By: Trevor Loudon
New Zeal

Kia Ora Gaza sounds friendly and has a very cutesy logo. The name conveys a Maori greeting to the people of the “besieged” Gaza Strip, sandwiched as it is, in the buffer zone between Israel and Egypt.

In fact, Kia Ora Gaza is a militantly anti-Israel group and is the New Zealand wing of the infamous George Galloway’s Viva Palestine.

Galloway, a former British Labour Member of Parliament, has enjoyed a long, if sometimes fractious relationship with the also militantly anti-Israel British Socialist Workers Party.

It is therefore no surprise to learn that Kia Ora Gaza is controlled by New Zealand’s Socialist Worker, a sister party of the British S.W.P.

Grant Morgan

Kia Ora Gaza’s founder is Grant MorganVaughn Gunson.

In October 2010, a six-person Kia Ora Gaza team was part of the huge Gaza aid convoy that successfully broke Israel’s blockade to deliver “desperately-needed medical supplies along with a message of international solidarity.”

“Our Kiwi volunteers are authentic heroes who put their bodies on the line to help people in need on the other side of the world,” said Grant Morgan, co-organizer of Kia Ora Gaza.

George Galloway (center) congratulates the Kia Ora Gaza team for their “significant contribution to the success of the international aid convoy to Gaza.” From left: Roger Fowler, Julie Webb-Pullman, Pat O’Dea, Hone Fowler, Mousa Taher and Chris van Ryn.

Of those pictured above:

• Roger Fowler is an Auckland based Socialist Worker activist and former Communist Party of New Zealand member.

Julie Webb-Pullman

• Julie Webb-Pullman is an activist/journalist who has worked in Havana for Cuban press agency Prensa Latina and has ties to the Cuban ambassador in New Zealand. Webb-Pullman also has strong links to Mexico’s Zapatista rebels and also to 17 pro-Zapatista New Zealand activists who were arrested in October 2007 for allegedly participating in quazi-military training camps in the Urewera Mountains. In Gaza, Webb-Pullman, while at a reception hosted by terrorist organization Hamas, had a brief meeting with with Gaza President Ismail Haniya and Foreign Minister Mahmoud Zahar.
• Pat O’Dea is an Auckland based Socialist Worker activist and former Communist Party of New Zealand member. He is from an Irish Republican supporting family.
• Hone Fowler is a youth worker and Roger Fowler’s son.
• Mousa Taher is a Wellington born convert to Islam who speaks Arabic. He is active in the Marxist led Wellington Palestine Group.
• Chris van Ryn is an “award-winning travel writer and photographer with wide experience in business and human rights campaigns.”

Kia Ora Gaza is a small cog in a big anti-Israel machine. But New Zealand socialists, like Kiwis in general, tend to punch above their weight.

Any one concerned with the survival of Israel should be finding out as much as possible about the worldwide Marxist networks dedicated to the Jewish State’s destruction.