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More Than a Boat: The Gaza Flotilla as a Symbol of a Growing Global Movement
Ramzy Baroud
One needs only to examine the actions and rhetoric of the Israeli government to fully appreciate the profound significance of the solidarity flotillas bound for Gaza. As the latest and most significant of these efforts, the Global Solidarity Flotilla sets sail, Israel’s hostile discourse has intensified, articulated most forcefully by National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir.
The extremist minister has ominously declared that all the volunteers on board the Flotilla are “terrorists,” vowing that they will be treated as such. To grasp the chilling meaning of treating non-violent activists as terrorists, one must consider a recent investigation by The Guardian newspaper. The report exposed that of the 6,000 Palestinians detained in Gaza during the first 19 months of the genocide, all were held under a law that classifies them as “unlawful combatants,” thus terrorists, allowing for indefinite imprisonment.
This investigation revealed that the vast majority of those incarcerated by Israel are in fact civilians, including medical workers, teachers, journalists, civil servants, and children. The fact that Israel would extend this same draconian definition to international activists, whose declared mission is to break the siege on Gaza, powerfully underscores the political and strategic value of these missions in Israel’s eyes.
Israel’s deep-seated fear of civil society involvement in its military occupation and war on the Palestinian people is not a recent development. The ongoing genocide has merely highlighted the utter failure of the international legal and political system and, in turn, the rising importance of civil society.
When the first solidarity boat, sent by the Free Gaza Movement, reached Gaza in 2008, Israel was incensed. The activists served as crucial ambassadors, educating their communities about the Israeli siege on the Strip. Tel Aviv’s response to the 2010 Gaza Freedom Flotilla, which included the MV Mavi Marmara, was lethal. Israeli commandos killed 10 activists, sending a stern message that Israel would not tolerate any interference, even from well-known and respected Western-based charities, in its war against the Palestinians.
Since then, treating activists as criminals has become standard operating procedure, bolstered by the fact that not a single Israeli has ever been held accountable for the outrageous violence against civilians. This, however, has not deterred solidarity activists, who have attempted to sail again and again – in 2011, 2015, and 2018. The eventual infrequency of these missions was not due to a lack of interest, but rather the fact that some European countries, in coordination with Israel, did everything in their power to prevent the activists from setting sail.
This dynamic has shifted dramatically with the current genocide. Solidarity with Palestinians in Gaza has surged and now dominates many European societies, eventually winning the support of various governments, including Spain, from which the latest Global Solidarity Flotilla has embarked. Starting from Barcelona, the boats are to be joined by others along the way. They will collectively carry vital supplies to Gaza, knowing full well that their chances of being intercepted and seized, along with their life-saving cargo, are far higher than their chances of reaching the besieged coastal Strip.
This stark reality has been reinforced by recent events. The Conscience flotilla, for instance, was targeted by drones off the coast of Malta last May. Meanwhile, the Madleen and Handala were seized and confiscated in June and July. Prior to the targeting of the Madleen, Defense Minister Israel Katz described Greta Thunberg, the renowned international activist who joined the flotilla, as “antisemitic.” He issued a warning: “You’d better turn back .. because you will not reach Gaza. Israel will act against any attempt to break the blockade or to assist terrorist organizations.”
This fury echoes the angry language and violent actions consistently used by Israeli governments against anyone or any entity that dares to challenge the Israeli siege on Gaza. But why such fury? These seemingly small, underfunded initiatives are, on their own, hardly enough to break the Gaza siege or to feed the two million people who are experiencing both a genocide and famine.
Israel is fully aware of the potent effectiveness of civil society action in the case of Palestine. In fact, most of the advocacy for Palestinian rights globally does not originate from those who purport to represent the Palestinian people, but from civil society at large. This includes a wide range of actions: political advocacy that lobbies governments, legal advocacy that holds states accountable to international law, economic pressure through divestment and boycott initiatives, cultural and academic boycotts, and massive grassroots mobilization.
The solidarity flotillas are therefore a powerful expression of how far civil society is willing to go to do the work that should have been the responsibility of governments and international institutions. Ben-Gvir’s explicit threat to treat activists as “terrorists” is a direct reflection of Israeli fears and, paradoxically, a powerful acknowledgment of the international solidarity movement’s growing influence.
While it is ultimately the Palestinian people, their sumud (steadfastness), and resilience that will defeat the Israeli stratagem, one must not underestimate the critical role of international solidarity. The freedom flotillas are not isolated acts to be judged based on their ability to reach Gaza. Instead, they are a vital piece of an intricate global process that will ultimately lead to Israel’s profound isolation on the international stage — a process that has already begun with considerable success.
[Dr. Ramzy Baroud is a journalist, author and the Editor of The Palestine Chronicle. He is the author of six books. His forthcoming book, ‘Before the Flood,’ will be published by Seven Stories Press. His other books include ‘Our Vision for Liberation’, ‘My Father was a Freedom Fighter’ and ‘The Last Earth’. Baroud is a Non-resident Senior Research Fellow at the Center for Islam and Global Affairs (CIGA).]
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The Sumud of Direct Nonviolent Action
Fatima Hendricks
September 24, 2025: It is 4:00 am on the 10th day of our sail, aboard a boat in the Global Sumud Flotilla. We have heard explosions hitting other boats and seen drones piercing the night sky.
Tensions are high as we wonder about the fate of the attacked boats and when our turn will come.
I am on night watch and taking a short break, for morning prayers. Despite the adrenaline, my heart is filled with awe at the magnificent starry night and the whooshing of the waves as they splash against our vessel. The splashing waves remind me of the waves of resistance from oppressed peoples and their allies since time immemorial, some violent and others not.
I was first introduced to the concept of nonviolent resistance during my time at the Madina Institute Center for Nonviolence and Peace Studies. However, as a South African growing up during Apartheid, there have been moments when I perceived the strategy of nonviolence as weak, wondering if liberation would have ever come to South Africa without armed struggle.
In recent years, my perspective has been reaffirmed that nonviolent direct action is strategically effective yet difficult to execute. Some describe nonviolence as passive, yet it is one of the most testing, active approaches we can take in resisting oppression. Nonviolence is far from a cop-out or a weak means of struggle, as I am learning on this flotilla.
As comrades on the flotilla, we have often said, “When governments fail, the people set sail.” Governments and corporations have largely been weak in their tangible material interventions for Gaza, offering mostly rhetoric of condemnation and “thoughts and prayers.”
This 38th flotilla to Gaza, aiming to break the illegal and immoral siege, is the largest and most historic to date. It is galvanizing attention on the urgent action required to open a sustainable sea corridor for humanitarian aid to the Palestinian people in Gaza.
Given the occupying power’s war crimes on previous flotillas and its current aggression toward our flotilla in real time, I recall my chat with Ayesha Vahed, a South African attorney and legal reporter practicing in South Africa and The Hague. When asked, Vahed reaffirmed and explained to me that the Global Sumud Flotilla is protected under international law:
According to International Law, the flotilla mission is a completely lawful, civil, nonviolent humanitarian mission. The Israeli blockade, engineered to starve an entire population, is illegal under International Maritime Law. The flotilla has a right to humanitarian passage, based on the fact that the people in Gaza are under an occupying power and have a right to receive aid. This gives the flotilla free passage through international waters, an obligation that has been reaffirmed by the International Court of Justice, which has already ruled that Israel is obliged to allow unrestricted access of aid into Gaza.
Various international lawyers, academics, legal experts, and genocide scholars have mobilized behind this lawful initiative. Furthermore, the confirmation by the United Nations Independent International Commission of Inquiry that Israel has committed genocide against Palestinians in the Gaza Strip obliges all States to fulfill their legal obligations under International Law. In a situation of genocide, states have an *erga omnes* obligation, which is an obligation owed to the international community as a whole, to facilitate human rights and protection, which in this case extends to the opening of humanitarian corridors.
Despite this international framework of legality, the Global Sumud Flotilla participants are being described as terrorists. This hasbara campaign is intended to construct a faulty basis for further aggressive actions toward flotilla participants, past and present. However, this type of behavior is not new to nonviolent movements, as was witnessed in the US Civil Rights Movement and the Palestinian Great March of Return.
As we sail in the People’s Flotilla, the mandatory nonviolence training we received in Tunis from GSF trainers stressed that nonviolence is a dynamic method of action, not an avoidance of conflict. I personally witness the intensity of global mobilization and organizing as intensely active, not passive.
During our training in Tunisia, one trainer shared the history of flotilla missions to break Israel’s illegal siege, and it was moving to meet and hear from those who had been on past flotilla missions, including the Mavi Marmara in 2010 when Israel Occupation Forces soldiers murdered nine activists during the interception of the vessel in international waters.
Our training also included examples of nonviolent actions shared by comrades from across the world, including historical examples from the Civil Rights Movement in America, the 1956 Women’s March in South Africa, protests by Turkish women who were excluded from official spaces for wearing the hijab, and Mexican anti-government protests.
The flotilla’s collective action across movements and countries involves broad-based mass participation and is a notable example of nonviolent mobilization, coupled with calls for boycotts, divestment, and sanctions. It is a movement built on strategic resistance to an illegal blockade and occupation.
The flotilla’s nonviolent direct action requires strength and Sumud (steadfastness). It is an active resistance to decades of injustice from an illegal sea, land, and air blockade. It is far from a passive, symbolic, or performative action.
If people ask me how hard it is to enact nonviolence as a strategy of resistance, my response is that it is tough but necessary, given the occupying power’s total disregard for the sacredness of human life. Acting in nonviolence requires great Sumud in the face of genocidal evil and violent occupation.
As humanitarians on a mission of hope, and solidarity with the Palestinian people in Gaza, nonviolence is our means of resistance, and our language of love.
[Dr. Fatima Hendricks is an occupational therapist, mother of two, and cancer survivor. Dr. Hendricks has three master’s degrees, a doctorate, and 30 years of international experience in health and education program development. Her work highlights the devastating impact of oppression on health, education, and family life. Her passion has taken her to South Africa, Nigeria, the USA, Türkiye, and the Syrian border. She is giving voice to the crime of Genocide as a “mass disabling consequence” and is inspiring awareness of the rights of Palestinians to live freely and peacefully. She is the author of Please Forgive Me and Living Love. Courtesy: Common Dreams, a US non-profit newsportal.]
Spain Joins Italy in Sending Ship to Protect Gaza-Bound Sumud Flotilla
Jessica Corbett
September 24, 2025: Critics of Israel’s genocide in the Gaza Strip welcomed Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez’s Wednesday announcement that his country will join Italy in sending a warship to protect the Global Sumud Flotilla, which has endured several drone attacks during its journey to deliver humanitarian aid to starving Palestinians.
The flotilla—whose name means perseverance in Arabic—departed Barcelona over three weeks ago. The peaceful mission to break Israel’s blockade of Gaza involves around 50 boats carrying hundreds of people from dozens of countries, including Spain.
“The government of Spain demands compliance with international law and respect for the right of its citizens to safely navigate the Mediterranean,” Sánchez said during a Wednesday press conference in New York City, where he is attending the United Nations General Assembly. He said a vessel equipped to assist the flotilla will depart from Cartagena on Thursday.
Sánchez’s move came after Italy’s defense minister, Guido Crosetto, said earlier Wednesday that his government sent a naval ship “to ensure assistance to the Italian citizens on the flotilla” following an overnight drone attack in the Mediterranean Sea.
Both ship announcements followed 16 foreign ministers, including Spain’s José Manuel Albares, warning Israel against attacking the Global Sumud Flotilla last week. On Monday, the Spaniard had reaffirmed diplomatic support for participants, vowing that Spain “will react to any act that violates their freedom of movement, their freedom of expression, and international law.”
The Israeli government has a history of attacking flotillas, and although it has not formally claimed credit for the recent drone attacks, it is widely believed to be responsible. The latest was “the largest and most terrifying attack yet,” Progressive International co-general coordinator David Adler, who is part of the Global Sumud Flotilla, told Jacobin.
“While we expect these attacks to escalate each day that we approach Gaza, we cannot normalize the criminal violence committed against this peaceful convoy of humanitarian workers and the critical aid that we carry with us,” Adler said. “This midnight incident is just a reminder of the brutal violence deployed against the people of Palestine, hour by hour and day by day. If the state of Israel can attack us here—with the eyes of the world watching—then they can do so in Gaza a millionfold, with even greater impunity.”
Israel’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs has posted multiple threatening messages on social media attempting to connect the Global Sumud Flotilla to Hamas, which Israel and its ally the United States have designated a terrorist organization.
“We have another proposal for the Hamas-Sumud flotilla: If this is not about provocation and serving Hamas, you are welcome to unload any aid you might have at any port in a nearby country outside Israel, from which it can be transferred peacefully to Gaza,” the ministry said several hours after the latest attack. “Israel will not allow vessels to enter an active combat zone and will not allow the breach of a lawful naval blockade. Is this about aid or about provocation?”
The Spanish and Italian governments’ decisions have generated questions about how Israel will now engage with the flotilla.
“Wow. This is absolutely huge,” British writer Owen Jones said of Sánchez’s move. “After the attacks, Spain is offering direct military protection to the flotilla bringing humanitarian aid to Gaza. So what now, Israel? Are you going to risk acts of war against a European nation so you can attack humanitarian vessels?”
The European leaders’ actions have also been met with applause. Francesca Albanese, an Italian human rights lawyer now serving as UN special rapporteur for the occupied Palestinian territories, said: “Thank you, Spain.”
“I implore other countries to mobilize their fleet to grant the flotilla safe sailing to Gaza, and deploy a real humanitarian convoy to break the blockade,” she continued. “That’s what people want. That’s what humanity commands. If not in the time of a genocide, when??”
Nathan J. Robinson, editor in chief of Current Affairs, said: “This is a good start. Now tell him to gather food, pack it on ships, and send the whole navy.”
“Let Israel face down the full Spanish Armada if it wants to block aid from entering Gaza,” he added.
As casualties have continued to climb in Gaza—local officials said Wednesday that the Israeli assault has killed at least 65,419 Palestinians and injured 167,160, though global experts believe those figures are undercounts—a growing number of world leaders have not only called for a cease-fire but also recognized the Palestinian state.
At UN headquarters earlier this week, Sánchez described recent recognition of Palestine as “a crucial step” toward “the two-state solution” but also stressed that “there can be no solution when the population of one of those states is the victim of genocide.”
Speaking to the General Assembly on Tuesday, Colombian President Gustavo Petro called for invoking the United for Peace resolution to send an armed protection force to Gaza. He also took aim at US diplomatic and weapons support for Israel, saying that President Donald Trump “allows missiles to be launched at children, young people, women, and the elderly” and “becomes complicit in genocide.”
[Courtesy: Common Dreams, a US non-profit newsportal.]
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In Genoa
Marina Forti
26 September 2025: A general strike erupted across Italy on Monday and some half a million people took to the streets in one of Europe’s largest mobilisations against the war on Gaza. Actions took place in at least 75 municipalities under the slogan ‘Blocchiamo tutto’ – ‘Let’s Block Everything’ – shutting down schools, disrupting trains, and obstructing roads and ports. The largest crowds gathered in the major cities – 100,000 in Rome alone, according to organisers, where protesters occupied the main railway station before marching through the streets. The strike was called by several grassroots unions who demanded that the government end commercial and military cooperation with Israel. In parliament, Riccardo Ricciardi of the Five Star Movement described the demonstrations as an attempt to ‘restore Italy’s honour’. Ministers of the ruling Fratelli d’Italia, meanwhile, expressed support for the security services who have used pepper spray, tear gas and water cannon on the crowds. Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni – in New York for the UN General Assembly – condemned the disorder at the central station in Milan. Her government has been among Israel’s staunchest European supporters, though there are signs that popular pressure is having an effect, even if largely symbolic.
The nationwide walkout follows action taken by workers in Genoa, one of Europe’s busiest ports, in solidarity with the Global Sumud Flotilla, the civilian convoy of boats which set sail from several Mediterranean ports last month, aiming to break the Israeli blockade of Gaza. The Ligurian dock workers have threatened to prevent the departure of container ships heading to Israel, in support of the flotilla, which has suffered a series of drone attacks. Meloni dispatched naval vessels this week in response – a number of Italian citizens, including politicians, are on board – though she also described their mission as ‘gratuitous, dangerous and irresponsible’, and urged the activists to hand over their cargo in Cyprus.
‘If we lose contact with the boats, even for twenty minutes, we’ll shut down all of Europe’, declared Riccardo Rudino, a representative of Genoa’s Autonomous Port Workers’ Collective (CALP), addressing a crowd of 40,000 people on a Saturday evening in late August in front of the port gates. At the end of July, the Genoa-based humanitarian association Music for Peace became involved in organising the local fleet which would be part of the flotilla; the CALP was among the first organisations to join them, followed by trade unions and local community groups. The ensuing mobilisation – in the August heat – exceeded all expectations. The organisers called on the city to help, asking for 40 tonnes of food to be donated to the four vessels leaving Genoa. Three hundred tonnes arrived, far more than could be carried, and some 40,000 people – in a city of 560,000 – joined the procession: the biggest demonstration since the G8 summit here in 2001. In the Piazza De Ferrari, Mayor Silvia Salis spoke of Genoa’s history of anti-fascist resistance; a representative of the Roman Curia said that the city has shown that it believes that ‘another world is possible’.
‘When we said we would block everything, we weren’t just talking. That’s what we’ll do’, Rudino tells me, when we meet a few days after the march. ‘Every year, 13 or 14 thousand containers of various goods leave the port of Genoa for Israel. But if they stop the flotilla, not even a nail will leave here.’ Genoa’s dock workers have been mobilising against the war in Gaza since it began in October 2023, in response to an appeal from Palestinian trade unions to block arms supplies to Israel. The most recent confrontation occurred in July this year, when workers managed to prevent the docking of the Cosco Shipping Pisces, which was carrying containers of matériel from Singapore bound for Israel. The cargo ship had already been turned away by workers in Piraeus; it was the Greek dock workers’ union who alerted their Italian colleagues.
‘For us, blocking ports is nothing new’, Rudino explains – nor are coordinated actions among Europe’s dock workers. In 2019, employees at the port in Le Havre in northern France refused to load French-made cannons onto the Bahri Yanbu, headed for Saudia Arabia. Fearing that the weapons could be diverted by land to Genoa, where the Saudi cargo ship was reported to be arriving, French activists raised the alarm with the Italian Disarmament Network, and Genoa’s Autonomous Port Workers’ Collective responded. The Caesar howitzers did not arrive but the Saudi ship was due to be loaded with electric generators produced by the Italian company Teknel. These had been declared for civilian use but checks revealed that the vessel was authorised to export arms, and its cargo might have been destined for the Saudi National Guard, then engaged in a war in Yemen. Invoking a 1990 Italian law prohibiting the supply of weapons to nations at war, Genoa’s dock workers refused to load the generators; in the end, Teknel gave up on the shipment and the Bahri Yanbu left the port without it (the generators eventually made it to Saudia Arabia via Venice). It was this case that prompted workers at the Ligurian port to consolidate relationships with dock workers across Europe, forging an anti-war network to track and disrupt the global arms trade.
Genoa’s longshoremen – known as camalli – have a distinguished history of self-organisation and political activity. The first modern cooperative of port workers in the city was founded in 1889, at the time of the emergence of workers’ mutual aid societies; in the early 1900s, a series of strikes succeeded in ending an unjust system of day labour. After the Second World War the Compagnia unica lavoratori merci varie (CULMV) was established, charged with the training and protection of dock workers. Crucially, the Compagnia was given exclusive control over hiring and contracts: shipping companies could not employ their own workers directly – on what were likely to be more precarious and badly paid terms – but had to draw from members of the CULMV.
Although an association to manage employment rather than a trade union proper, the Compagnia has long been a key institution in broader political organising and consciousness-raising. In the post-war period, its leaders and members mostly belonged to the CGIL, the majority-Communist trade union, and voted en masse for the Italian Communist Party. As well as improving their own working conditions, the camalli have played a leading role in national resistance movements. In June 1960, they joined the occupation of the squares to prevent the neo-fascist Italian Social Movement (ancestor of Meloni’s party, with various metamorphoses along the way) from holding its congress in Genoa. The uprising, which saw violent clashes with the police, led to the fall of Tambroni’s right-wing coalition government. Genoa’s port workers also have a venerable history of international solidarity. In 1973 they sent a ship loaded with food and goods to support the Democratic Republic of Vietnam – a feat that remains legendary in the city. They also blocked cargo ships supplying American troops in Indochina and Pinochet’s dictatorship in Chile, and boycotted apartheid South Africa.
As in many other industries, technological and social change has transformed the nature of work at ports in recent decades, shifting the balance of power. The rise of container shipping revolutionised the logistics of international trade and mechanisation at the docks has reduced the amount of work – in the 1970s, there were 8,000 port workers in Genoa; twenty years later, there were just 1,000. In the 1990s, a wave of privatisation swept through Italy, and the Ligurian docks were opened up to private companies to whom the port authorities – now acting as a kind of public landlord – would lease terminals. The new regulations allowed these companies – ‘terminal operators’, as the jargon has it – to recruit their own employees, endangering the status of the Compagnia, though the latter clung on to its role as a supplier of labour: during peaks in activity, private companies can only draw on CULMV members.
Today, the port of Genoa has about 3,400 employees, of whom 2,300 are dockers involved in loading and unloading cargo (of these, about half are associated with CULMV). Employment is stable and relatively protected; CULMV guarantees private companies flexibility and thus prevents the spread of temporary and poorly paid work, rampant in other sectors. ‘We have handheld devices and computers, but in the end, the work is still loading and unloading ships’, explains Riccardo Rudino: ‘In a port of this size, human labour continues to count.’ ‘In the city, dock workers are still viewed with great respect’, Riccardo Degl’Innocenti, an independent researcher working on the history of the docks, told me.
The Autonomous Port Workers’ Collective are highly conscious of the organisational and strategic power they retain, especially given the global import of their work (the Weapon Watch, a research centre based in Genoa, describes ports as ‘the heart of the global military-industrial system’); and they are proud of their history of collective struggle. ‘Like our fathers and grandfathers, we do not want to be complicit in arms trafficking’, Rudino tells me; he uses the word ‘trafficking’, he explains, because such trade violates Italian and international regulations, not to mention principles of humanity and solidarity.
Over the weekend, dock workers from across Europe and beyond – Marseilles, Athens, Tangier – are gathering in Genoa for the first international meeting of the newly formed Coordinamento Internazionale dei Portuali (International Port Workers’ Alliance). Convened by Italy’s USB union, and featuring delegates from various European, North African and Middle Eastern dockers’ unions, the two-day assembly aims to coordinate the effort to prevent weapons exports to Israel and strategize a response to the drone attacks on the flotilla. Dock workers are among the volunteers on board. One evening earlier this month, during a crowded public meeting organised by CALP and the USB at the Genoa Port Authority Workers’ club to plan this week’s general strike, contact was made via video link with one of the ships en route to Gaza. ‘Hello everyone’: a smiling, tired-looking young man was projected onto a large screen. ‘Hello Jose’, replied dozens of voices, amid applause. Jose Nivoi is a port worker and member of the CALP. ‘Morale is high. Knowing that you are following us helps’, he told the crowd. A worker at the port of Livorno declared into the microphone: ‘We are mobilising not only out of solidarity with the tormented Palestinian people, but also out of the anger we are harbouring’. Another worker added: may this be ‘the beginning of a hot autumn’.
[Marina Forti is a journalist and writer. She worked for 30 years at il manifesto, where she was foreign service chief, editor-in-chief and correspondent. Courtesy: Sidecar, the blog of New Left Review. The New Left Review is a British bimonthly journal covering world politics, economy, and culture, which was established in 1960.]
