Here’s a rather tragic press release, put out by the frothers, self publicists, and Shirley Valentine types who are still aboard the Audacity of Hope, following the failure of its Hamas support mission:
Athens, July 12, 2011, At 10 am today, the shore electricity was cut off to the Audacity of Hope, the US Boat to Gaza, leaving us with no power. The boat has been imprisoned at the US Embassy/Greek Coast Guard dock, near Piraeus, Greece, just outside of Athens since we tried to sail to Gaza on July 1 when the Greek Coast Guard intercepted our small boat and hauled us into this compound.
Its over 100 degrees inside the boat, and a Russian ship loading grain is spewing grain and dust over the entire area. In addition, the off-loading noise the ship is making is above environmentally acceptable limit, sounding like a bad rock concert playing at the back of the boat! Six women are staying on board to protect the boat, since two boats heading to Gaza were already sabotaged in an attempt to prevent us from sailing to Gaza. Four of us are over 60. The Greek naval facility is co-located with a US Embassy compound which has one warehouse exclusively for the U.S. government, as well as a ramp for loading vehicles onto a ship. It also has a parking area for the wrecked cars of Americans who have been involved in traffic accidents plus a secure warehouse compound behind the ubiquitous high fence topped with razor wire and signs printed in both English and Greek in the US government block style lettering
The Greek Coast Guard is probably caught in the middle and may be ready to release us, but government politics seems to wants to keep us in port to appease the Israeli government, since the occupation of Palestine has been outsourced to the Greeks.
*sniff*
Hope there are pictures!
