UNRWA, the main U.N. aid agency in the Gaza Strip has said that a lack of international funding forced it to suspend grants to tens of thousands of Palestinians for repairs to homes damaged in last summer's war.
“People are literally sleeping amongst the rubble, children have died of hypothermia,” Robert Turner, Gaza director of operations for the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA), said in a statement. He said UNRWA received only $135 million of the $720 million pledged by donors to its cash assistance program for 96,000 refugee families whose homes were damaged or destroyed in the 50-day conflict between the Hamas government and Israel. Little of the total $5.4 billion pledged for Gaza's reconstruction at a Cairo conference of international donors in October 2014
has reached the Gaza, and thousands of Palestinians have been sheltering in tents near destroyed homes.
“Thousands more have been living in damaged buildings, using plastic sheeting to try to keep out the rain. Around 20,000 displaced are still being housed in U.N.-run schools.” While we recognize that funds are needed to rebuild Gaza, we feel that the publicity from another flotilla will help gain attention to the plight of the people of Gaza in ways that other initiatives may not. Indeed, governments are forced to react to the flotillas as evidenced through the diplomatic cables obtained by the Center for Constitutional Rights from the U.S. Department of State to U.S. missions in the Middle East region.
At a December, 2014 meeting, the Gaza Freedom Flotilla Coalition decided to sail a 3-ship flotilla to challenge the blockade in the first half of 2015. Twenty passengers will be aboard each of the 3 ships for a total of 60 passengers. The coalition will seek representatives from 30 countries with each country having two passengers. The U.S.- Palestinian Solidarity community will participate in Gaza Freedom Flotilla 3 and has a target of $20,000 as their part for renovation expenses and to be able to have two persons as the U.S. delegates.
Nonviolence International of Washington, DC, the 501(c)(3) for U.S. contributions to Gaza’s Ark, is the 501(c)(3) organization. Please make an online contribution here and indicate ‘Gaza’s Ark/Gaza Freedom Flotilla 3’ in the Please designate this gift for a specific purpose ‘Designation Code’ box. Checks payable to ’Nonviolence International’ (with Gaza’s Ark/Gaza Freedom Flotilla 3 in the memo line) may be mailed to: Nonviolence International 4000 Albemarle Street, NW Suite 401 Washington, DC 20016 USA
Photo of Gaza?s Ark, a fishing trawler in Gaza converted into a cargo ship to sail products out of Gaza, that was targeted and destroyed by the Israeli Defense Forces.
Stay in touch with Freedom Flotilla Coalition through its Facebook https://www.facebook.com/FreedomFlotillaCoalition and boat2gaza2015@gmail.com About the Author: Ann Wright served 29 years in the U.S. Army/Army Reserves and retired as a Colonel. She was a US diplomat and served in US Embassies in Nicaragua, Grenada, Somalia, Sierra Leone, Micronesia, Afghanistan and Mongolia. She resigned from the U.S. government in 2003 in opposition to President Bush?s war on Iraq. She was an organizer of the 2009 Gaza Freedom March and the 2011 US Boat to Gaza and was a passenger on one of the boats in the 2010 Gaza Freedom Flotilla that was attacked by the Israeli government killing nine and wounding over fifty passengers. She is the co-author of Dissent: Voices of Conscience.