The Audacity of Hope, US-registered lead ship in the latest Gaza aid flotilla, was stopped by the Greek Coast Guard just some 20 minutes outside the port of Perama on July 1. Dimitris Delavekouras, a spokesman for the Greek Foreign Ministry, confirmed that the vessel had been detained. Athens warned that all ships bound for Gaza will be prohibited from leaving Greek ports. The Greek Ministry of Citizen Protection issued a statement saying that the Minister, C. Papoutsis, decided to prohibit the departure of ships flying either Greek or foreign flags "to the maritime area" of Gaza.

More than 20,000 local Aymara residents filled the public square in Desaguadero, in Peru's southern region of Puno, to hear Walter Aduviri, leader of the Natural Resources Defense Front of the Southern Zone of Puno, announce a formal end to the civil strike that the organization has maintained for more than 40 days. Aduviri said the decision was taken after consultation with the Front's base communities along the shores of Lake Titicaca. In his address, he detailed accords reached in recent negotiations with the government in Lima for the suspension of a controversial mining concession in Puno. (Radio Onda Azul, Puno, June 26)

The Israeli human rights group Gisha, which advocates for freedom of movement for residents of the besieged Gaza Strip, last week appealed to Israel's Supreme Court a judgement upholding the policy that allows Christians —but not Muslims—to exit the besieged Gaza Strip for worship at Jerusalem's holy sites. The ruling by the Beer Sheva District Court rejected a petition filed in February by seven Muslim women from the Gaza Strip. The petitioners sought to enter Israel in order to exercise their right to freedom of worship and pray at the al-Aqsa Mosque. Despite the declared sensitivity towards freedom of worship at Jerusalem's holy sites, Israel does not allow the entry of Muslim worshippers from Gaza, even subject to security screening, but does allow Christian worshippers to enter.

Egyptian security forces fired tear gas at some 3,000 protesters, some of whom hurled back stones, in Cairo's Tahrir Square the evening of June 28. The clashes were apparently triggered when family members of the more than 800 protesters killed during the campaign to oust Hosni Mubarak attempted to storm a theatre where a memorial service was being held for those fallen in the uprising. Activists said the families of the victims had been denied entry to the memorial, and were beaten by police when they tried to force their way in. Activists have called for a massive rally on July 8 aimed at keeping up the pressure for democratic reforms. (Middle East Online, June 29; AlJazeera, June 28)

French officials announced June 29 that they have armed rebels in Libya, in an attempt to break the stalemate in a conflict that has stretched longer than many policy-makers anticipated. France dropped guns, rocket-propelled grenades and other munitions in Libya's western Nafusa Mountains (heartland of the Berber insurgency) in early June to help rebel forces who were at the time under threat from Qaddafi's military, a French military spokesman told reporters. (WP, June 29)

Our last issue featured the story "The Two Wars in Libya: Revolutionary Struggle and NATO Intervention" by Art Young of Green Left Weekly, arguing that progressives in the West can support the first while opposing the second. We also ran the story "Libya and the Left" by Seth Weiss, special to World War 4 Report, who asks whether it is possible to support the rebels without supporting their call for military assistance. Our May Exit Poll was: "Is NATO's Libya war a necessary humanitarian intervention or bloody imperialist aggression?" We received the following responses:

Activists preparing the new aid fllotilla to the Gaza Strip charge that Israel sabotaged one of their boats at the Greek port of Piraeus. In a statement, Scandinavian organizers said "hostile divers" had cut the propeller shaft of the Juliano, a ship shared by Swedish, Norwegian and Greek activists. They said the damage can be repaired and that it will not affect plans to sail for the Palestinian territory toward the end of the week. The 10-ship flotilla has already been delayed by administrative problems with Greek port authorities that activists blame on Israeli diplomatic pressure.

Naitonal Police troops and soliders fired on a crowd of protesters staging an occupation of the airport at Juliaca, in Peru's conflicted southern region of Puno, leaving six dead and at least 37 injured. Protesters had succeeded in setting one of the terminals on fire when security forces started shooting. The protesters were Quechua campesinos from the neighboring province of Azángaro, who are demanding remediation of the local Río Ramis following its pollution by small-scale mining operations in the area of Ananea district, San Antonio de Putina province. The National Confederation of Communities Affected by Mining (CONACAMI) condemned the killings as "ethnocide and genocide...against the protests of the original Quechua people, defenders of life." (La Republica, June 25; CONACAMI, Mariátegui blog, June 24)