From the Free Gaza team:
Dear Friends,
Our four boats are purchased or refurbished, flagged and registered. The cargo ship is now named the MV Rachel Corrie with the blessing of the Corrie family. Children in Gaza and the occupied West Bank will name the other two boats, and we will let you know what they chose.
We are hard at work collecting the cargo cement, books for children and universities, paper for printing books, water filtration equipment, and medical equipment, all being denied the people of Gaza by Israels brutal blockade.
So we ask one last time for a $25.00-$100.00 donation from each of you, a donation that will be used for our operating costs. It is not enough to buy, register and insure the boats. We need fuel for all vessles, crew expenses, supplies for all four boats, a crane to add to the cargo ship to offload the cargo, and miscellaneous expenses that always appear at the last minute.
Please go to http://www.freegaza.org/de/donate and help us raise the final 20%. You can donate in the U.S. by writing a tax-deductible check to our fiscal sponsor in DC, donate through our two PayPal accounts, one in Cyprus and one in the U.S. or wire an amount into our Free Gaza account in Cyprus. UK and European Donors can also use a £ and Euro paypal account on the site. The website provides all of the detail for you.
With your help, our final $100,000 can be raised in the next month as we get ready to leave Europe on May 3 and begin our voyage to Gaza. More than 5000 of you now follow our voyages; you have signed up for our TWITTER account, you have joined our newsletter, and you are members of many Free Gaza lists.
Please donate, send our plea to your own lists, then watch our journey as we make our way across the sea to Gaza.
Thank you from all of us at Free Gaza. Every one of you has made this flotilla a reality.
2) Appeal for Cement
From the Free Gaza Movement team:
Dear Friends,
First, we’d like to thank those of you who have stepped up to send us euros, dollars and pounds for our next mission. That appeal went out on April 9, and, in four days, you have already sent us over a quarter of the money we need. So we are adding this plea to our first one. We have a cement company in Ireland who will match the bags of cement that we buy…bag for bag. Here is another way that you can help.
Our PayPal account at http://www.freegaza.org/en/donate can accept donations for cement and school bags. In the message section on PayPal, tell us you want the money used to purchase cement or school bags. Or you can wire money into the Irish account designated below this announcement. We will use your donation for cement for reconstruction or school bags for the children if you designate it’s for them.
The Free Gaza Movement calls on communities, schools, hospitals, trade unions and families across Ireland and the world to sponsor bags of cement and school supplies to send to Gaza. They will be loaded onto our Irish cargo ship, the MV Rachel Corrie, as part of an international flotilla of ships sailing to Gaza in May.
Just 5 will pay for a bag of cement to help the people of Gaza rebuild, supporting the Palestinian people and their refusal to be broken despite a devastating siege and Occupation. 5 for a bag of cement (or 10 for two bags, 20 for four bags, 100 for 20 bags) or 10 for a school/sports bag.
Israels blockade of Gaza is in its third year, and virtually no reconstruction materials have been allowed into the Gaza Strip, which is still in ruins after Israel’s massive onslaught in Dec/Jan 2009 which killed over 1,400 Palestinians, almost 400 of them children.
At least 11,000 houses, 105 factories, 20 hospitals and clinics, 159 schools, universities, playschools and technical institutions were either damaged or destroyed and are still in ruins. Over 20,000 people were driven from their homes many still living in tents.
Israel has also banned books, paper, pens and school supplies, and we plan to deliver them along with messages of solidarity to the children of Gaza. For 10, you can sponsor a school bag filled with school supplies to support children struggling to study under siege.
John Ging, the Director of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency told reporters in March 2010: I have no cement or steel or iron. We can’t get in one bag of cement, one pane of glass to actually begin that reconstruction.
This May, The Free Gaza Movement is answering the call for help by sending a flotilla of boats carrying building supplies, humanitarian relief, and human rights defenders from across the world to Gaza.
The flotilla is made up of a coalition of organisations- from Turkey, Greece, Malaysia, Belgium, Sweden, Indonesia and Ireland, and will set sail in mid May to challenge the illegality of the siege of Gaza and devastating occupation of Palestine. Help us support the Palestinians’ right to rebulid their lives.
You can wire your donations to the Bank of Ireland, 32 south Mall, Cork, Republic of Ireland, Acct #41818255, Sort Code 902768, IBAN #,
