JERUSALEM, Aug. 30 (Xinhua) -- Israeli border guards have refused two international peace activists to leave the Gaza Strip through Eretz Crossing with some Palestinian patients, the Free Gaza Movement said in an e-mail sent to Xinhua Saturday.

    The refusal happened on Friday when Bill Dienst, a doctor from U.S., and British journalist Lauren Booth, accompanied by some sick Palestinians who need special medical care, attempted to exit Gaza via the Eretz Crossing into Israel after their U.S.-based movement finished its days-long protests against the Israeli siege.

    Dienst said in the e-mail sent from Gaza that he and Booth as well as the sick Palestinians were stopped by Israeli guards at the Eretz Crossing.

    "The Israeli border guards threatened to shoot us, but we advanced slowly with our arms raised, holding our passports up high. We advanced right through the tunnel right up to the iron gate, but the Israelis would not open it," Dienst said, adding that the U.S. and British embassies did not help them.

    Some 44 international human rights and peace activists of the Free Gaza Movement reached the Gazan coast last Saturday afternoon after over 30-hour sailing in the Mediterranean Sea in a bid to break the Gaza blockade.

    On Friday, two wooden fishing boats carrying dozens international peace activists and nine Palestinians left the Gazancoast and arrived safely in Cyprus in the night, while nine others decided to continue to stay in Gaza temporarily.

    Dienst said that the nine international activists were now trapped in Gaza, who are waiting for the Egyptian authorities to let them out of there through Rafah Crossing at the border with the Gaza Strip.

    "Now I am getting a better appreciation of what it means to be a Palestinian from Gaza," he said.