Gaza’s Ark, will build a boat in Gaza, by Palestinian hands and expertise, with international assistance using existing resources. A crew of internationals and Palestinians will sail it out of Gaza carrying Palestinian products to fulfill trade deals with international buyers.

Gaza’s Ark will help revitalize the dwindling ship building industry in Gaza and help ensure the transmission of this disappearing expertise, another effect of the blockade, to the younger generations, according to a statement by Gazaark.org.

Gaza’s Ark aims to secure trade deals between Palestinian producers in Gaza and international businesses and NGOs a channel, in order to export Palestinian products from Gaza that are available despite the blockade.

“Although it will help in a very limited manner to alleviate Gaza’s unemployment crisis by paying wages to the boat builders and providing business opportunities to traders, Gaza’s Ark is not an aid project, but a peaceful action against the blockade which Israel ” ‘unreasonably’ imposes on Gaza,” the statement stated.

“Gaza’s Ark challenges the blockade by building hope on the ground in Gaza, and affirms our confidence that the Palestinians of Gaza can rebuild their economy through outbound trade that threatens no-one’s security,”

Israel first imposed a blockade on Gaza in June 2006 after Palestinian militants captured soldier Gilad Shalit but it has been under tighter embargo by both Israel and Egypt since Hamas took control Gaza  in 2007. Before the 2007 coup, Gaza’s exports totalled 86 truckloads a day on average, with more than 85 percent of its products going to the West Bank.

Since the beginning of 2012, Israel has allowed Gaza to export an average of two truckloads a day, but only to markets abroad, meaning Palestinians must pay high transportation costs to reach overseas markets where demand for Gaza’s products is low, accoridng to Haaretz.