There were in total 663 or 683 people from 37 nations on board the 6 ships in the civilian flotilla. Notable people aboard the flotilla included Nobel Peace Prize laureate Mairead Corrigan, former UN Assistant Secretary-General Denis Halliday, Israeli-Arab member of Knesset Haneen Zoubi, leader of the northern branch of the Islamic Movement in Israel Raed Salah, Swedish novelist Henning Mankell, and a number of politicians from European and Arab national governments and the European Parliament.