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Turkish ashes scattered on Hamas militants’ graves in Gaza

24 October 2010 02:05 (UTC +04:00)

Baku-APA. Leaders of Islamic Hamas movement scattered Saturday the ashes of nine activists killed in an Israeli raid on a Gaza-bound flotilla on May 31 on the graves of Hamas militants killed in Gaza, APA reports quoting news.xinhuanet.com website.

The nine activists’ ashes were brought to Gaza by members of the aid convoy Lifeline 5, which arrived in the Hamas-ruled Gaza Strip on Thursday, Hamas officials said.

Mahmoud al-Zahar, a high-ranking Gaza-based Hamas leader, who scattered the ashes on Hamas militants’ graves in western Gaza cemetery, told reporters that "mixing the ashes reiterates the strong ties between the Turkish people and the Palestinians in confronting Israel."

"Those martyrs of the freedom flotilla sacrificed themselves and their bloods to defy the Israeli siege imposed on Gaza. Today we mix the ashes upon the request of the families of the Turkish victims," he said.

Israel has been barring every aid ship trying to reach Gaza to defy a sea and a ground blockade it has imposed on the Gaza Strip after Hamas movement seized control of the enclave by force in 2007.

However, British lawmaker George Galloway has managed to send five convoys of vehicles and aid to the Gaza Strip via Egypt. The last Gaza Lifeline convoy included around 140 vehicles and aid worth five million U.S. dollars.