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An Israeli soldier stands inside a tent at the port of Ashdod in preparation for the arrival pro-Palestinian activists trying to reach the Gaza Strip - Source: Reuters
Pro-Palestinian activists vowed to send a convoy of aid ships to
break an Israeli blockade of the Gaza Strip, despite warnings it
will be stopped and a sail ban from normally sympathetic
Cyprus.
Eight ships, including four cargo vessels and a Turkish passenger
ferry carrying 600 people, were heading towards Gaza in defiance of
a three-year Israeli closure on the sliver of desert territory,
home to 1.5 million Palestinians.
"We are planning on going. This is not going to stop us. The boats
are already on their way," said Greta Berlin, a spokeswoman for the
Free Gaza Movement.
Israel criticised the activists for what it described as a
propaganda stunt, while Turkey urged Israeli authorities to treat
the convoy as humanitarian aid.
A Turkish human rights group is one of the organisers.
Cyprus, which activists have used as a launch pad for shipping
missions before, said it would not allow any vessels to sail from
its ports to Gaza.
The activists said they would press ahead regardless of the ban,
and that the flotilla had never planned to dock at any of Cyprus'
ports.
The boats would converge at a meeting point in international waters
east of Cyprus, probably late on Friday, and then head across the
eastern end of the Mediterranean Sea towards Gaza, Berlin
said.
Israel has urged the convoy to turn back, saying its navy was
prepared to intercept it.
Israel says relief aid is already flowing into Gaza though
approved channels.
"If they were really interested in the wellbeing of the people of
Gaza, they would have accepted the offers of Egypt or Israel to
transfer humanitarian aid to the people of Gaza," Israeli
government spokesman Mark Regev said.
"Instead they have chosen a cheap political stunt," he said,
referring to the activists.
Holding camp
Israeli naval commandos have held drills in preparation for
boarding and searching the convoy.
Activists faced arrest and deportation and their cargo would be
confiscated for possible transfer by Israel to Gaza, Israeli
military officials said.
Israel has urged the activists to sail to the coastal city of
Ashdod, where it has set up a temporary holding camp with tents for
passengers of the flotilla, and hand over their cargos for
screening.
A Turkish human rights organisation has chartered one passenger ferry.
The Turkish government was not involved in the mission, a
foreign ministry spokesman said.
"We don't want new tensions in the region...Problems can be avoided
if this aid package is seen as humanitarian aid," Foreign Ministry
spokesman Burak Ozugergin said.
Muslim Turkey is one of Israel's closest allies in the Middle East
but relations have soured in part due to Prime Minister Tayyip
Erdogan's frequent criticism of the Jewish state's policies toward
the Palestinians.
Israel and neighbouring Egypt closed Gaza's borders after Islamist
Hamas, which rejects the Jewish state, took over the territory in
2007.
Tensions have run especially high since the December
2008-January 2009 war between Hamas and Israel.
Gaza's people, many of them United Nations aid recipients, suffer
shortages of water and medicine.
The Free Gaza Movement first started sending aid directly into Gaza
in August 2008.
They have been intercepted on three occasions, but had problems
with their last mission from Cyprus last year.
"We have taken a decision to ban this operation of outbound vessels
heading to Gaza in the interests of Cyprus," Makis Constantinides,
the director-general of the Cypriot Ministry of Communications and
Works said.
The convoys would be taking in 10,000 tonnes of supplies, including
cement - a material Israel bans, citing fears Hamas could use it to
construct bunkers - as well as water purification kits,
pre-fabricated homes and medical equipment.
In recent weeks Israel has allowed some goods it used to ban, such
as clothes, shoes, wood and aluminium, to enter the strip through
land border crossings.
It continues to allow a steady flow of humanitarian aid into the coastal territory.
