A ship carrying humanitarian aid bound for Gaza was bombed just off the coast of Malta on Friday, with activists saying that Israel bears responsibility for the attack on the vessel aiming to break Israel’s two month-long total aid blockade on the Gaza Strip.
The Freedom Flotilla Coalition, an activist group formed in 2010 aiming to break Israel’s decades-long blockade of Gaza, announced that its ship came under attack in international waters shortly after midnight in Maltese time on Friday.
According to the group, armed drones hit the ship twice, igniting a fire and causing a major breach in the hull. Video posted from the group shows a large flame aboard the ship, while pictures of the aftermath show massive burn marks and breaches on the ship’s hull.
The crew sent out a distress signal, and the Maltese government said in a statement that everyone involved in the mission is “confirmed safe.”
According to officials, there were 12 crew members and four civilians on board, and the crew confirmed that the fire had been put out. An activist involved in the aid ship efforts, Surya McEwen, also told The Washington Post that there were 16 people on board, and that the drones appeared to be aiming attacks at the ship’s generators.
Freedom Flotilla Coalition did not directly blame Israeli authorities for the strike in a statement on the attack, but said that “Israeli ambassadors must be summoned and answer to violations of international law, including the ongoing blockade and the bombing of our civilian vessel in international waters.”
Others in the group have pointed out that Israel has attacked activists involved in the Freedom Flotilla movement numerous times in the past, and most recently tried to obstruct a Freedom Flotilla mission last year as it tried to provide aid amid Israel’s genocide.
In 2010, the Israeli military sieged and boarded a flotilla crewed by activists trying to deliver 10,000 tons of aid to Gaza. Israeli soldiers took the activists on the boats hostage, killing 10 of them. Activists involved in the effort said that there were nearly 700 people aboard the boats.
“Israel has threatened us and attacked us many times before, in 2010, killing 10 of our volunteers. It is also the primary entity interested in keep[ing] us and any aid out of Gaza,” Freedom Flotilla organizer Huwaida Arraf told the Washington Post, noting that the group cannot “confirm 100 percent” that Israeli drones carried out the attack.
“This attack fits a well-documented pattern: the use of force to block aid ships headed to Gaza — long before they reach its shores. Maritime relief has been targeted before. This isn’t the first time,” Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor said on social media.
Friday’s attack comes as major aid groups warn that the entire humanitarian aid operation in Gaza is on the verge of total collapse because of Israel’s total aid blockade that has gone on for seven weeks now.
Activist Greta Thunberg told Reuters that she was supposed to be aboard the ship that was attacked on Friday.
Human rights experts and advocates for Palestinian rights have called for an investigation into the attack, condemning it as a war crime.
“This was an attack on Europe, on Malta, on unarmed civilians and the very idea of laws for peace — and this was not an accident — it was a warning shot and open threat against all people and States,” said Lamis Deek, founder and director of the PAL Law Commission, in a statement.
“It is a violation of the UN Charter, the Geneva Conventions, the Rome Statute, the Law of the Sea, and the laws of peace,” Deek went on. “Today’s attack proves that Israel sees every attempt to save Palestinian life from total annihilation as an existential threat to its genocidal project — and [will] wage war against the whole world to preserve it.”
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