[antiwar-van] IOF stops Rachel's body from leaving Gaza

[Macdonald Stainsby]

Independent Online (South Africa)
 March 18, 2003

 Army stops US woman's body from leaving Gaza


 The Israeli army prevented an ambulance carrying the
 body of a US activist who was crushed to death by a
 bulldozer a day earlier from leaving the Gaza Strip,
 Palestinian security sources said.

 Rachel Corrie, a volunteer from the International
 Solidarity Movement (ISM), was buried alive by an
 Israeli bulldozer on Sunday afternoon as she was
 trying to prevent the demolition of a Palestinian
 house in Rafah, on the border between the Gaza Strip
 and Egypt.

 Corrie's parents were not able to fly from Washington
 DC to attend the funeral due to travel restrictions
 imposed by the United States on US citizens wishing to
 go to Israel in the context of an imminent war in
 Iraq.

 They had asked that the body be cremated in Tel Aviv
 and her ashes flown back to the US. However, they
 declined to allow their daughter's remains to be
 transferred by the Israeli army or the US embassy, ISM
 activists said.

 The activists said they had struck a deal with the
 army for three of them to accompany the body to Tel
 Aviv by ambulance. But Palestinian security sources
 said it was turned back by the soldiers manning the
 Sufa checkpoint between the Gaza Strip and Israel.

 The ambulance was headed back to a European hospital
 between Khan Yunis and Rafah, they said.

 The Israeli army regretted Corrie's death but the ISM
 movement and Palestinians who witnessed the incident
 said she was deliberately killed. - Sapa-AFP



 This article was originally published on page 4 of The
 Cape Argus on 18 March 2003



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Macdonald Stainsby
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