Israel continues to threaten Flotilla despite Irish TDs promise to deliver letter to Shalit
Despite calls from the UN, Israel continues its plot to intercept the Freedom Flotilla to Gaza.
Israel's foreign ministry said it had given warnings to the ambassadors of Ireland, Cyprus, Greece, Sweden and Turkey - from where the ships set sail - that it had "issued warrants that prohibit the entrance of the vessels to Gaza".
Detention camp for Flotilla participants in Ashdod
This statement comes in the midst of Israeli preparations for a massive outdoor detention centre in the Israeli port of Ashdod and ongoing diplomatic attempts by the Israeli Foreign Ministry to prevent the Freedom Flotilla from reaching Gaza. Israel has vowed to divert the ships to Ashdod, by force if necessary, where all Israeli participants will be arrested, Palestinians will be questioned by Israeli secret police and internationals will be deported or held in a detention centre if they refuse deportation.
John Ging, Head of United Nation's Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) in the Gaza Strip since 2006 has asked the international community to "bring us the supplies we need to rebuild schools and run them, bring us the equipment we need to hospitals and health centers. Everybody knows how desperate the situation is in the Gaza Strip after almost three years of blockade. We need action now."
However the Director General of Israel's Foreign Ministry, Yossi Gal, said that the flotilla was "an absolute provocation" and a "cheap political stunt". Israel has entered into a full scale PR battle against the Freedom Flotilla by attempting to propagate the myth that there is no aid crisis in Gaza, despite Israel's illegal three-year-old blockade of the tiny coastal strip.
Dr. Fintan Lane, one of the 11 Irish activists on board the flotilla, said that they were determined to break Israel's blockade and will not be intimidated: "The people of Gaza have a right to access to the outside world and the right to determine their own future. If Israel attempts to stop the flotilla, they will once again show their true colours to the international community."
The Irish members of a Parliamentary delegation travelling to Gaza on the flotilla have this morning written to the father of Gilad Shalit, the Israeli soldier in captivity in Gaza, in response to a letter received by the Free Gaza movement in which Shalit's parents asked that letters and parcels from Shalit’s family be given to their son.
Aengus Ó Snodaigh TD, Chris Andrews TD and Senator Mark Daly have agreed to personally hand the letters and parcels to the Red Cross in Gaza or to their fellow Irishman John Ging, head of UNRWA in Gaza. They have also agreed to reiterate their call for the release of Gilad Shalit when they reach Gaza.
Turkish Freedom Flotilla ship
Challenger 2 on its way to Gaza
international |
rights, freedoms and repression |
news report
Friday May 28, 2010 12:07
by Freda H - IPSC
printable version
Digg this
del.icio.us
Furl
Reddit
Technorati
Facebook
Gab
Twitter
View Comments Titles Only
save preference
Comments (14 of 14)
Jump To Comment: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14Cyprus announced on Thursday that it would not allow vessels participating in the flotilla to Gaza to gather in its territorial waters. This has just been inforced. Flotilla participant and IPSC activist Fintan Lane has just contacted us to say that the Challenger 1, the ship on which he is travelling, has just been refused permission to pass through Cypriot waters.
The Challenger is now being followed and filmed by a Cypriot police helicopter.
Updates to follow
Take action to support Freedom Flotilla - http://ipsc.ie/flotilla/
Israel's Disinformation Campaign Against the Gaza Freedom Flotilla: http://cosmos.ucc.ie/cs1064/jabowen/IPSC/ipsc/displayRe...D=346
The Ireland Palestine Solidarity Campaign is calling for a public demonstration in solidarity with the Gaza Freedom Flotilla which is under threat from the Israeli Navy who say they aim to hijack the ships, and their 10,000 tonnes of supplies, and arrest, detain and/or deport their passengers.
We are calling for people to mobilise at 6pm on Monday 31st May at the Spire on O'Connell Street in a public display of support for the brave people of many nationalities - including 11 Irish nationals - who are aiming to break Israel's inhumane 3-year-old seige by sea.
Whether it will be a celebration for the supplies and people reaching their destination or a protest against Israeli piracy on the high seas is in the hands of the Israeli state.
Nice to see the TDs stepping after the Flotilla organisers refused to convey letters.
The Swedish delegates, including Henning Mankell (author) & Mehmet Kaplan (Green Party), had a hard time getting onto the boat because of these problems. They did get on eventually (because of the Swedish media inetrest?). There is much more coverage of events here in Sweden, across all forms of media over the last week, than there has been in Ireand.
This answers Mr Man's disinformation, fairly thoroughly.
'Israel claims that we refused to deliver a letter and package from POW Gilad Shalit's father. This is a blatant lie. We were first contacted by lawyers representing Shalit's family Wednesday evening, just hours before we were set to depart from Greece. Irish Senator Mark Daly (Kerry), one of 35 parliamentarians joining our flotilla, agreed to carry any letter and to attempt to deliver it to Shalit or, if that request was denied, deliver it to officials in the Hamas government. As of this writing, the lawyers have not responded to Sen. Daly, electing instead to attempt to smear us in the Israeli press.[5] We have always called for the release of all political prisoners in this conflict, including the 11,000 Palestinian political prisoners languishing in Israeli jails, among them hundreds of child prisoners.[6]'
Supporting this aid convoy to the people of Gaza is such an obvious, uncontroversial thing, I find it hard to believe that there are people out there still engaged in cynical pointscoring on this. Since there is undoubtedly more cynical disinformation on the way I can only recommend again our press release combatting this disinformation campaign http://cosmos.ucc.ie/cs1064/jabowen/IPSC/ipsc/displayRe...D=346
More coverage in the Swedish media.Well we have important things to think about with Eurovision and Matt Cooper interviewing Ryan Tubridy and the inverse ratio between decreasing bread and expanding circuses.Besides,Mossad have taken over in the Passport Office so we have to be nice in case anywhere crops up worth emigrating to.Is it not appropriate that the office is located at Moles(worth) street?Ah,that will be them at the door.Scuse me.
One thing that struck me about the Zioracist Media blitz over the past few weeks is that virtually all their info relating to supplies shipped into Gaza seems to start in 2010 - absolutely no mention of 2009 figures! Why? Because in 2009 the Zioracists were attempting to starve the Gazans into submission - like the Nazis before them, some part of the Zioracist murder-machine had actually sat down and calculated the absolute minimum calorie requirements of the Gazan population and that is the amount of food they allowed into Gaza, (the sick little racist modern-day Nazi fuckwits) but due to the brave actions of people like the Flotilla participants, the bad publicity started to hurt their carefully crafted (but totally false) 'eternal victim' media-image.
thankfully, unlike most of the western media, Al Jazeera are not afraid of becoming the target of the insane racist-rantings of the blood-dripping-from-the-fangs-Zio-racist-media-pitbulls (that's actually kinda insulting to pit-bulls, so my apologies to pit-bulls everywhere) and have had the guts to actually pick apart their silly cynical propaganda.
You can see their report below
Caption: Video Id: EbBDNEP6Znw Type: Youtube Video
Zioracists exposed for the scum-bag liars that they truthfully are
Well snared hb.But tone your language.Take your lead from that presenter who kept her cool and demolished the lies and spin with facts.Ranting only turns off those who approach with less information but still open minds.You'll turn into a mirror of the opposition if you let them infect you.Take it from one who has a short enough fuse himself.Keep on scanning.
Thanks for keeping us updated Freda. Good luck to all involved. Free Gaza & the West Bank, free the Palestinians
opus diablos, can I join the regressive hypocrite party?
Today Sunday May 30th, as of 10am this morning many Human Rights groups have come together
to Twitter for Gaza and the success of the flotilla.
Please join us and help us to get the VERY best coverage possible for the flotilla, Media outlets are VERY slow and some not responding at all
we are trying to tweet our way to the top of all search engines.
Please follow these links:
http://twitter.com/ipsc48 link for IPSC
http://twitter.com/waterfordsgroup link for IPSC Waterford
Or set up an account, either way join in and help us to assist the MV Rachel Corry and other vessels to get coverage
Thank You
Sorry,Balducci,its a private party.Did you not notice the singularity of hypocrite?But then I dont have a franchise on double-think either.If you can register the name I'll join your party.I'd call it copy-left only I think someone has that copywrongfully nailed.Last time I tried Dail Eireann didn't even reply.Ce la mort.
Meantime according to the Jerusalem Post the flotilla is getting radio jamming and unspecified technical problems.Not expected inshore till Monday apparently.Lots of vitriol and bile pumping down their comment lines but the actual coverage is more even handed than I expected.More even handed than the Israeli pap we're getting through Irish media.Even Carol Coleman,who can ask questions and pursue evasions seems slack with her bland treatment.Someone pulling her pigtail.
Pity,we could do with a bit of dismantling of the Israeli media security wall.Its higher than the CRH curtain.Its all tar Hamas and polish that Israeli 'bastion of the free west' halo.
BBC reports the truth but will only stick in at the bottom of an article, in the hope that most people will miss it, I 'spose. That way the pro-Zionist (and therefore Pro-racist) plants at the BBC can have their cake and eat it, by being able to claim that they did actually report the truth of the situation, while doing their best to bury the info where many will miss it.
The pro-Zionist (and therefore Pro-racist) plants at the BBC titled this article; http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/world/middle_east/10193249.stm Gaza aid flotilla 'leaves Cyprus' as if the flotilla leaving Cyprus was a merely a matter of opinion, open to some dispute. One wonders what goes through the heads of the sub-editors at the Beeb. . . .
Anyway, here's the tiny bit of true reporting they allowed in in the very last 2 paragraphs of the article -
But of course in the 2 preceding paragraphs the resident BBC 'expert' had to give us his spin, while pretending to be objective:
The BBC & Donnison pretend that the Hamas quote is 'spin' when in fact by all the international Laws of the Sea the Israeli actions ARE an act of piracy
The BBC & Donnison pretend that the United Nations statement that "the blockade a "medieval siege", says this is only a fraction of what is needed and less than a quarter of what was coming into Gaza before the blockade was enforced" is some sort of inaccurate 'spin' which may be mere fabrication, and in all likelihood is an exaggeration, but in reality is a very accurate summation of the dire humanitarian situation which has made the brave actions of the Flotilla members very necessary.