In the early hours of May 30, a flotilla carrying humanitarian aid to Gaza was attacked by the Israeli Defence Forces. During the attack, Israeli commandos killed nine activists on board a Turkish ship, the MV Mavi Marmora, sparking international outrage. Indeed it may have been a turning point in the siege of Gaza, as in the wake of the killings, even the US government felt the need to declare that the siege was unsustainable.

Though none of them were aboard the Marmora, a number of Irish citizens were part of the convoy that was attacked and taken by force by the Israelis.
"I was on the radio, talking to the Mavi Marmora and when I looked around I could see two small ships approaching quickly from behind,"says Shane Dillon, first mate on board the MV Challenger I. "There were also about six smaller boats, Zodiacs. They had no lights but I could see the bow wave on the water horizon. One of the Israeli boats came alongside us on the port side."
The initial radio contact from the Israeli authorities - warning the flotilla to turn back - had come two hours earlier, at around 11pm. The flotilla had elected to press on. Now, as the Israeli craft approached, it was still dark but the night was clear and there was a moon. The crew and passengers of the Challenger watched as the Israeli commandos approached the Marmora. Then, chaos broke out.
"The other boats started their anti-piracy offences, running the firehouses over the side of the boats,"Shane, who worked on Irish merchant ships for 11 years explains. "It’s typically what you do if you’re going past Somalia; it makes it awkward for small boats to come alongside."
These were moments of high drama, when anything might have happened. But no one who was part of the mission had anticipated that people would die.
"They used stun grenades on the stern of the Marmora,"

Shane says. "We could see what looked like tear gas from the stern of the boat. The passengers started trying to throw rubbish bags – just black sacks – off the side. We could hear the snaps of tasers."
What do you do in circumstances like that: sit and watch as the Israelis take over? Try to do something to help the other ship?
"Well, myself and [captain] Denis Healey decided to try and make a break, to get any satellite data uploaded which the journalists on board had recorded. We did 22 knots in the direction of Gaza, followed by a small Corvette [boat]."
About 30 minutes after breaking away from the flotilla, one of the engines of the Challenger began to fail. Soon afterwards, the crew noticed another Israeli vessel approaching them at speed.
Captain Denis Healy, a citizen of the UK, decided to cut the engines because he was afraid the boat would be rammed by the approaching vessel. The chase was over.
There were five men and 12 women on board the Challenger when between 30 and 40 Israeli commandos boarded with venemous intent, carrying automatic weapons. The soldiers used stun grenades, paintball guns and tasers against passengers and crew.
Dr. Fintan Lane of the Ireland Palestine Solidarity Campaign was on the bridge – or command room – of the ship with the captain at the time.
"We decided our strategy was to defend the journalists on board and impede the progress of the boarding party, so that the journalists could upload material or hide it," he recalls. "Before they came on board, a stun grenade exploded close to me, but I managed to get the sliding door closed."
It is almost impossible for an outsider to imagine the intensity of those moments, but Lane paints a vivid picture.
"They smashed through the door with their rifle butts and then we had a barricade of chairs and tables – but they smashed through those as well.
"It was a few minutes before they gained access. But the first people they went for were the journalists. They ripped [Sydney Morning Herald photographer] Kate Geraghty's camera from her. Kate was hit by a taser. An activist, Fiachra Ó Luain, out on the fly-bridge, had a small handy-cam. They ripped that off him. Only some footage and a few photos were saved."
The activists' mobile phones, cameras and other belongings were seized by the Israelis. Fiachra Ó Luain's passport was also confiscated.
The Israeli troops weren't interested in niceties. Having taken control of the ship by force, they brought the Challenger into the Israeli port of Ashdod. Along the way the activists were roughly treated by the soldiers, and the ill-treatment continued at the detention centre, where they were taken. Irish diplomats in Israel are pursuing these allegations and say the matter of mistreatment is "high on their agenda."
Fintan Lane recalls: "There was a man from Firhouse, a Libyan man with an Irish passport [Isam Bin Ali], who had diabetes and he collapsed while we were waiting for the bus to the airport. He wasn't given food and they knew what the problem was – but they took a long time to respond."
Violence was also used against the activists as they awaited deportation at the airport: twisted fingers, bruises and broken limbs were sustained – but that was minor compared to what transpired on the MV Mavi Marmora.
It was only when they reached Ashdod that the activists learned that some of their Turkish colleagues had been killed. Fiachra believes that Muslims were deliberately targeted and that it's no accident that the raid took place during their time of morning prayer. "I'm sure they said, 'We'll kill a few Muslims and then deliberately spin it so that we can blame the Muslims – we can convince most Americans and western Europeans of that'," he reflects.
Meanwhile, the MV Rachel Corrie was sailing past the coast of Malta as news of the killings broke. The ship had left Dundalk on May 14, but failed to catch up with the rest of the flotilla in Cyprus due to technical problems.
"We were really shocked when we heard what was happening," the owner of the Rachel Corrie, Derek Graham, says. "The information was sketchy for the first couple of days. We'd heard between two and 20 people were killed. It was frightening, but everyone was more determined than ever to carry on."
The Rachel Corrie was finally intercepted on Saturday, June 5 and the seven people on board – including former UN assistant secretary general Denis Halliday and Nobel peace laureate Mairéad Maguire – were taken to Israel and subsequently deported. Following the international storm caused by the killings, the Israelis were more circumspect: the activists on the Rachel Corrie were not mistreated. But nothing could bring the dead back to life...

SETTING SAIL
The MV Challenger I had set sail from Crete on Thursday, May 27. On Sunday, the six ships in the flotilla gathered together off the coast of Cyprus and set their course towards Gaza, ignoring Israeli warnings that they would be intercepted.
The convoy was organised by the Free Gaza Movement, an international coalition of pro-Palestinian groups. The ships carried around 10,000 tons of aid, including building materials, medical supplies, paper and other educational materials.
The mood was buoyant as the ships set sail, according to Fintan Lane. The activists say they knew they would be challenged by Israel, but they never anticipated the level of violence that ensued.
"The flotilla wasn't fearful. When we met up with the rest of the flotilla close to Cyprus, we arrived at two o'clock in the morning. It was a magnificent sight. The following morning, we saw the ships across the horizon and there was a real sense of hope. People were elated."
Activist (and former European Parliament electoral candidate) Fiachra Ó Luain says everyone was aware that the Israelis were dangerous – but no-one anticipated a "murderous assault", particularly not in international waters.
"We thought it was more likely that they would create a cordon and block us for a few days or a few weeks. There was enough food on the Marmora to keep the entire flotilla going for a month. We really thought the Israelis were going to be much more careful about the whole thing, keep as much of the higher moral ground as possible. But they didn't."
Was this assumption that Israel would play nice somewhat naïve? The Israeli government was inevitably going to be pissed off ("provoked" to use their preferred term) by a high-profile convoy making a beeline for Palestine.
Fintan argues that any such "provocation" was unintentional. "It was not about provoking Israel; it was about bringing aid into Gaza and linking up with the people and expressing solidarity. We weren't intending to provoke Israel. The siege of Gaza is illegal, it's against international law."

BREAKING THE BLOCKADE
The flotilla had two stated aims. One was humanitarian: to bring badly needed aid to Gaza. The other was political: to break the blockade of Gaza's port that began three years ago when Hamas came to power.
From a humanitarian point of view, the flotilla was a failure. The activists agree that most of the aid now sitting in the Israeli port of Ashdod will never make it to Gaza. Would it not then have made more sense to try and reach a compromise arrangement – perhaps by bringing the aid to Ashdod and having it transferred to Gaza under the watch of international observers?
Fintan doesn't think so. "It's more important that the siege is lifted. If we can end the siege, the issue of cargo sitting on a quayside is less important."
Derek Graham agrees with him. In April 2008, Derek was on the first boat to successfully breach the blockade. He attempted to make the journey again last June, but was arrested and held for eight days.
"Last June, they said they would let the aid in, but they only let the medical equipment through. That would happen again. There are over 4,000 items on the banned list."
Derek, who has been to Gaza five times, believes that the terrible living conditions the Palestinians suffer will never improve until the blockade is lifted. He gives the example of the restrictions placed on fishermen.
"The sewage system hasn't worked for three years. One and a half million people's sewage is going into the sea.
"If the fishermen go out past two miles, they are shot at, so they have to fish in polluted waters. If you have nothing else to eat, you will feed that to your family. People end up in hospital with stomach complaints, but there are no medical facilities for them, so they die. It's a slow form of genocide. Israel says these people are dying from 'natural causes'."
The blockade means that, on the one hand, medical supplies cannot get in, and on the other patients in need of care cannot get out.
"The first time I was there, in 2008, we were shown around and one thing really stuck in my mind. We were brought to Al Shifa hospital to the prenatal unit. A huge amount of children are born prematurely because of the strain their mothers are under.
"We asked the doctor what was going to happen to a baby who was born 26 weeks premature. He said, 'He needs an operation but there is no anaesthetic.' We said, 'So what is going to happen?' He said, 'We'll look for an exit visa, but he is a male'. And we said, 'So? What has that to do with it?'
"All males under 35 are classed as terrorists. So he can't get out. So the medical staff will make him as comfortable as possible before he dies. By the time we came to the third baby, we stopped asking because we were looking at a line of little coffins. Kids who shouldn't even be born yet are left to die."
In the wake of the flotilla raid and the killing of the nine activists, there is renewed opposition, both in Ireland and internationally, to the blockade of Gaza. The Ireland Palestine Solidarity movement has been inundated with membership enquiries, and thousands have taken part in protests around the country.
After the raid, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton described the situation in Gaza as "unsustainable and unacceptable". At the time of going to print, EU foreign ministers are planning to make a joint statement, calling for an end to the siege.
"The bigger picture is the people of Gaza. At least nine people die every day in Gaza, but you don't hear about that in the media," says Derek.
"Though it's a terrible thing to say, maybe the loss of life on the MV Mavi Marmora is not in vain because it will help the Palestinians and save lives there."
All of the Irish citizens who were on the mission are now home and safe, but Fintan Lane insists that this is not the last of the flotilla.
"We are going to go back, possibly within another six weeks," he states. "I think those nine people can't be allowed to have died in vain. We can't back down to that.
"At the funerals in Turkey, which I attended with Fiachra, there was a deep sense of sorrow but also of determination. People had Palestinian flags and they obviously intended to carry on. So will we."