A Devon surgeon is planning to sail to Gaza in a fishing trawler to take humanitarian aid to Palestinian people.

David Halpin, 62, from Haytor in Dartmoor, is funding the �120,000 cost of the voyage and hopes to sail the 3,000-mile trip within the next two weeks.

He is taking 17 tonnes of medical supplies, food and clothing on a 30-year-old, 108-tonne Brixham-based beam trawler Jacoba.

Mr Halpin said the aid was intended to help the 1.1 million Palestinian refugees from Israel who live in Gaza.

Gaza: Home to 1.1 million refugees

A list of what supplies were needed was established after Mr Halpin got in contact with the Medical Aid for Palestine organisation in London.

Mr Halpin, who worked at hospitals in Torquay and Exeter, but is now part-time, said the aid he was planning to take was "a crumb but a useful crumb".

He said: "The children have suffered and about 800 have been killed since in September 2002.

"About half of children are malnourished throughout the occupied territories, and that includes Gaza, which I think is particularly badly affected."

He has asked the Foreign Office to clear the vessel's entry into the Israeli port of Ashdod, near the northern border of the Gaza Strip.

He has also requested permission for the aid to be taken on a road passage through a checkpoint into Gaza.

The trawler's skipper and part-owner, John Hingley, 50, who will have a local crew of three, said the voyage was a "challenge" and "very worthwhile".