By Fintan Lane
On Wednesday evening, our crew (Shane Dillon , Pat Fitzgerald and John Hearne) sailed it from its storage location and, after an overnight passage, arrived on Thursday morning at a new berth in a country close to our port of departure. Everything went smoothly and the vessel is in excellent condition.

The boat is now positioned for the flotilla and we will depart for the assembly coordinates in international waters on the weekend of 24-25 June.

The cost of moving the boat to the departure position in terms of fuel was about €6,000. The boat itself is fully paid for - the price of €70,000 was covered by donations from the extraordinary ordinary people of Ireland.

However, it will cost us an additional €10,000 for fuel to sail to Gaza and we have not yet got that money—we need to raise it asap, so I am urging all those who support Freedom Flotilla 2–Stay Human to please make every effort to solicit or make donations. We urgently need to raise roughly €14,000 before we sail in order to cover fuel and other misc expenses including satellite technology.

At this stage, it is hard cash that we require rather than ideas on how to raise the money.

Donations can be made by cheque (make out to 'Irish Ship to Gaza' and post to Fintan Lane, 12 Lennox Place, Portobello, Dublin 8), put directly into the ISTG bank account or made via paypal; for details go towww.irishshiptogaza.org Irish Art for Gaza prints can also still be purchased with all proceeds going to the ship: www.irishart4gaza.com

Care/act - please show your solidarity with the people of Gaza by donating towards the Irish ship. Let's show the world that Ireland cares and wants an immediate end to this immoral and illegal siege!

Fintan Lane is the National Coordinator—Irish Ship to Gaza