Article and photo by Brenda Norrell at The Narcosphere The American Indian Movement and the Free Palestine Movement announced that Bill “Jimbo” Simmons will be a member of the Gaza Freedom Flotilla Delegation. Tony Gonzales of AIM-WEST in San Francisco said Sunday that Simmons, Choctaw, joins the flotilla in solidarity to break the blockade. "AIM representative Jimbo Simmons, in solidarity with the Palestine Freedom Movement, is among the Gaza Flotilla delegates heading off in an effort to break the blockade,” Gonzales said. “Watch this action unfold as AIM enters international waters bringing peace and extending its hand in friendship. Our prayers go out with the flotilla and with our brother Bill 'Jimbo' Simmons.” more

From the Palestine Information Center GAZA, (PIC)-- The Center for Prisoners’ Studies in Gaza has revealed that Israeli security forces developed more than a hundred mental and physical torture methods designed to elicit confessions from Palestinians during interrogations. Israel uses torture against the prisoners from the moment they are arrested until when they are set free, said CPS director Raafat Hamdouna, condemning Israel’s democracy and human rights claims, and calling on the world community to monitor what is happening and issue indictments against security officers involved in torturing prisoners. Hamdouna said that everyone who has ever entered Israeli prisons has been subjected to multiple forms of torture. It begins from the time of arrest, when brutality is used to instill fear in the arrestee’s family. The residents of the targeted houses are then usually degraded and assaulted before the subject is taken as prisoner from his home, Hamdouna added. “That is followed by...

From Haaretz Hamas announced Sunday that all its members currently sitting in Israeli prisons will launch a hunger strike on Monday, after Israel transferred senior Hamas officials to solitary confinement. A Hamas spokesman said Sunday that the purpose of the hunger strike was to demand the release of Yihyeh Sanwar, who is considered the most senior Hamas official in prison, and his brother Mohammad, who was among those responsible for the abduction of Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit. According to the Hamas spokesman, Sanwar suffers from serious health problems. According to Hamas, at least six more senior Hamas officials were recently transferred to solitary confinement. more

http://www.irishshiptogaza.org Members of the MV Saoirse, the Irish Ship to Gaza, give their views on Sec for State Hillary Clinton's statement that the Freedom Flotilla was a provocation by "entering Israeli waters."

From The Sacramento Bee JERUSALEM -- Israel on Sunday threatened to ban international journalists for up to a decade from the country if they join a flotilla planning to breach the Israeli blockade of the Gaza Strip. The warning reflected Israeli jitters about the international flotilla, which comes just over a year after a similar mission ended in the deaths of nine Turkish activists in clashes with Israeli naval commandos. Israel is eager to avoid a repeat of last year's raid, which drew heavy international condemnations and ultimately forced Israel to loosen a blockade on Hamas-controlled Gaza. Israel says the blockade is needed to prevent Hamas from smuggling weapons into the territory. It remains unclear when the current flotilla will actually set sail, but organizers have hinted it could be as soon as this week. In a letter to foreign journalists, the Government Press Office's director, Oren Helman, called the flotilla "a dangerous provocation that is being organiz...

Asa Winstanley - The Electronic Intifada 25 June 2011 Glasgow University Media Group’s ambitious new study of British TV’s coverage of Israel and the Palestinians, More Bad News from Israel, is the second edition of 2004’s Bad News From Israel. Led by academics Greg Philo and Mike Berry, this work is precise, fair-minded and detailed. It constitutes irrefutable evidence of endemic pro-Israel bias. Those of us regularly subjected to BBC and ITV news won’t exactly find this conclusion surprising but the importance of detailed documentary evidence like this book provides cannot be overstated. The team had originally analyzed approximately 200 bulletins and questioned more than 800 persons. This new edition examines coverage from the past few years (369). Samples of coverage were taken from the main news bulletins on BBC and ITV (the most popular TV news programs in the UK). The authors identify key themes, such as coverage of casualties on “either side,” justifications for violence and “p...

From the BBC A mysterious explosion has gone off in Gaza City near a U.N. compound and a key base of the ruling Hamas movement's feared intelligence service. Security officials say no one was hurt in the blast, which tore a 2-meter (6-foot) wide hole through a wall surrounding the U.N. compound. They said it was not clear what the target was. more

GREEK OFFICIALS ATTEMPT TO BLOCK U.S. BOAT TO GAZA FROM LEAVING GREEK PORT   PASSENGERS SUSPECT ISRAEL/US ECONOMIC PRESSURE ON BELEAGUERED GREEK GOVERNMENT     Athens - Passengers on the U.S. Boat to Gaza, The Audacity of Hope, are asking Greek government officials to clarify whether the boat they are leasing is being blocked from leaving Greece because of an anonymous request of a private citizen concerning the seaworthiness of the ship or whether a political decision has been made by the Greek government in response to U.S. and Israeli government pressure. They specifically want to know if the U.S. is using its leverage at the International Monetary Fund over the implementation of an ongoing bailout of European banks with massive Greek debts to compel the Greek government to block the U.S. Boat to Gaza from leaving Greece.   On the morning of June 23, the American passengers learned that a "private complaint" had been filed against the U.S. Boat to Gaza, which is part of an...

From the International Solidarity Movement Non-violent protesters are rising up to challenge the Israeli occupation, from the chambers of Congress to the shores of the Mediterranean . And while other action have received global media coverage, a small West Bank village named Nabi Saleh has been struggling without the attention it deserves. Its residents have been organizing a campaign to challenge the illegal theft of their land by the settlement of Halamish since January 2010. Dozens of men and women have been gathering every Friday to voice their opposition to the injustice they face, using creative actions and non-violent demonstrations. The weekly protests are also joined by international and Israeli solidarity activists. In an attempt to silence their dissent, the Israeli army has utilized banned high-velocity tear-gas projectiles, rubber-coated steel bullets and at times, even live ammunition at demonstrations. Additionally, the Army is conducting an ongoing arrest campaign ag...

(pic: Flotilla activists in Greece take part in non-violence training) From Ynet news The only French ship participating in the international flotilla carrying humanitarian aid to Gaza has left Saturday morning Corsica, with six people on board, according to AFP news agency. "The entire fleet will sail next week from various Mediterranean ports," he told AFP a committee member coordinating the French countryside, Julien Rivoire. Ships, including two freighters carrying medical supplies, "should reach the port of Gaza at the end of next week," he added. From Ice News Danish activists have announced that they will join a new flotilla of boats to the Palestinian Gaza Strip, just over a year after nine civilians were killed on-board a Turkish vessel that tried to break the Israeli blockade. Together with protest groups from Canada, Belgium and Australia, Danish organisation Free Gaza will join a fleet of 20 in its boat named ‘Tahrir’, meaning ‘freedom’ in Arabic. They p...

RAMALLAH, ( PIC )-- The Israeli occupation authority (IOA) refused to allow relatives of prisoners to visit them because they refused to be strip searched at roadblocks leading to Shatta and Megiddo jails. The mother of a prisoner said that she was detained at a roadblock along with her daughter while on their way to visit her son Yousef Abdulaziz in Shatta jail. She said that the Israeli soldiers detained them in a room and refused to allow them to proceed to the jail or even to go back to their home in Jenin because they refused strip search. They were detained for long hours before being released. In a similar incident, Israeli soldiers detained relatives of prisoners in Megiddo at Jaba’a roadblock and tried to force women to strip for search but they refused. Witnesses said that the women were detained until a late night hour for refusing the search and were denied visitation. Thanks to PIC

From Al Manar Susan Rice, the American ambassador to the UN, said there was "no greater threat" to US support and funding of the UN than the prospect of Palestinian statehood being endorsed by member states. Mahmoud Abbas, president of the Palestinian authority, plans to ask the UN general assembly, which comprises all 192 members, to vote on recognition at its annual meeting in New York in September. The US and Israel are pressing Abbas to drop his plans. Obama has strongly opposed the move, raising the prospect of a veto in the UN Security Council, which is expected to vote on a Palestinian statehood proposal in July. However, Palestinian officials have spoken of their determination to a circumvent a US veto by deploying a rarely used Cold War mechanism known as "Uniting for Peace" under which a two-thirds majority in the General Assembly can override the Security Council. Speaking at an event in Washington, Rice said the Obama administration was devoting "ex...

Crew member Yonatan Shapira talks about why he is going aboard the US Boat to Gaza with the Stay Human Flotilla at the end of the month. I was a captain in the Israeli Air Force and a Black-Hawk Pilot until 2003 when together with other pilots I initiated the pilots' letter and refused to take part in the crimes of the occupation. Today I am a member of Boycott, a group of Israeli citizens who are actively supporting the Palestinian call for Boycott Divestment and Sanctions from within. I have a Master degree in Peace and Conflict Studies, I facilitate dialogue groups and volunteer as a sailing instructor for children with disabilities. I've been sailing since I was a child and in September of 2010 I was a crew member on the Jewish boat to Gaza that was intercepted by the Israeli Navy. I work as a commercial pilot in the US and am still dreaming to be a musician.

By Philip Weiss at Mondoweiss CNN ran a piece by Alice Walker saying why she's trying to go to Gaza on the flotilla, it feels a need to balance it with these tripes from "British Jewish author" shown holding his pen at the beach, Howard Jacobson. I saw his novel supporting Israel at my sister's house at Thanksgiving. I better talk to my sister about this, actually. This piece is portentous, and blind to the disproportion of suffering. Check this out: if the aim of the flotilla is to ensure that one child will not be set above another it is hard to see how challenging the blockade will achieve it. All an Israeli parent will see is a highly charged emotionalism disguising an action that, by its very partiality, chooses the Palestinian child over the Israeli. As if Israeli conditions are anything like the ghetto that is Gaza. "If the Israeli military attacks us, it will be as if they attacked the mailman," she says. Wrong on a thousand counts. As a wri...

Friend-a-Soldier is an interactive website which allows anyone to meet, talk to and befriend an Israeli combat soldier. Your job is simple: pick a soldier, think of a question — any question — and ask away! You will receive a transparent, personal response in your e-mail inbox from the soldier you’ve chosen. You might want to send a non-abusive but thoughtful message to one of the soldiers asking how they could justify killing 1400 people during the 'Cast Lead' war on the people of Gaza. click here

The Free Gaza movement has in the past sent boats from Cypriot ports but the flotilla is not intending to use Cyprus as a staging point in any case. Cyprus (the southern half that is) is a key trading partner of Israel. ( Reuters ) - Cyprus said on Thursday it had banned all sailings to Gaza, serving notice to any pro-Palestinian activists who might use the Mediterranean island as a springboard to challenge Israel's blockade of the territory. Activists are planning to send an aid flotilla to Gaza from ports around Europe this month, defying warnings from Israel which has tight sea and land border controls around the enclave. There had been no suggestion that Cyprus would be used for sailings, but the Mediterranean island was the launchpad for earlier voyages to Gaza which started in 2008. more

(pic: PCHR - Israeli soldiers arrest an Israeli human rights defender during the weekly peaceful demonstration against the construction of the annexation wall in Nabi Saleh village, northwest of Ramallah) Israeli Occupation Forces (IOF) Continue Systematic Attacks against Palestinian Civilians and Property in the Occupied Palestinian Territory (OPT) · A Palestinian was wounded and arrested by IOF in Qalqilya. · Israeli warplanes bombarded a chicken farm in the central Gaza Strip, killing 3,500 chicks. · IOF continued to use force against peaceful protests in the West Bank. - 4 Palestinian civilians, including a child, were wounded. - IOF arrested 6 international human rights defenders. · Israeli gunboats opened fire at Palestinian fishing boats in the Gaza Strip. - Two fishing boats were damaged. · IOF conducted 38 incursions into Palestinian communities in the West Bank and two limited ones into the Gaza Strip. - IOF arrested 12 Palestini...

From Fox News : The Obama administration on Friday stepped up pressure on American activists planning to challenge Israel's sea blockade of the Gaza Strip, formally warning they face action from Israeli authorities and may be violating U.S. law. The warning was the latest in a series from the State Department this week urging Americans not to join a flotilla planned to commemorate a similar effort to challenge the blockade last year. That voyage ended in a deadly clash with the Israeli navy in which an American citizen was killed. The warnings came after 36 Americans said they will sail a U.S.-flagged vessel in the flotilla and come at a delicate point in U.S. diplomatic efforts to get Israel and the Palestinians to resume stalled peace talks. American participation, which Israel has vowed to thwart, could embarrass the administration as the ship the group intends to use is named "The Audacity of Hope," which takes its name from the title of President Barack Obama's b...

From Zaman Israeli officials have been in talks with Turkish representatives in a bid to restore bilateral relations, Israeli news report have said, revealing that the Israeli side has offered compensation for the families of Turks killed by Israeli commandos on an aid ship last year but still refuses to apologize to Ankara for the May 31, 2010 incident. Israeli Deputy Prime Minister Moshe Ya'alon has been appointed by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to serve as an envoy for reconciliation between Turkey and Israel, the Israeli newspaper Haaretz, quoting an unnamed Israeli official, reported on its website on Thursday. Ya'alon has been meeting with Turkish Foreign Ministry Undersecretary Feridun Sinirlioğlu, while there are also other talks taking place between the Israeli representative on the UN inquiry committee on last year's Gaza flotilla, Yosef Ciechanover, and Turkey's representative on the UN inquiry committee, Özdem Sanberk. The two have been passing message...

Gaza's medicine shortage has reached "alarming proportions," international aid group Oxfam said Friday, quoting medical officials saying that drugs were held up at Israel's crossing into Gaza. Shifa Hospital in Gaza City has only five vials left to dissolve blood clots, the director of Gaza's Central Drug Store told Oxfam, and kidney transplant patients are at risk of rejected organs due to drug shortages, a release from the international organization said. "Can you imagine after going through all the hardships to find a compatible kidney, having it rejected because drugs did not enter Gaza?" Dr Mohammed Zamili said, noting that deliveries from the Ministry of Health in Ramallah were not meeting the huge shortage of medicines. "There are also some trucks held up at the Kerem Shalom crossing and we don't know exactly what's in them," he added. more