Al-Amal, which is no more than a cargo ship that has no distinguished features and may even be worn out, has caused the Israeli’s reaction that the entire world watched, and made them wage against it various types of discrediting, jam and pressure at different levels.

Our goal has always been to arrive in Gaza and to help the people of Gaza in order to achieve the goal of alleviating the suffering of the Palestinian people and provide them with the support they needed.

In the face of the Israeli insistence on preventing Al-Amal Ship to reach its destination, we believe that the Ship had achieved its purpose and showed to the whole world the truth about what is going on. The situation that faced Al-Amal ship made us think and compare between the alternatives available. The ship docking at Ashdod port was not considered an option, and it was unacceptable; we also did not have the intention to engage in confrontation and bloodshed by risking the lives of innocent people. The only alternative we had in mind the one that achieves the human, moral and political target for which Al-Amal ship sailed: to do all what is possible to provide the maximum possible support and to alleviate the suffering of the blockaded Palestinian people in Gaza so that they can achieve their full human rights.

All previous attempts at various levels have failed to do anything for the Palestinian people and to ease their suffering. The reconstruction has not started yet. Despite the fact that the Arab summit in Qatar earmarked funds for reconstruction, not a single country has been able to access Gaza to deliver supplies. So far, not even a sack of cement or a construction steel bar has been able to enter Gaza and not one dirham has been spent in compliance with the pledges made in Qatar.

But now the picture has changed after a European party offered to us intervention and mediation. The message conveyed to us by the mediator is that if the goal was to help the people of Gaza, that could be achieved, but if our goal is otherwise, the alternative would be to enter into confrontation with the Israelis and to assume the consequences and even in terms of victims who may fall. We have always said that our aim is to help the Palestinian people to achieve their rights; anything else would not achieve their interests. We put forward to the mediator our demands. Our response was in fact difficult to meet. We put forward a certain number of conditions, including lifting the blockade of Gaza and beginning the reconstruction process. We thought that Israel would not accept such conditions, but it seems that Al-Amal ship achieved some gains, and that we underestimated their position.

Our conditions were accepted, including allowing construction materials such as cement and steel to enter Gaza for reconstruction. Israel has always refused this. The mediator told us that they had accepted our conditions and would do whatever possible to implement them.

It was also accepted that Libya would spend US$ 50 million that it pledged at the Qatar summit to finance housing projects and make sure that Palestinian families would not spend winter in the open.

It was also agreed to allow the entry of construction materials, cement and iron, for the first time, and for the first time reconstruction projects will be carried out and UNRWA can start its construction projects and to launch the process of reconstruction.

Multilateral contacts have also been successful in extracting a number of concessions for the benefit of the blockaded Palestinians by allowing for the implementation of reconstruction projects in Gaza. The concerned parties have also pledged to allow patients to get treatment outside Gaza Strip, the transfer of patients for treatment outside Gaza.

In addition, the implementation of Foundation’s initiative to provide a first batch of 500 fully-equipped houses and decent housing that meets human dignity before winter was also accepted.

In return and taking into consideration these achievements, the Foundation, in order to reaffirm its desire to avoid confrontation with anyone, and keen to ensure the safety of all those on board the Ship, decided to redirect Al-Amal aid ship to the Egyptian port of El-Arish providing that the ship's cargo would be allowed to go to Gaza through Rafah crossing on the Egyptian side.

With such a positive feeling and results that could be reached by negotiation through mediators and provision of all the safeguards and commitment of all parties involved to implement the agreement, including sisterly Egypt, which provided us with all the guarantees to implement what was agreed upon, we believe Al-Amal’s goal has been achieved without bloodshed and that the outcome is to achieve gains for the Palestinians, which were inconceivable even in a dream.

The humanitarian suffering of the blockaded people of Gaza should not be the subject of trade-offs or altercation by any party, not even by Palestinians. The suffering of Gaza cannot be traded for political purposes for any party.

In response to the voices that say that the Libyans have to engage in armed confrontation, we say that this did not and would not offer to the Palestinian people anything. That request should rather be directed to the Arab armies, and not to a simple decaying cargo ship carrying nothing but food supplies and a limited number of young people who believe in the need to provide all assistance possible to the people of Gaza and to end their blockade.

All who is concerned with the Palestinian people should strive in all possible ways to accomplish beneficial goals, but not to take the suffering of the Palestinian as a cause or political tool to achieve gains through battles that may not be obligatory.

Gaddafi International Charity and Development Foundation

Tripoli: Wednesday, 14/07/2010

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