Friday 1 July 2011

Irish Ship to Gaza SABOTAGED by Israeli agents: Protest & sit in today

Posted by Kev.

Terrible news has reached us in the early hours of Thursday – the Irish Ship To Gaza, MV Saoirse, has been SABOTAGED, presumably by agents of Israel. The damage is extensive, and indeed, if it had gone undetected apparently may have been lıfe-threatenıng if the ship had been at sea.
This is an unacceptable act of aggression against an Irish vessel (which is sovereign Irish territory), against the Freedom Flotilla, and most importantly against the people of Palestine which this flotilla was intending to reach in an act of humanitarian solidarity.

Full details of the extent of the sabotage, including photos and video of the damage will be made available to the press later today.

The Irish Ship To Gaza have called an EMERGENCY DEMONSTRATION for today (Thursday) in response to this outrageous act. We are calling on people to assemble at 6pm at the Spire in O’Connell Street. From there we will march to the Israeli Embassy and stage an overnight sit-in outside (so bring sleeping bags etc). We intend to shut down the Israeli Embassy!

We need this demo to be as loud as possible, so if you have drums, bodrans, whistles, whatever, please bring them along.

This act of sabotage against a peaceful humanitarian civil society mission (which has been paid for by 1000s of ordinary Irish people) must be protested in the strongest terms possible.

MV SAOIRSE SABOTAGE PHOTOS AND VIDEO

Posted by smac.


On Monday the ships 3 crew members, Shane Dillon, John Hearne and Pat Fitzgerald; along with Clr Gerry MacLochlainn, Charlie McMenamin (both from Derry) with John Mallon and Phil McCullough (both from Belfast) set sail on the MV Saoirse for re-fueling and a test run.

On the way back to port Pat Fitzgerald, ship’s engineer, noticed that something was very wrong with the boat. Upon returning to the dock the first inspections began, it was then we realised that sabotage had been done to Ireland’s boat.

Pat and the crew then hired experts to dive down and inspect the damage closer, upon their return to land it was noted that the boat has very serious damage done and that a piece was missing from one of the propeller shafts. The boat was then removed from the water and inspected on dry land where the deep cuts inflicted onto the propeller shaft could be clearly seen and photos taken for evidence, the shaft was also seriously and dangerously bent. These things together could have created a life threatening situation for those who had just been sailing on the ship. The sabotage was intended to endanger and/or inflict injury or death on Irish citizens as they went about their lawful right to sail on the high seas.

The passengers from Belfast and Derry who were onboard the ship for the test run were a bit un-nerved when told the possibilities of what could have happened on that short journey they had just returned from.

This same type of sabotage was done to another vessel in Greece only days ago. This was a vicious attack on Irish property by international terrorists against a boat flying the Irish flag. The ship is so damaged it will now be unable to take part in the Flotilla. However arrangements are being made to find seats on other ships for as many Irish passengers as possible.





Ships engineer Pat Fitzgerald inspects the damage, note that the damage was meant to sink the boat and would have cost Irish lives


River to Sea Uprooted Palestinian

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