Today, Wednesday 31st March, the Free Gaza Movement, a human rights organisation which has successfully sent a number of boats into Gaza through the Israeli naval blockade, announced that it had bought a 1200 tonne cargo ship at an auction in Dundalk, Ireland.
The vessel had been impounded a year ago following an inspection by the International Transport Federation (ITF) which found that its owners had exploited their Lithuanian crew members - not paying their wages and subjecting them to humiliating treatment.
ITF Inspector and Services, Industrial, Professional & Technical Union organiser Ken Fleming stated that: "We are pleased to announce that this vessel which was used to subject workers to modern day slavery, will now be used to promote human rights for the people of Palestine".
The Free Gaza Movement now owns four ships, including three passenger vessels.
Free Gaza’s ships will take part in an international flotilla taking humanitarian aid to the besieged Gaza strip in May 2010. Passenger and cargo ships are also being organised by the Turkish humanitarian organisation IHH (Foundation for Human Rights & Freedoms & Humanitarian Relief), and by groups in Greece, Sweden, Malaysia and Belgium.
Free Gaza has launched eight missions to Gaza since summer 2008. Five were successful. The two most recent were violently stopped by the Israeli Navy, which rammed one boat and arrested human rights observers and international parliamentarians travelling on another.
The Irish ship will be taking 500 tons of cement, as well as medicines, medical equipment and educational materials to the people of Gaza.
Derek Graham of the Free Gaza Movement said, 'We have international law and the conscience of the people of the world on our side. We know the Irish people will not stand by and let the people of Gaza be starved and punished by Israel any longer’.
In preparation for the launch of the Irish ship, hospitals, trade unions, churches, mosques, families and community groups are being invited to sponsor bags of cement to help the people of Gaza to rebuild.
Caoimhe Butterly of the Free Gaza Movement stated that: 'We call upon the Irish people and government to support the safe passage of our mission. The siege is a form of collective, sustained and devastating punishment. Supporting the flotilla is a way for the people of Ireland to show direct solidarity with the 1.5 million Palestinians trapped in Gaza as they attempt to pick up the shattered pieces of their lives’.
The vessel, the MV Linda, will be re-named the MV Rachel Corrie, in memory of the 23-year-old solidarity activist crushed to death in 2003 by an Israeli military bulldozer as she attempted to prevent the demolition of a Palestinian home in Gaza.
