Those striking include five Britons, 3 Belgians, and a Greek. Further info from their colleague who has returned: david.shove@googlemail.com
If you wish to also write directly to the FCO, you could address your letter to Bill Rammell [Minister Foreign and Commonwealth Office <psrammellinfo@fco.gov.uk>] and/or David Miliband [Secretary of State- Foreign and Commonwealth Office private.office@fco.gov.uk], otherwise write to your MP or other power-broker.
This kind of action deserves and requires great publicity, so I suggest that everyone write letters to their newspapers, at least. This is mine:
Dear Sirs
As a regular reader of the Independent I am disappointed that I only found out about the hunger strike at Rafah by personal contacts, and not through your paper. As the idea of a newspaper does carry a notion that people might read it to find out news, could I ask you to cover, daily, the brave action, begun on May 19th, of these five British, 3 Belgian and I Greek persons? I think that reporting their progress is the least we can expect for people prepared to die for an ideal gaining nothing for their personal or national benefit. Even Gandhi did not do as much.
The Hunger strike is designed to force open the gates of Rafah at the border between Egypt and Gaza. The closure of the borders of Gaza by Israel, who also are the puppet-masters behind the Egyptian closure at Rafah, is illegal, and were the UN's forceful attitude to Israel about food delivery through the borders not keeping the Palestinians alive, it would be no less than mass murder. As it is, it is random murder of individuals unlucky enough to require the advanced services of these 8 doctors and 1 specialist nurse.
Rod Cox
