Word: gaza
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...Palestinians in Gaza don't get many visitors. That's because the Israelis have imposed an air, land and sea blockade since 2007 when Islamic militants seized control of the coastal strip on the Mediterranean, making it impossible for friends to just drop by. So when two vessels loaded with 46 peace activists arrived on Saturday, thousands of Palestinians lined the harbor in a party mood. Fishing scows honked their foghorns and swarms of kids swam out to the arriving boats just as the sun was turning the water to molten reds and gold...
...remarkable odyssey for the two battered ships of the "Free Gaza" movement, a U.S.-based pro-Palestinian group, which set out from Cyprus on Friday morning with few hopes of reaching Gaza. The activists, who hail from 14 countries, said that before they even set sail, they faced anonymous death threats, the mysterious drowning of one potential sponsor, and constant badgering by Israeli spies badly disguised as guitar-strumming hippies. "They kept popping up, everywhere," said Angela Godfrey-Goldstein, an organizer. "They were really annoying...
...biggest danger they faced was possible arrest by the Israelis. Earlier, Israel had declared Gaza's waters to be a "designated maritime zone" and warned the peace activists to steer clear or face arrest. At one point, says Palestinian-American law professor Huwaida Arraf who joined the activists, the radar picked up three vessels which were shadowing them from just over the horizon. The "Free Gaza" crew presumes the ships were Israeli...
...Israel chose to play nice, letting the peaceniks into Gaza on a once-only pass instead of acting the part of a high seas ogre. "They wanted a provocation at sea, but they won't get it," explained Israeli Foreign Ministry spokesman Aviv Shiron. Now, Israel has to contend with a barrage of international media coverage of the two peace vessels sailing into Gaza harbor - and the publicity boon this will give to the Hamas militants who have ruled Gaza since June 2007 when they split with Prime Minister Mahmoud Abbas, who governs from the Palestinian inland enclave...
...Gaza Palestinian Infighting In the deadliest intra-Palestinian violence in nine months, 11 people were killed in the Gaza Strip on Aug. 2. Eight of them were members of the Hilles clan, a large family of Gazans who found themselves in a three-way crossfire among the Islamist group Hamas, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas' Fatah and Israel. The Hilles clan was blamed for a late-July bombing that left five Hamas members and one child dead. Hamas retaliated, and in the ensuing violence, more than 180 people--many of them clan members--fled over the border into Israel, where they...