Pulitzer Prize-winning author Alice Walker is joining an international flotilla of boats sailing to Gaza aboard "The Audacity of Hope". Writing on the CNN website, and in much more detail on her blog, she explains why:

http://www.cnn.com/2011/OPINION/06/21/alice.walker.gaza/

"Our boat, The Audacity of Hope, will be carrying letters to the people of Gaza," Walker writes. "Letters expressing solidarity and love. That is all its cargo will consist of. If the Israeli military attacks us, it will be as if they attacked the mailman."

I'm not going to question here Alice Walker's very strong views on the rights - which belong only to Palestinians - and wrongs - which belong only to Israelis and Jews (although we must be thankful that she does stop herself writing, as she puts it, "the N word" to describe what Israeli/Jewish people have become).

But I am going to ask her if, in the name of humanity, she will include a letter to Gilad Shalit in her cargo. Just one letter, from his parents. A letter expressing soldarity and love to a person in Gaza whose human rights are being trampled on.

Tomorrow it will be five years since Gilad Shalit was kidnapped. What a gesture it would be, if Walker would agree to mark the fifth anniversary by offering to include a letter to Shalit in the cargo.

I am not talking here about the plight of Palestinian prisoners in Israeli prisons.

Walker is concerned about THE PEOPLE OF GAZA. She is carrying letters to THE PEOPLE OF GAZA, so that is what I am focusing on. The people of Gaza. Gilad Shalit is currently one of "the people of Gaza".

Therefore, we must all ask Alice Walker: PLEASE WILL YOU CARRY JUST ONE LETTER TO GILAD SHALIT IN YOUR CARGO?