A flotilla carrying humanitarian aid and activists, including Swedish climate campaigner Greta Thunberg, have left Barcelona, vowing to try to “break the illegal siege of Gaza”, AFP reports quoting organisers.
Some 20 vessels set off from the port city on Spain’s east coast just after 3:30 pm (6:30 pm PKT) pledging to “open a humanitarian corridor and end the ongoing genocide of the Palestinian people”, said the Global Sumud Flotilla.
The group defines itself on its website as an independent organisation with no affiliation to any government or political party. The flotilla, flying Palestinian flags, has hundreds of people aboard, among them activists from dozens of countries, including Irish actor Liam Cunningham and Spain’s Eduard Fernandez.
Also aboard were European lawmakers and public figure,s including former Barcelona mayor Ada Colau.
The flotilla is expected to arrive at the ravaged coastal enclave in mid-September.
Meanwhile, a post-conflict plan for Gaza is circulating within United States President Donald Trump’s administration that would see the US administer the ravaged enclave for at least a decade, the temporary relocation of Gaza’s population and its rebuilding as a tourist resort and manufacturing hub, Reuters reports quoting The Washington Post.
The Washington Post said that according to a 38-page prospectus it had seen, Gaza’s 2 million people would leave either through “voluntary” departures to another country or into restricted areas within the territory during reconstruction.
Anyone who owns land would be offered a “digital token” in exchange for rights to redevelop their property, The Post reported, adding that each Palestinian who left would be provided with $5,000 in cash and subsidies to cover four years of rent. They would also be provided with a year of food, it added.
The Post said the plan is called the “Gaza Reconstitution, Economic Acceleration and Transformation Trust, or GREAT Trust,” and was developed by the GHF.