FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: April 25, 2011
PRESS CONTACT: FELICE GELMAN
(917) 912 2597
US human rights advocates who are planning to sail their boat - The Audacity of Hope - this spring as part of an international
flotilla in solidarity with the people of Gaza will not be deterred by implied
threats of violence by the Israeli government, say the boat's
organizers.
The Israeli media recently reported that that country's UN ambassador, Meron
Reuben, asked the international organization to stop the flotilla, which is
expected to include some 12 boats carrying a thousand nonviolent civilians from
dozens of countries. Reuben characterized the activists as "terrorists" with
ties to Hamas, the Islamist party that rules Gaza, who are "willing to become
martyrs."
Jane Hirschmann of the US Boat to Gaza, which is organizing the US
participation in the flotilla, said that the Israeli charges "are absurd and
would be laughable if it were not for the fact that last year, the Israeli
military boarded a Turkish boat with aid for Gaza and killed nine unarmed
civilians, including an American."
The use of "the language of anti-terror", retired US Col. Ann Wright, one of
the people who will be on the boat and who was on the 2010 Gaza Freedom Flotilla
which was attacked by the Israeli military, said, is a "not very subtle threat
against the nonviolent human rights activists who will be aboard The Audacity of
Hope and our partner ships. We have no ties to Hamas or any political party. We
are sailing in peace, we are sailing unarmed, but be assured that, despite these
threats, we are definitely sailing."
Follow the US Boat to Gaza on Twitter
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