VIVA PALESTINA CONVOY BIDS FAREWELL AS THEY COMPLETE THEIR MISSION

GAZA, Jan 9 (Bernama) -- After 48 hours of getting the feel of Gaza, the
Viva Palestina convoy finally bade goodbye to the Palestinians at 10am local
time (Gaza time).

Although their stay in Gaza was a short one, the volunteer force of 450
people were satisfied as they successfully completed their mission in delivering
trucks and ambulances loaded with humanitarian aid including educational and
medical supplies directly to the Palestinians in Gaza.

Malaysia donated four trucks of humanitarian aid and one ambulance worth
100,000 pounds to the Gaza Elwafa hospital.

Dr Khamis Elessi, Head of Medical Rehabilitation, Elwafa Hospital said the
Palestinians are grateful to Malaysians for donating the various supplies.
"We thank the Malaysian government, the Malaysian people for donating this
truc
k for Elwafa Hospital Gaza, we are so grateful for Malaysian people for
coming over such a long distance, we are so grateful that we find honest,
courageous and generous people like the Malaysian people.

"The Palestinians in Gaza need thousands and thousands of tonnes (of medical
aid), this kind of donation will for sure help many people recover and help make
the lives of many people much better during these horrible times and miseries",
he added.


Viva Palestina founder and organiser, George Galloway, said this mission
was not the last.

"God bless Dr Mahathir (Mohamad), god bless Viva Palestina, god bless
Malaysia people who contributed in any way including the beautiful journalist
for the success of the mission.

Similar missions of sending aid to the Palestinians in Gaza were organised
in March and July last year.

"We will never stop until the siege is lifted, we will never stop, maybe we
will come by sea next time then we'll only have one obstacles to deal with
instead of many", he said.

The convoy of various nationals started their journey from London on
Dec 6, travelling through various cities and towns in Turkey, Syria and Jordan

They encounterd various obstacles especially from the Egyptian Government
for not allowing them to use its Nuweiba city as a gateway to Gaza via Rafah.
This delayed their December 27 dateline to reach Gaza, marking a year of
Israelis atrocities against the Palestinians.

The convoy started with 220 vehicles comprising trucks, ambulances and sedan
cars, but upon arriving at the El-Arish port city, they were forced to leave
behind 59 cars with the Egyptian government.

Their suffering did not end there. Many members were injured during a
protest against the Egyptian authorities, resulting in seven being arrested,
including a Malaysian student.

-- BERNAMA