Tyrone To Gaza, home safely in Dungannon

[mylestheslasher]

Dixie - Just sent them an email. I hope everyone else will do so too.

[Smokin Joe]

Through work I would have a lot of dealings with Qatar (obviously an Arab country) and most of the top non Qatari jobs seem to be given to Egyptians.

I had therefore always assumed that Egypt was a very Arab friendly country.

But I guess I was wrong.

[give her dixie]

Folks, the time for talking is over, and it's time to take action.
Please pass this press release onto everyone you know, and ask them for their support.

John Hurson

International Hunger Strike Press Release


Sunday December 27th marks the anniversary of the attack on Gaza by Israel, which left over 1,400 people dead, and over 5,000 injured in 22 days.
At 11 35 am, the time of the first attack, a group of humanitarians on the "Viva Palestina Convoy" will embark on an International Hunger Strike in the main square in Aqaba, Jordan.

The International Hunger Strike will aim to highlight the ongoing illegal siege imposed on Gaza, and to remember the victims of the attacks who died during the 22 day bombardment by Israel.

This International Hunger Strike will also highlight the refusal by Egypt, under Israeli pressure, to allow the humanitarian aid to reach the people in Gaza.
The convoy has been stranded in the city for 3 days now, having been refused permission to enter Egypt on their way to Gaza. There are 500 people from no less than 20 different countries in 250 vehicles loaded with charitable humanitarian aid. The convoy is been led by leading international politician George Galloway, having left London on December 6th.

Embarking on the International Hunger Strike are 15 people from different continents across the world. Among those taking part are Fatima Mohammidi from the United States, John Hurson and Caoimhe Butterly from Ireland, Ahasan Shamruk from Palestine, Nidal Hajaj, Hanan Chehata and Mohammed Shakiel from England, plus Kamal Mashni from Australia among others.

Each day, 15 more people from the convoy will join in the International Hunger Strike, and they will go without food until the convoy is allowed to enter safely into Egypt, and through the Rafah border to Gaza.

Speaking from Aqaba, Ahasan Shamruk, said, "I am joining this Hunger Strike to draw attention to the fact that the siege is a form of collective, sustained, and devastating punishment of 1.5 million civilian people. As we commemorate the first year anniversary of the massacres, it is important to remember, that for my brothers and sisters living under siege in Gaza, the war has not ended."

John Hurson, from Tyrone, who travelled on the first "Viva Palestinan Convoy", decided to join the International Hunger Strike to draw attention to the fact that nothing has changed in the past year following the attacks.

John said, "from my time spent in Gaza, to think that in the year 2009, people  are denied all the basic essentials in life, like water, electricity, medicine, blankets, books, and even footballs for the children, is just unbelievable and unacceptable.

"For Egypt to prevent this compassionate and charitable aid, donated by ordinary caring people from all over the world, unnnecessarily adds to the hardships currently endured on a daily basis, by the besieged and distressed people in Gaza.

I am hopeful that the leaders of the West will exert their influence, put pressure on Egypt, the United States, and Israel to end this inhuman blockade forced upon Gaza, and allow for the safe passage of this essential humanitarian aid. Enough is enough, this has to end now, for the sake of humanity."

[gerry]

good man john

[Aerlik]

Good man.  Keep us posted.  I have contacted a journalist mate at Sky news just now about this.

[Muhammed McCarthy]

ON the first anniversary of the beginning of Israel's war on the Gaza Strip — in my view it was a demonstration of Israeli state terrorism at its most naked — it's not enough to say that the governments of the Western powers (and others) are complicit in Israel's ongoing collective punishment of 1.5 million Palestinians, 53 percent of whom are children.

What is actually happening in the blockaded Gaza Strip, and less obviously on the occupied West Bank, is the continuation by stealth of Zionism's ethnic cleansing of Palestine. Professor Ilan Pappe, Israel's leading "revisionist" (meaning honest) historian and author of "The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine", would and has put it another way. What we are witnessing is, in his words, "genocide in slow motion." And that, really, is what the governments of the Western powers (and others) are complicit in.

The question that provokes in my mind is: Why, really, are the major powers (and others) allowing it to happen?

The only answer that makes some sense to me is this. They have concluded, but cannot say, that nuclear-armed Israel, with the assistance of the Zionist lobby in all of its manifestations, is a monster beyond control.

In my analysis it's possible to identify the moment in history when the major powers abandoned any hope they might have had of containing Zionism's colonial ambitions. It came, the moment, in the immediate aftermath of the 1967 war.

Contrary to Zionism's version of the story, it was a war of Israeli aggression, not self-defense.  Israel's military and political leaders knew the Arabs were not intending to attack.

That being so, what the major powers ought to have said to Israel (in the diplomatic language of a Security Council resolution and more explicitly behind closed doors) is something like: "Aggression cannot be rewarded. Aggressors cannot keep territory conquered in war. You are now required to get the hell out of it without laying down conditions for your withdrawal."

To drive home the point, they could and should have reminded Israel of what President Eisenhower said to the people of America when he demanded Israel's unconditional withdrawal from Egyptian territory after its collusion with Britain and France in 1956. Eisenhower, the first and the last American president to contain Zionism, said this:

"If we agree that armed attack can properly achieve the purposes of the assailant, then I fear we will have turned back the clock of international order. We will have countenanced the use of force as a means of settling international differences and gaining national advantage... If the UN once admits that international disputes can be settled using force, then we will have destroyed the very foundation of the organization and our best hope for establishing a real world order."

As it happened, the major powers could not say that to Israel in 1967 because the Johnson administration had colluded with Israel to the extent of giving it the green light to smash Egypt's armed forces, in the hope that a humiliating defeat for them would lead to the overthrow of President Gamal Abdel Nasser. But also true is that Johnson sought and obtained an assurance that Israel would not take advantage of the war situation to grab Jordanian and Syrian territory. It was because some in the Johnson administration (probably Defense Secretary McNamara and the joint chiefs of staff) didn't trust Israel to keep its word that the US spy ship, the Liberty, was stationed off the Israel/Gaza coast to listen to IDF movement orders. And it was because Israeli Defense Minister Moshe Dayan didn't want Johnson to know that he intended to take the West Bank and the Golan Heights that he, Dayan, ordered the attack on the Liberty. (The full story of that attack and Johnson's cover-up of it is also in my book, in a chapter headed The Liberty Affair — "Pure Murder" on a "Great Day").

Despite that, the major powers, including and led by America, could still have acted firmly to contain Zionism's colonial ambitions. They could have said to Israel something like: "We can just about live with the fact that you will retain the newly occupied Arab territories as a bargaining chip, to be exchanged for peace with your Arab neighbors, but we will not allow you to settle those territories. Not one building. If you defy us on this matter, the Security Council will authorize enforcement action as necessary to oblige you to comply with international law."

In what became Security Council Resolution 242, it was the failure of the major powers to read the riot act to Israel on the matter of not settling the newly occupied territories that marks the moment when they, the major powers, became resigned to the fact that the Zionist state, assisted by its awesomely powerful global lobby, was a monster they could not control. (They could slap it on the wrist from time to time but not control it).

The lesson of the cold-blooded attack on the Liberty was that there is nothing the Zionist state might not do, to its friends as well as its enemies, in order to get its own way.The real reason for Israel's decision to acquire a nuclear arsenal was to have the deterrent threat capability of saying to its friends, "Don't push us further than we are prepared to go or we'll use these things.") So in the full light of the truth of history as it relates to the making and sustaining of conflict in and over Palestine that became Israel, it's not surprising that the major powers (and others) are today complicit, more by default than design I say, in Zionism's crimes.

[mylestheslasher]

Hope it works out for you and your comrades John. I have had no reply from the Egyptian embassy.

[mylestheslasher]

John - your hunger strike made the bbc news website

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/8433010.stm

rte

http://www.rte.ie/news/2009/1227/jordan.html

Irish Times

http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/world/2009/1228/1224261301601.html

Also a report in Israeli Haaretz

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1138228.html

I emailed TV3 and RTE about your convoy and the fact that 2 Irish citizens were on Hunger strike so hopefully they will report on it in more detail. All the best.

[Pangurban]

You are a true hero John, you have our support, i will do what i can to publizise your situation

[mylestheslasher]

A more prominent report from todays times..

http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/ireland/2009/1229/1224261353114.html

Peace activists on hunger strike over Gaza aid blockade

JAMIE SMYTH
TWO IRISH peace campaigners have gone on hunger strike to protest against Egypt's refusal to allow a convoy of humanitarian aid to enter Gaza, which remains under a strict Israeli blockade.

Caoimhe Butterly and John Hurson are both members of the Viva Palestina Convoy, which was supposed to deliver the aid last Sunday to mark the anniversary of last year's Israeli attack on Gaza.

Mr Hurson, who is from Tyrone, said he joined the hunger strike to draw attention to the fact that nothing had changed since the attack, which killed more than 1,400 people and injured 5,000.

"For Egypt to prevent this compassionate and charitable aid, donated by ordinary caring people from all over the world, unnecessarily adds to the hardships currently endured on a daily basis by the besieged and distressed people in Gaza," said Mr Hurson.

There are 500 people from 20 countries on the convoy, which contains 250 vehicles loaded with food, medical supplies and educational equipment for the people living in Gaza.

The convoy, which is being led by British MP George Galloway, has been stranded for four days in the city of Aqaba, Jordan, having been refused permission to enter Egypt on its way to Gaza.

Mr Hurson and Ms Butterly went on hunger strike on Sunday along with 13 others taking part in the aid convoy. A further 50 people on the convoy joined the hunger strike yesterday.

"We will stay on this hunger strike until the Egyptian authorities agree to allow us to enter Gaza," said Mr Hurson yesterday.

Kate O'Sullivan, a former student at UCC who is one of 12 Irish people on the aid convoy, said some medicine could be destroyed because of the severe heat unless it was delivered shortly. She appealed to Irish people to send e-mails and letters to the Egyptian embassy in Dublin urging them to allow the convoy to proceed.

"We need a huge show of support and protests to persuade the Egyptians to let the convoy continue," she added.

Meanwhile, the Ireland-Palestine Solidarity Campaign said yesterday that two members, Zoe Lawlor from Limerick and Hilary Minch from Dublin, were detained by the Egyptian authorities.

[longrunsthefox]

FOX NEWS- Apparently the hunger strike got great publicity around the world and has ended as the convoy has been told that it will get into Gaza.   

[stew]

FOX NEWS- Apparently the hunger strike got great publicity around the world and has ended as the convoy has been told that it will get into Gaza.

I hope to God this is so.

Egypt is a disgrace, as are the Israeli's, yanks and everyone else who were complicit with the plight of these poor people.

[give her dixie]

Well folks, the good news to report is that we have come of the hunger strike. This morning, we got news that we would be allowed to cross into Egypt, via Syria.

That meant, we had to drive 500 miles back up to Damascus today, and hopefully we will cross tomorrow.
Instead of a 4 hour journey, we will have a 72 hour trip.

The behaviour of the Egyptians has been totally disgracefull, and un called for.
They should hang their heads in shame for their treatment of the Palestinians in Gaza.

In todays world, to deny humanitarian aid to those who need it boggles the mind.
We have no gaurantee on paper, and things could change at the last minute.

Will keep you posted as it develops.

John

[Galwaybhoy]

Great news.  Even if they are making it difficult for ye and ye have to make a 72 hour trip.  Safe trip and keep us updated!

[give her dixie]

Map of our detour