Free Gaza Movement

[Anonymous]

http://freegaza.org/index.php?language= ... ur_mission

OUR MISSION
 
 2008: Sixty Years On  
 
May 2008 marks the 60-year anniversary of the Nakba, "the catastrophe", when the overwhelming majority of Palestinians were forcibly evicted from their ancestral homeland to create the state of Israel. In contravention of International law, human rights, and basic principles of morality, Israel continues to deny these refugees and their descendants their right to return home. Israel has neither acknowledged nor attempted to amend this historic injustice that gave birth to the Jewish state. Instead, more than 5 million Palestinian refugees languish in refugee camps, while their homes, farms, and properties are inhabited by Jewish immigrants who arrived in Palestine from around the globe.

The historic illegal appropriation of Palestinian land, home and heritage is at the heart of the Middle East conflict. It has given rise to the largest ongoing refugee population in the world. It paved the way for subsequent land theft in 1967, and the ongoing ethnic cleansing that has squeezed Palestinians in the West Bank into ghettos and bantustans surrounded by 27-foot walls, sniper towers, and military guards. It has created the open-air prison of Gaza with an impoverished and overcrowded population of 1.4 million inhabitants.

This tragic event has dispossessed and disinherited Palestinians all over the world; and a destitute population of refugees with only their memories of Palestine, crumbling property deeds, and an undaunted will to return.

Mission Statement
We want to break the siege of Gaza. We want to raise international awareness about the prison-like closure of the Gaza Strip and pressure the international community to review its sanctions policy and end its support for continued Israeli occupation. We want to uphold Palestine's right to welcome internationals as visitors, human rights observers, humanitarian aid workers, journalists, or otherwise.

Who are we?
We are these human rights observers, aid workers, and journalists. We have years of experience volunteering in Gaza and the West Bank at the invitation of Palestinians. But now, because of the increasing stranglehold of Israel's illegal occupation of Palestine, many of us find it almost impossible to enter Gaza, and an increasing number have been refused entry to Israel and the West Bank as well. Despite the great need for our work, the Israeli Government will not allow us in to do it.

We are of all ages and backgrounds. Back home, we are teachers, doctors, nurses, engineers, truck drivers, youth workers, musicians, secretaries, parents, grandparents, lawyers, students, activists, actors, playwrights, politicians, web designers, authors, international training consultants, and we even include a former Hollywood film industry worker, a former Marine, an aviator, and an explorer. We are Italian, Irish, Canadian, Greek, Tunisian, German, Australian, American, English, Scottish, Danish, Israeli, and Palestinian.


What are we going to do?
We've tried to enter Palestine by land. We've tried to arrive by air. Now we're getting serious. We're taking a ship.

A Holocaust survivor, a Catholic nun and former British Prime Minister Tony Blair's sister-in-law are set to sail to Gaza on Thursday to try to break an Israeli blockade on the territory.



The three are among some 46 activists from 16 countries who have gathered in Cyprus for the journey, which The Free Gaza Movement hopes will draw attention to the plight of 1.4 million Palestinians suffering shortages of everything from fuel to food since an Israeli crackdown began last year.


Their goal is to set up a regular route of communication and commerce from the island of Cyprus to Gaza to ferry humanitarian supplies and people into and out of Gaza.


Under international law, this is a legal venture and is being done with the permission of the Gazan authorities and the government of Cyprus. It is, in essence, a jailbreak into the besieged Gaza strip along the same lines as the Berlin airlift that freed West Berlin from Soviet efforts to starve it into submission.


Any action designed to harm civilians constitutes collective punishment (in the Palestinians' case, for voting the "wrong" way) and is both illegal under international law and profoundly immoral.


The people who are embarking on this humanitarian mission are very brave human beings, considering that Israel has already indicated that they will use the Israeli Navy to shoot to kill these volunteers, and claim it as legitimate Israeli "self defense".

[youtube:f70qe954]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fCbEkCjsevo[/youtube]f70qe954]

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/objects/pa ... No=1012171

Israel may use force to halt boat trying to break Gaza siege

By Amos Harel

Defense officials favor forcefully blocking two boats which a group of U.S.-based activists plan to sail to Gaza to protest what they call "the Israeli siege on the Strip," Haaretz has learned.

According to the Foreign Ministry, Israel is within its rights to use force against the seafarers.

The subject of the Greek-flagged boats which the Free Gaza group said it would sail from Cyprus to Gaza this week prompted defense officials to hold a series of discussions; they said allowing the ships to reach the Gaza coastline could create a dangerous precedent. But the Israel Navy has not yet received any instructions on how to treat the vessels.

According to some officials, Hamas is keen to exploit the initiative by the activists - including Israeli professor and activist Jeff Halper - for its political needs, and could try to greet the seafarers with fishing boats.

The officials believe that Hamas views the drive as an opportunity to underscore the suffering of the civilian population because of Israel's policies. A position paper by the Foreign Ministry's legal department says Israel has the right to use force against the demonstrators as part of the Oslo Accords, which names Israel as responsible for Gaza's territorial waters.

An official in Jerusalem said the Foreign Ministry's paper means that security forces could detain the vessels upon entry to Gaza's territorial waters, arrest the passengers and haul the ship to Israel, where the detainees could be interrogated.

The organizers have reportedly raised almost $300,000 to finance the operation and recruited 60 people to sail on the ship. These include activists from several countries as well as journalists.

In conversations with their Israeli counterparts, Cypriot officials have expressed concerns about the boat departing from their shores, but say they can do nothing to prevent it. According to the information that has reached Israel, however, Cyprus is not the only point of departure under consideration; the ship might also sail from Turkey or Alexandria in Egypt.