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23 april 2009
Posted in
News
Our two Free Gaza co-ordinators in Gaza are planning a speaking tour in a number of European and Middle East countries over the next few weeks.
Caoimhe Butterly and Ewa Jasiewicz, who both originally travelled to Gaza on siege breaking Free Gaza boats (the second and fourth voyages respectively) have been working closely with partners on the ground in Gaza over the last few months. Ewa was in Gaza throughout the December - January massacres and Caoimhe managed to return to Gaza during the war. They will be speaking about Israeli war crimes and working with paramedics, journalist and farmers under fire in Gaza before, during and after the 2009 war.
The key message that Ewa and Caoimhe will be bringing is that people in Gaza want pressure for political change - particularly through the boycott, divestment and sanctions campaign. The message is that aid work must be accompanied by campaigning to bring about justice and freedom from occupation.
Both Caoimhe and Ewa will be available for media interviews but will be mainly focussing on speaking to people about what they have seen in Gaza, and acting as a bridge to bring the messages from Palestinians inside Gaza to the outside world. They have developed close links with a number of developing grassroots projects in Gaza and have ideas about links which groups in Europe and elsewhere may want to develop.
They will be travelling to Lebanon, Britain, Ireland, Poland, and possibly Germany, Spain and Italy.
We will post up a schedule once we have more details.
Update: April 23rd, Ewa and Ca are waiting at the Rafah exit crossing, having spent three days trying to leave. They report:
The last two days of being at Rafah, though, have given us a much deeper understanding of the deep humiliation that Palestinians crossing through Rafah have to endure. It's infuriating- the elderly, wounded, trapped students, patients, families- proud, noble people being subjected to such degrading treatment.
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