Free Gaza Movement

The Free Gaza Movement is a coalition of human rights activists and pro-Palestinian groups formed to challenge the Israeli-Egyptian blockade imposed on the Gaza Strip by sailing humanitarian aid ships to Gaza. The group has more than 70 endorsers, including Desmond Tutu and Noam Chomsky.

The organizations participating in the Free Gaza Movement include the International Solidarity Movement. The activists participating in the effort include Jeff Halper, Hedy Epstein, Lauren Booth, and members of various Christian, Jewish, and Muslim religious organizations. Israeli intelligence agencies say that it also includes Islamist organizations that pose a security threat to the Jewish state.

United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, the United States, France, the United Kingdom, Turkey and Canada have all publicly opposed the 2011 flotilla.

The first sailing took place in early August 2008. It was organized by the Free Gaza Movement and the International Solidarity Movement. Many of the latter's members had been barred from entering Israel on security grounds. According to the Free Gaza Movement's Web site, the group intended for the boat to cross the Israeli-declared "special security zone" to deliver 100 hearing aids to a Palestinian charity as a form of humanitarian aid. A story in Israel-based Haaretz said the organizers were attempting to provoke a clash with the navy that would end with arrests. A spokesman for the group said, "We hope that the Israeli government will have some wisdom. To drag us in and arrest us and say somehow we are a danger is absurd."

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