A boat carrying Jewish activists from Israel, Germany, the United States and Britain set sail Sunday from northern Cyprus for the Gaza Strip, hoping to breach Israel's naval blockade there.

The boat left from the port of Famagusta, nearly four months after Israeli commandos boarded a flotilla of Gaza-bound ships, including the Mavi Marmara, killing eight pro-Palestinian Turkish activists and a Turkish-American.

The goal is to show that not all Jews support Israeli policies toward Palestinians, according to one of the organizers.

The boat was called Sven Y Two as it left on Sunday, but organizers plan to change the name to Irene once it is in open water.

The vessel is to deliver children's toys, medical equipment, outboard motors for fishing boats and books to Gaza residents.

"The only way to go on and move out of this endless cycle of violence is simply by talking," one of the activists, Rami Elhanan, an Israeli whose daughter Smadar was killed in a suicide bombing at a shopping mall in Jerusalem in 1997, said before leaving.

'A provocative joke'

In Jerusalem, Israeli Foreign Ministry spokesman Andy David called the latest protest boat "a provocative joke that isn't funny."

Yousef Rizka, an official with Hamas, the Islamic militant group that controls Gaza, said the government views positively all attempts to break the blockade.

The voyage came as Israelis, Palestinians and U.S. mediators sought a compromise that would allow Middle East talks to continue after an Israeli settlement slowdown expires at midnight Sunday night.

Israel maintains a strict naval blockade on Gaza Strip that bars ships from entering the coastal territory.

It is a part of the Jewish state's wider blockade on Gaza, imposed when Hamas seized power.

After the international backlash over the Mavi Marmara attack, Israel eased its blockade on commercial goods, but it maintains tight restrictions on construction materials, exports and the movement of Gazans.

The three-year blockade, supported by neighbouring Egypt, has badly impoverished already needy Gaza residents, penned them into the territory and caused one of the world's highest unemployment rates.

The Irene catamaran, carrying a total of nine passengers and crew members, set sail from Cyprus's breakaway Turkish-Cypriot north because the internationally recognized Greek-Cypriot south imposed a ban on all-Gaza-bound vessels in May, citing "vital interests."

Before the ban, international activists had used southern Cyprus to launch eight boat trips to Gaza over a two-year span.