Palestine Activists in Boats Break Israeli Blockade of Gaza

by Andrew Pollack / September 2008

Thousands of Palestinians turned out in Gaza Aug. 24 to welcome two boats carrying members of the Free Gaza Movement (FGM), who had sailed there from Cyprus to break the Israeli blockade. As the boats approached Gaza’s beach, they released 5000 balloons with the colors of the Palestinian flag.

"It was really amazing—there were kids swimming out and boats sailing out to meet us," said Jeff Halper, head of the Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions. "It took us a day and a half to get here, and most of the activists got seasick, but the people here were so happy when we arrived."

Activists on the boats had spent two years organizing the effort, raising money by giving small presentations to community and religious groups, and in homes of family, friends, and supporters. Many of the activists said they and their families had received death threats before they set sail.

Palestinian journalists who set out to meet the boats said they were forced to turn back after the Israeli navy had fired warning shots at them. While still far from the shore, and in choppy waters, the boats’ communication and navigation systems were jammed.

The boats carried 46 participants from 17 different countries and a wide variety of jobs and professions. They included an 83-year-old Holocaust survivor, an 81-year-old nun, and former British prime minister Tony Blair's sister-in-law, Lauren Booth. Over 170 prominent individuals and organizations endorsed the effort, including the Carter Center, former British Cabinet member Clare Short, and Nobel Peace Prize laureates Mairead Maguire and Archbishop Desmond Tutu.

The ships, remodeled fishing boats, were named the SS Free Gaza, and the SS Liberty—the latter in remembrance of the USS Liberty, a U.S. Navy ship attacked by Israeli planes and boats on June 8, 1967, killing 34 American sailors and wounding 170. Before leaving Cyprus, a ceremony was held in which flowers were dropped into the sea in honor of those sailors and all victims of the Israeli siege of Gaza.

A Danish FGM member told The Electronic Intifada that although most of the participants were from the U.S. and Europe, "the whole idea of having just one Palestinian who's been forced off their land and who is able to return to Palestine—this is something that could demolish the whole Zionist venture."

After their arrival, Hamas leader Ismail Haneya called on Arab leaders to send boats and vessels through the sea to Gaza to continue the breaking of the blockade. Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas telephoned the activists to praise them.

"This is a great victory in breaking the siege and the beginning of what we hope will be more and more boats," said Riad al-Faraj, head of the International Committee to Break the Siege, which helped organize the trip.

In a declaration of their purposes before embarking, organizers noted that the event takes place in the year marking the 60th anniversary of the Nakba, "the catastrophe," when the overwhelming majority of Palestinians were forcibly evicted by Zionist armed forces. They added that Israel’s denial of the rights of refugees to return home since then is a violation of "international law, human rights, and basic principles of morality."

The organizers declared: "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."

The last line is a reference to the repeated deportations of solidarity activists, such as those from the International Solidarity Movement (ISM), who come to the West Bank or Gaza to participate in nonviolent civil disobedience.

Huwaida Arraf, a Palestinian-American and co-founder of the ISM, told Pacifica Radio that "we are carrying onboard about 200 hearing aids requested by a society in Gaza for children. It's not very well known, but many of Gaza's children are going deaf because of the sonic booms that Israeli planes constantly let off over Gaza. They actually requested 9000. We could not arrange it in this time. We're also carrying urgently needed medical supplies."

But she wanted it made clear that "we are very adamant that this is not a humanitarian convoy, because we do not intend to keep putting band-aids on Gaza. We are out to show that the people of Gaza have human rights and deserve to be able to make a living. Israel is trying to starve and humiliate an entire people."

She noted that besides breaking the siege, the attempt to land would be a challenge to Israel’s claim that it doesn’t control Gaza, adding that as the occupying power, under international law Israel is responsible for the well-being of the civilians under occupation.

Arraf said, "If they do blockade us, we are prepared to stay out at sea for as long as our water and our food holds out." She invited "anyone that has a boat that wants to, to come join us."

Impact of the blockade

The trip was also designed to expose Israeli propaganda denying the humanitarian crisis they have caused in Gaza, and more recent lies about supposed easing of the blockade since a truce was announced two months ago.

According to the UN, "only 43.5% of basic commercial food import needs were met during the period between Dec. 3 and 30, 2007."

In May 2008, Oxfam, CARE, and other international aid organizations said, "the stranglehold on Gaza’s borders has made the work of the UN and other humanitarian agencies virtually impossible. Only a trickle of medicine, food, fuel, and other goods is being allowed in. … [The blockade] has made people highly dependent on food aid, and brought the health system and basic services such as water and sanitation near to collapse."

The week before the voyage, the BBC noted that despite the truce, tons of raw sewage continue to flow every day into the sea off Gaza, and at times into its streets, because of power shutoffs disabling treatment plants, and refusal of the Israelis to allow in spare parts to repair those that still have power.

Furthermore, says the BBC: "Since the ceasefire began, the fighting with Israel has died down, but the strict sanctions remain. Most Gazans are reliant on food aid, and are unable to enter or leave the strip. Over the last year, tens of thousands have lost their jobs. Most industrial operations have stopped because raw materials are not being allowed in, or goods allowed out for export."

And despite the U.S. media’s almost exclusive focus on rockets fired from Gaza, usually with no casualties, the BBC notes that before the recent truce, "Shifa Hospital in Gaza City was receiving dead and injured almost every day from Israeli operations."

Just two weeks ago, 1.5 tons of medicine donated by the Scottish Palestine Solidarity Campaign was forbidden entrance by Egyptian authorities, who have been enforcing the siege along their border with Gaza on behalf of Israel. And Palestinians killed when tunnels underneath the borders are blown up are often not carrying weapons but rather banned food, medicine, or other goods for civilians.

The blockade has also led to the death of more than 200 sick Palestinians—mostly children, women, and elderly—who were refused exit or held up at checkpoints when seeking treatment. Malnutrition rates have skyrocketed, and 80% of the people of Gaza depend on UN food aid.

On Aug. 4, Physicians for Human Rights-Israel revealed that seriously ill Palestinian patients were being pressured to collaborate with Israeli intelligence, and were turned back when they refused. They include cancer patients and people who will go blind if they don’t have treatment soon.

Added to such life-threatening measures are vindictive acts such as the denial in May of visas for Gaza students who had won Fulbright scholarships to study in the U.S. One of them pointed out that the way they were "mysteriously singled out for last-minute denial based on ‘secret evidence’" was ironically reminiscent of the type of secret and fabricated evidence that the scholarships’ namesake, U.S. Senator William Fulbright, had opposed when carried out by Joe McCarthy.

Israel has carried out regular but partial blockage of goods and people in and out of Gaza since 1967. The noose was tightened two years ago when Hamas won elections to head the Palestinian Authority, and Israel, the U.S., and the European Union imposed sanctions on the PA. After Hamas resisted Fatah attempts to drive them from power last June, the sanctions were converted into a total blockade in an illegal act of collective punishment, with rare and limited exceptions for inadequate amounts of food and medicine.

On Sept. 19, 2007, Israel declared that the Gaza Strip is an "enemy entity." Not Hamas, or Islamic Jihad, or the PA—but the Gaza Strip as a whole, including all its inhabitants! Thus, 1.5 million civilians are declared justified targets of military attack, repression, and starvation. The declaration was immediately backed by U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice.

The Washington Post’s Linda Gradstein quoted Israeli officials as saying that this policy is designed "to encourage residents to overthrow Hamas." This kind of collective punishment is, of course, in direct contravention to the Geneva Conventions.

Israel threatens the boats

Until a few hours before reaching land, almost everyone expected Israel to try to stop the boats and arrest those on board. The expectation of an attack had been reinforced by the memory of how Israel stopped an attempt by the PLO in 1988 to carry out a similar symbolic voyage carrying 100 Palestinian refugees to Haifa. A hole was blown in the boat by an Israeli mine. The day before, Israel used a car bomb to assassinate three PLO officials who they believed were the organizers of the planned boat trip.

But Israel did not attack, claiming that they wished to deny the FGM a propaganda victory. Clearly, however, attention given to the boats around the world was making an Israeli attack difficult (this didn’t include the U.S. media, which has largely ignored the events).

Said a Foreign Ministry spokesman, "They [FGM] wanted provocation at sea but they won't get it." and Ha’aretz reported that senior Israeli political sources said this "took the wind out of the sails of the left-wing activists who were seeking to create a provocation."

The spokesman said the decision to let the boats in did not set a precedent and that future cases will be examined on their merits. But that will depend, as with this voyage, on how well organized future such actions are, and the degree of support from inside Gaza.

In reply to Israel’s claims, Halper said: "Now that we've come through, what's the excuse to keep the third boat out, or the 10th boat, or the 100th?"

It is still uncertain whether Israel will try to detain the boats or its passengers when they leave Gaza. According to an Israeli official, the Israelis are "worried they [the boats] might be used to smuggle wanted Palestinians out. They've got a reputation for protecting terrorists and acting as human shields." This is a standard slander used by the regime and its supporters abroad against the ISM.

Similar slanders were spewn by the Israelis in response to an FGM offer to Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni to join the trip. Noam Katz, Livni’s director of public relations wrote: "You are supporting the regime of a terrorist organization in Gaza. Hamas is the address to which you should direct your complaints concerning the situation there.

"There isn't another conflict in the world in which one side supplies all the needs of the other side—food, medicines, water, fuel, and electricity." This last claim has the emotional weight of Nazis asking for thanks for letting a box of food into the Warsaw Ghetto.

Katz demanded that any humanitarian aid supplies be handed over to Israel (which means they would most likely sit unused in an Israeli warehouse for months or years), and warned, "If you do not deliver the aid via Israel, this proves your goal is political and constitutes the legitimization of a terrorist organization."

Will the siege be broken?

After their successful arrival, Paul Larudee, a Bay Area activist told the press: "We won’t be the last. We welcome the world to join us and see what we’re seeing."

According to Tom Nelson, a lawyer from Oregon, "Americans are terribly ignorant of the human effects of what they support. This boat is one of the most effective means of raising consciousness about the problems caused by American foreign policy. Americans have to know the consequences of these policies."

Certainly more support from outside Gaza—especially in those countries funding Israel and backing its policies—is essential. But the more fundamental question is what impact the boat will have on Palestinians themselves as well as allies throughout the Middle East.

Author and professor Ghada Karmi said participants told her they were "filled with revulsion at the Warsaw Ghetto Israel has created in Gaza." She went on to criticize Arabs for not providing sufficient support: "Why was this not one of many Arab-organized attempts at breaking Gaza's siege? Where was the Arab refusal to stand by in the face of such oppression and injustice?

"We need to recognize the Arab role in this victimization of Gaza's people. Nowhere is this more evident than in the case of the Rafah crossing to Egypt.

"This should have been the rallying point for all Arabs to unite in rejection of a vicious punishment unjustly imposed on an innocent people. It could have been the first move to reinstate Palestine's cause at the heart of the Arab world. Not one, but a fleet of Arab ships should have visited Gaza daily to break the siege. It is an indictment of us all that it took a foreign crew and foreign volunteers to breach the walls of Gaza's prison and defy its cruel jailers."

Karmi makes some valid points. But it’s important to remember the role of the U.S.—with aid from its watchdog, Israel—in setting up such puppet regimes and crushing nationalist, labor, and socialist movements in the region, precisely to quell the spirit of resistance.

What’s more, there are voices among working people in the region who share Karmi’s outrage and determination to stand up for the Palestinians, because they see that cause as inseparable from their own.

Thus Joel Beinin, in one of many articles in the last couple years on the mass strikes by Egyptian workers, wrote on Jan. 24: "The Palestinian cause is too popular and emotional an issue in Egypt for Mubarak to appear to be assisting Israel in starving the people of Gaza. Some of the demonstrations in solidarity with Gaza also raised slogans against the drastic rise in the price of food in recent months. Opposition demonstrations linking the Palestine cause with domestic economic issues and autocracy have the potential to threaten a regime whose legitimacy is already minimal."

Referring to the mass mobilization that tore down the wall between Gaza and Egypt in January, he wrote: "Palestine, Israel, and Egypt after the fall of the Gaza wall are more unstable than before. … The people of the Gaza Strip have taken their survival into their own hands and have shown that the power of ordinary people is more likely to shape the future than polished diplomatic formulas."

Other hopeful signs of the possibility of mobilization from within are the weekly demonstrations in the West Bank that have been going on against land theft and against the Apartheid Wall for years now (in which ISM members are regular participants), as well as strikes by PA employees against IMF-imposed job and service cuts.

An action taken by the FGM two days after reaching shore also shows the possibility of linking up to the region's workers, in this case of Gaza itself. The SS Free Gaza sailed alongside six Palestinian fishing boats to eight miles off the coast in a challenge to the six-mile limit imposed by Israel (the Oslo Accords provide for a 20-mile limit).

Despite being circled by three Israeli naval vessels, the Gazan fishermen continued to exercise their right to ply their trade during the day. This continues the solidarity ISMers have shown with farmers trying to regain the ability to work on their stolen land, and future solidarity actions could take inspiration from this and link up with other sectors of the Palestinian workforce.

Hopefully, the victory of the Free Gaza Movement will be an inspiration for a renewal of efforts on all these fronts, and their coordination.