'Our boats will sail to Gaza again'

(press tv) The Free Gaza Movement is again challenging Israel by preparing to send more boats to the blockaded Gaza Strip. The Free Gaza Movement is again challenging Israel by preparing to send more boats to the blockaded Gaza Strip in trips similar to their historic 2008 voyage.  "We will not be stopped. We will get more boats, and we will sail again and again, delivering supplies and materials to help the people survive and rebuild their homes and their lives", the movement said in statement issued on Tuesday.  Two small boats - the Free Gaza and Liberty - sailed to Gaza last August to break Israel's occupation and blockade that had condemned 1.5 million Palestinians to a life of poverty, hunger, humiliation, death, and destruction.  The boats made several successful voyages carrying journalists, medical personnel, various parliamentarians, and human rights advocates to Gaza.  The statement says that they brought several dozen Palestinians out of Gaza aboard their boats, including students whom Israel had prevented from leaving to attend international universities, patients needing medical treatment not available in Gaza due to the siege, and others so that they could reunite with their families outside of Gaza.  But in late December, Israeli Navy boats destroyed one of the boats, Dignity, which was carrying doctors and medical supplies needed desperately to help Gaza medical personnel providing emergency care for hundreds of victims of the Israeli invasion of Gaza. But fortunately no one was killed.  Dignity had till then completed four successful voyages.  During the 22-day Israeli blitz on Gaza, beginning December 27, almost 1,400 Gazans were killed, most of them civilians. Hundreds of houses were destroyed and heavy damage was done to Gaza's infrastructure.  "Several members of our Free Gaza Movement who had sailed on our boats were on the ground in Gaza throughout the Israeli offensive, helping families and medical personnel, and sending eyewitness reports and videos to the world outside," the group said.  The Free Gaza Movement said on Tuesday that nothing, even Israel, can stop them from reaching their friends in Gaza. Source: Press TV