cairo and some of them have been arrested

Police tightened up procedures all along the main road to the border town of Rafah, checking the identity of travelers and asking them the reason for their journey, but many of them driving individual cars managed to reach Al Arish were they are waiting their friends.

Now, the activists who were traveling in the buses are still in Ismailia and demonstrating in front of the checkpoint.

They are chanting slogans asking the lift of the Gaza blockade;

They said they will stay there till Egyptian authorities will allow them to go to Gaza, even if this will happen only tomorrow.

According witnesses, the police seized one of the buses full of food.

Dr Abed Elglil, the Kefaia leader, said in a phone call: “Police is still stopping us and we intend to stay there till tomorrow. Egyptian authorities are worse than Israelis authorities because Israel let get through the 2 Free Gaza Movement’s boats”

Indeed, the Egyptian government contributes to the blockade of Gaza by refusing to open the Rafah crossing point without Israeli approval, as it agreed in a 2005 deal with the Israelis.

Several national forces are participating in this action, including the Committee Against the Gaza Siege, Engineers against Detention, al-Karamah party, Labour Party, Nasserist party, Kifâya, independent lawyers, March 9 Movement, April 6 Movement and Muslim Brotherhood’s members.

Ynet: Blair sister-in-law – “Gaza world’s largest concentration camp”

British left-wing activist Lauren Booth remains stuck in Strip after journey to ‘break’ Israeli naval blockade, equates situation to Holocaust, Darfur

By Noa Raz

To view original article, published by Ynet on the 11th September, click here

To view the Free Gaza Movement website click here

Unlike her brother-in-law, Quartet envoy to the Middle East Tony Blair, who frequently travels from Israel to the Palestinian territories and back, Lauren Booth has found herself stuck in the Gaza Strip.

The British left-wing activist arrived in the Hamas-controlled coastal enclave as part of the dozens of ‘Free Gaza’ activists who set out on two boats from Cyprus last month with the intent of “breaking” the Israeli naval blockade imposed on the Strip. Booth is one of the 10 activists who chose to remain in Gaza while her companions set sail back to Cyprus.

Since then she has been stuck in Gaza, unable to exit through Israel or Egypt.

In a telephone interview with Ynet on Wednesday, Booth slammed Israel’s policies and called Gaza “the largest concentration camp in the world today. I was startled the Israelis agreed to this.”

Despite her current predicament, Booth said she has no regrets. “My children are the ones who are suffering, because I’m being prevented from leaving and they can’t see me. I don’t regret it, because I wanted to come here and help these children who are suffering on a daily basis,” she said.

Booth asserted that the current siege is not the result of the policies of the Hamas government. “There’s been a siege for 20 years already. Palestinians’ freedom of movement has been restricted since the 80s. This is an inexcusable outrage on an international level.”

She spoke of the situation in Gaza and said, “Yesterday, I visited mothers of children under the age of five. Nutrition here has deteriorated threefold over the last two years because it is impossible to bring food through the crossings. Unemployment has risen, so people can’t even afford to buy what food there is left.”

‘It’s as bad as Darfur’

When asked about Israel’s right to respond to incessant attacks emanating from Gaza, Booth evoked Holocaust-related rhetoric. “There is no right to punish people this way. There is no justification for this kind of collective punishment. You were in the concentration camps, and I can’t believe that you are allowing the creation of such a camp yourselves.”

“The Palestinians’ suffering is physical, mental and emotional,” she went on, “there is not a family here in which someone is not in desperate need of work, shelter or food. This is a humanitarian crisis on the scale of Darfur.

Booth said that while the media does focus on Gaza, its journalistic criterion remains deeply flawed.

“One Western person is stuck in Gaza and the media turns it into a huge story. A million and a half people are stuck in Gaza, and it’s a non-story. I am telling you, what is going on here is a tragedy. Whatever is being done, it’s not enough.”

One person Booth doesn’t think is doing enough, is her brother in law Blair. “I don’t think he has a real idea of what’s going on here. I think that the Israeli government is working very hard to keep him in the dark.”

Winter fuel shortage

Despite the morale boost from the sea-faring activists, Gaza residents are concerned of the impact the Israeli siege may have as winter nears, and are preparing for long months with limited amounts of fuel. Director of the Palestinian Energy Authority in Gaza warned of an exacerbation of the fuel siege during the cold season. The director said the amount of fuel currently being brought in to the Strip through Israel serves a mere 35% of the Palestinians’ needs.

Meanwhile on Wednesday, Egyptian security forces prevented a convoy of local operatives from reaching the Rafah crossing and from there to Gaza.

Hamas slammed Egypt’s decision, and said that the security forces’ actions hurt the Egyptian nation’s feelings and those of the Palestinians.

Ali Waked contributed to the report

Maan: Two injured in Israeli attacks on Palestinian fishermen in Gaza

To view original article, published by Maan News Agency on the 2nd September, click here

Two Gazan fishermen were injured when Israeli naval vessels fired on Palestinian fishing boats on Monday.

Palestinian medical sources told Ma’an that 32-year-old Husam Sultan was hit in the head with shrapnel. His wounds were described as serious. Ninteen-year-old Muhammad Sultan was lacerated by shrapnel in various places on his body.

The Israeli navy opened fire at the fishermen off the Gaza shore near the former site of the Israeli settlement Dugeit, west of the Palestinian town of Beit Lahiya, in the northern Gaza Strip.

This Israeli attack is an apparent violation of the ceasefire between Israel and Palestinian factions in the Gaza Strip which went into effect on 19 June. The violation came on the first day of the Islamic fasting month of Ramadan.

Another Israeli naval assault was reported earlier in the day in the day by international human rights activists accompanying Palestinian fishermen.
The Free Gaza movement reported live bullets fired near Gaza City, where five internationals were accompanying fishing boats during daily work in Gaza territorial waters. The group said the boats were “several miles offshore” when Israeli ships opened fire.

Activists from the Free Gaza boats who have remained in the Strip joined Gazan fishermen Monday morning as they launched their boats in order to monitor Israeli Naval aggressions.

There have been repeated reports of warning shots, arrests and boat shadowing by the Israeli navy patrolling Gazan waters.

Israel enforces a “Fishing Limit” that is 6 nautical miles (11.1 km) from the Gaza shore. The international waters boundary and the 1996 Oslo accords boundary both state that Gaza waters extend 20 nautical miles from the Gaza coast, and the 2002 Bertini agreement (signed by Israel and the Palestinian Authority) has the boundary lying 12 nautical miles or 22.2 km from the Gaza coast. The current “Fishing Limit” has been imposed by the Israeli navy since October 2006.

The Israeli navy began limiting traffic going in or coming out if the Gaza Strip starting in the mid-1990s when the Oslo accords were signed. All traffic was halted since 2007, when Hamas took over the Gaza Strip.

The Free Gaza activists will be joined by others from the International Solidarity movement in Gaza, who will record and document all instances of Israeli naval aggression and harassment.

The activists announced Monday that they would be present on any fishing boat at any time along the entire Gaza coast from Monday morning onwards. They said that they hoped the presence of internationals would deter further Israeli aggression.

The fishing industry employs some 3,000 individuals, who rely on traveling deep enough into the Mediterranean to catch sardine as they migrate from the Nile delta northwards every spring.

The Free Gaza movement has focused its efforts this year on exposing and halting what they call the illegal Israeli control of Gazan coastal waters. Since Israel disengaged from Gaza in 2005, and claims not to be an occupying force in the area, the movement attests that Gazans should have control over their own ports.

The movement successfully landed two boats in the closed Gaza port on Saturday 23 August. Israeli army and government officials had initially planned on preventing the ships from landing, but made a last minute decision to allow them to pass. The government later called the event a “one-time” deal, and promised it would not allow other ships through into Gaza.

When all but 9 of the Free Gaza activists left the Gaza port for Cyprus in Thursday 28 August, they brought with them seven Palestinians, who for the first time in years did not have to ask Israeli or Egyptian permission to leave the Strip. The Palestinian government in Gaza stamped the passports and travel documents of those leaving, who arrived in Cyprus the following day by ship.