The Israeli army began intercepting several vessels of the Global Sumud Flotilla on Monday morning, which is attempting to reach the Gaza Strip with the declared aim of breaking the blockade imposed by Israel, according to the flotilla. “Military boats are intercepting and boarding the first of our ships in broad daylight,” the organization warned after 10 a.m.
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Several of the 58 ships that make up the flotilla “have sent out a Mayday alert,” the organization stated. Meanwhile, the live broadcast from the activists’ cameras showed Israeli soldiers boarding their vessel about 80 nautical miles off the coast of Cyprus, according to the flotilla’s tracker, and 260 nautical miles (about 400 kilometers) from the Gaza Strip.
Later, the Freedom Flotilla, one of the sponsors of the initiative, specified that they have confirmation that five vessels were intercepted and suspect that another five were also intercepted by the Israeli Navy, but they are trying to “restore contact to confirm it.” Four of them belong to this organization –Adalah, Tenaz, Perseverance, and Lina Al Nabulsi-, according to which they were “attacked and illegally intercepted by the Israeli army around 10:30 Turkey time (9:30 in Spain),” reads a joint statement with Rumbo a Gaza.
It specified that on board the Adalah are four people with Spanish passports: Tomás Morate Serna, the ship’s captain; economist Santiago González Vallejo; climber Neus Bella Ferre; and Óscar Gallego Cubillana.
According to this organization, the Israeli army reported that the flotilla participants “will be transferred to a large cargo ship,” which it has called a “prison ship,” and taken to the Israeli port of Ashdod.
An hour before the interception, the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs urged the activists to “change course and return immediately.” It also questioned the intentions of these vessels and asserted that “the purpose of this provocation is to serve Hamas,” emphasizing that “two violent Turkish groups” are part of this new flotilla, the ship Mavi Marmara and the NGO that manages it, the Humanitarian Relief Foundation (IHH).
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The latter is considered a terrorist organization under Israeli law, as highlighted by the Foreign Affairs portfolio, which also accused the flotilla of “obstructing progress in the peace plan” of U.S. President Donald Trump.
The flotilla called for international community action against the interception. “Governments must act immediately to stop these illegal or piratical acts, whose aim is to maintain Israel’s genocidal blockade on Gaza,” the flotilla denounced alongside the message reporting the boarding.
The Islamist group Hamas joined the denunciation and labeled the interception by Israel as an “act of piracy,” according to a statement published on its social media. “We call on all countries of the world, the UN, and human rights and humanitarian groups to […] release the detained activists and end the unjust and illegal blockade imposed on more than two million Palestinians in Gaza,” the text reads.
Almost sixty vessels departed from the port of Marmaris, in northwest Turkey, last week in what the flotilla organizers described as the final stage of their journey toward the coasts of Gaza. The ships are part of the flotilla that set sail in mid-April from Barcelona with more than a thousand participants from about 70 nationalities, including Spaniards. Two weeks later, 22 ships were intercepted by Israeli soldiers near the Greek island of Crete, resulting in the detention of more than 175 activists (who were repatriated with Greece’s cooperation) and the arrest and transfer to Israel of two of its organizers, the Brazilian Thiago Ávila and the Palestinian-Spanish Saif Abukashek, who were released 10 days later after being interrogated and reportedly mistreated.
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