Free Gaza movement prepares eight mission to break siege

THE FREE Gaza movement is launching its eighth mission to break Israel’s siege of Gaza tomorrow, setting off from Larnaca port with two boats carrying cement and children’s toys.

The two boats, Free Gaza and the Spirit of Humanity will sail the 240 miles from Cyprus to Gaza with 36 people from 16 countries, as well as tons of cement, and suitcases full of toys, crayons and colouring books for children, items which the organisers say are all banned by Israel’s government.

Two of the organisers, Huwaida Arraf and Greta Berlin, as well as Cynthia McKinney, former US Congresswoman from Georgia, called on the world to recognise Palestinian human and civil rights that they argue have been denied for 61 years.

Arraf highlighted that despite the $4 billion pledged by the international community to rebuild Gaza, nobody was “doing a thing about the fact that Israel allows no building supplies into the territory… so 36 of us from 16 countries are leaving on Thursday to tell the world to do something”.

The group intends to go at least three times over the summer; June 25, July 14 and August 16, near the anniversary of the first successful voyage last August.

The Cyprus Mail is the only English-language daily newspaper published in Cyprus. It was established in 1945 and today, with its popular and widely-read website, the Cyprus Mail is among the most trusted news sites in Cyprus. The newspaper is not affiliated with any political parties and has always striven to maintain its independence. Over the past 70-plus years, the Cyprus Mail, with a small dedicated team, has covered momentous events in Cyprus’ modern history, chronicling the last gasps of British colonial rule, Cyprus’ truncated independence, the coup and Turkish invasion, and the decades of negotiations to stitch the divided island back together, plus a myriad of scandals, murders, and human interests stories that capture the island and its -people. Observers describe it as politically conservative.