Above Photo: Al Awda leaving Norway in May. (Photo by Elizabeth Murray)
Freedom Flotilla approaching Gaza from Freedom Flotilla website, https://jfp.freedomflotilla.org.
Take action to support the Freedom Flotilla.
Twitter: @gazafflotilla
For US citizens, please call the US Department of State and demand that the State of Israel be held accountable for piracy–and demand that the medical supplies for Gaza on Al Awda be sent from Ashdod harbor to Gaza as provided by international law.
United Nations
His Excellency Antonio Guterres
United Nations Secretary-General
Email: sgcentral@un.org
Web: www.un.org/en/contact-us/index.html (write message)
Twitter: @antonioguterres @UN_Spokesperson
Australia – Chris Graham
The Hon Julie Bishop MP Australian Minister for Foreign Affairs – Tel: +61 2 62777500 (ACT)
+61 8 9388 0288 (Perth number of Electorate office)
Email: Julie.Bishop.MP@aph.gov.au
Contact an MP or Senator – search here.
More information from our partner: www.facebook.com/GazaAustralia/
Canada – Larry Commodore
The Honourable Chrystia Freeland, Minister of Foreign Affairs
Tel: +1 613 9925234 Fax: +1 613 9969607
Email: Chrystia.Freeland@parl.gc.ca
Constituency Office
344 Bloor Street West (Main Office) Suite 510 Toronto, Ontario M5S 3A7
Tel: +1 416 9281451 Fax: +1 416 9282377
Denmark – Mikkel Grüner
Anders Samuelsen, Minister for Foreign Affairs
Tel: +45 3392 0000
Email: udenrigsministeren@um.dk
Other contact details of advisers here:
http://um.dk/en/about-us/organisation/contact-information
France – Sarah Katz
www.facebook.com/FlottilleGazaFrance
www.plateforme-palestine.org or www.france-palestine.org
Ecrire à Présidence de la République:
Francois-Xavier Lauch: francois-xavier.lauch@elysee.fr et
Ahlem Gharbi: ahlem.gharbi@elysee.fr
Ministère des Affaires étrangères – olivier.decottignies@diplomatie.gouv.fr et chloe.baudreux@diplomatie.gouv.fr
Ministère de l’Intérieur: stephane fratacci stephane.fratacci@interieur.gouv.fr
Malaysia – Dr Mohd Afandi Salleh
The Hon. Dato’ Saifuddin Bin Abdullah – Minister of Foreign Affairs
Tel: +603 8887 (Ext : 4503)
Email: saifuddin@kln.gov.my
New Zealand – Mike Treen
Rt Hon Winston Peters – Minister of Foreign Affairs
Tel: +64 4 439 8000
More information from our partner: kiaoragaza.net
Norway – Arne Birger Heli, Gerd von der Lippe, Herman Reksten, Jan petter Hammervold, Jørgen Pederson
Foreign minister – Ine Eriksen Søreide
Email: post@mfa.no
Tel: +47 2395 0000
Singapore – Jason Soo
Minister for Foreign Affairs – Dr Vivian BALAKRISHNAN
Email: v.bala@mfa.gov.sg and mfa@mfa.sg
Tel: 1800 4768870 or +65 63798000 or +65 6379 8855
Fax: +65 6474 7885
http://www.mfa.gov.sg
Spain – Emilia Nacher, Lucía Mazarrasa
Ministry of Foreign Affairs
Web: www.exteriores.gob.es/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Exteriores.maec/
Twitter: @SpainMFA
Spanish Embassy in Tel Aviv
Twitter: @EmbEspTelAviv
Sweden – Charles Andreasson, Divina Levrini
Stefan Löfven, Prime Minister of Sweden Prime minister’s office: Email: statsradsberedningen.registrator@regeringskansliet.se
Margot Wallström, Foreign Minister of Sweden Foreign Minister’s office
Email: utrikesdepartementet.registrator@regeringskansliet.se Press secretaries: Erik Wirkensjö +46 8405 1000 / +46 70317 6471
Tel: erik.wirkensjo@gov.se
Pezhman Fivrin
Tel: +46 8405 5361
Email: pezhman.fivrin@gov.se
Jonas Sjöstedt, leader of the Left party in Sweden
Email: jonas.sjostedt@riksdagen.se
Jessica Nordh, press secretary
+46 7307 62290 / +46 7062 00064
UK Swee Chai Khoo (Dr Swee Ang) – Arrived home 1 August – see brief update here)
Jeremy Hunt MP – Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs
Tel: 01428 609416, +44 20 7008 1500
Email: fcocorrespondence@fco.gov.uk, huntj@parliament.uk
@Jeremy_Hunt
Alistair Burt MP – Minister of State for the Middle East at the Foreign & Commonwealth Office
Tel: +44 207 219 8132
Email: alistair.burt.mp@parliament.uk
Jeremy Corbyn MP – Opposition Leader
leader@labour.org.uk
@JeremyCorbyn
Emily Thornberry MP – Shadow Foreign Secretary
Email: emily.thornberry.mp@parliament.uk
US – Joe Meadors
Mike Pompeo, Secretary of State
Tel: +1 202 647 4000
Email: pompeom@state.gov
Website: http://state.gov
Twitter: @SecPompeo @StateDept
Israeli soldiers in international waters boarded the Al Awda ship headed to Gaza to deliver relief supplies on Sunday, detaining everyone on board, including a USS Liberty survivor, after beating and tasering some passengers, according to an eyewitness account.
Only two of the 22 passengers on the ship have been released, with the rest being held in Givon prison in Israel, the flotilla’s organizers said on Monday.
One of those released, Zohar Chamberlain Regev, an Israeli citizen, contested an Israeli Defense Force (IDF) statement that the ship had been captured “without exceptional incident.”
“People on board were tasered and hit by masked IOF soldiers. We did not get our passports or belongings before we got off the boat. Do not believe reports of peaceful interception,” Regev said in a statement to the organizers, the Freedom Flotilla Coalition. Regev referred to the IDF derogatorily as the Israeli Occupation Force.
She said she saw “blood on the deck of the Al Awda as the last participants were being dragged off the ship,” according to the coalition’s statement. Regev and a second Israeli passenger, Yonatan Shapira, were charged with attempting to enter Gaza and conspiracy before being released.
Consortium News reported on July 9 that Joe Meadors, a survivor of the 1967 Israeli attack on the USS Liberty, joined the 2018 Gaza Freedom Flotilla as the delegate from the United States. He boarded the Al Awda in Palermo, Sicily for the final 1,000 miles to Gaza and is now in Israeli custody. Meadors pre-recorded this video message in the event that he was captured:
Meadors was a signalman on the bridge of the USS Liberty, a surveillance vessel operating in international waters of the Mediterranean Sea near Gaza during the 1967 Six-Day Arab-Israreli war when it was attacked by Israeli war planes and submarines, killing 34 U.S. sailors.
Speaking of the seizure of the Al Awda, the flotilla organizers said: “A military attack on a civilian vessel is a violent act and a violation of international law. Taking 22 people from international waters to a country which is not their destination constitutes an act of kidnapping, which is also unlawful under the international Convention of the Law of Sea.”
Consortium News has been following the progress of the flotilla in tworeports by passenger Elizabeth Murray. Murray left the Al Awda (The Return) before it approached Gaza and was not onboard when it was seized by Israeli forces.
“We call on national governments, civil society and international organizations to demand that Israeli authorities immediately release our boat so that we can deliver our much-needed medical supplies on Al Awda and the fishing boat itself to the rightful recipients in Gaza,” the Flotilla organizers said.
“Our second boat Freedom will follow Al Awda within a day or two, and the Freedom Flotilla will continue until the blockade ends and Palestinians of Gaza regain their full freedom of movement,” they said.
Besides delivering aid, the flotilla’s aim has been to bring attention to the illegal blockade imposed by Israel on Gaza since 2007.
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