The convoy of 198 trucks and more than 500 supporters left London a month ago hoping to enter Gaza despite the Israeli economic blockade. The trucks are now at el-Arish, an Egyptian port on the Mediterranean, a few miles south of Gaza.

Several protesters and police officers were injured after clashes early today. Reuters reported that Egyptian police threw stones at the crowd and arrested seven demonstrators, while some members of the convoy held four harbour police officers. Police fired water cannon to disperse the crowd that had gathered to receive the aid trucks.

Israel's strict blockade of Gaza, which has been in place for more than two years, prevents all exports and limits imports to a few humanitarian items. The policy has grown ever tighter since Hamas, the Palestinian Islamist movement, won parliamentary elections in early 2006 and then seized full security control of Gaza a year later. Israel now regards the strip, home to 1.5 million Palestinians, as a "hostile entity".

Click here to read more by Rory McCarthy, The Guardian, 6th January 2010