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THE FREEDOM FLOTILLA: BRAVELY BREAKING THE SIEGE AGAINST GAZA
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Margaret Knapke
June 3, 2025
Foreign Policy in Focus
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_ A dozen unarmed activists are standing up against one of the
world's most powerful militaries. _
, Greta Thunberg (Shutterstock)
Many people, armed only with moral and political convictions, would be
too intimidated to confront an army or navy directly. But not all.
Twelve nonviolent human-rights activists with the international
Freedom Flotilla Coalition [[link removed]] (FFC) are
currently sailing a small boat, the _Madleen_, to Gaza. They hope to
create a humanitarian sea corridor through Israel’s illegal blockade
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should arrive this weekend, with “baby formula
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flour, rice, diapers, women’s sanitary products, water desalination
kits, medical supplies, crutches, and children’s prosthetics.”
They know the danger. Ten volunteers were killed by Israeli commandos
when they boarded the _Mavi Marmara_ in 2010. But, as Greta Thunberg
said before she embarked last Sunday, “We are doing this
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because no matter what odds we are against, we have to keep trying,
because the moment we stop trying is when we lose our humanity.”
HOW PALESTINIANS SEE IT
The history is important, and one does not have to approve of Hamas’
attack against Israeli civilians in October 2023 to understand that.
During the Nakba [[link removed]] in
1948, at least 750,000
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Palestinians were violently displaced from their homelands by Zionist
paramilitaries and nascent Israeli forces. As Palestinian-Canadian
Samah Al-Sabbagh recently told a crowd, those who survived that
colonial onslaught left their “homes, land, olive groves, even the
freshly baked bread
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The occupation has never stopped, and now the violence is more
high-tech and all-inclusive in its reach. In Gaza, bombs (largely
supplied by the United States) have destroyed homes, apartment
buildings, schools, universities, hospitals, mosques, churches, and
more—leaving thousands buried under rubble. Adding to that
nightmare, doctors
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report the intentional killing of children
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with high-velocity bullets that can destroy surrounding tissues and
organs.
The death toll is staggering. As of May 27, 2025, the Palestinian
Ministry of Health in Gaza
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at least 54,056 people, including at least 17,400 children, have been
confirmed as killed in Gaza since October 2023.
For those still living, Israel’s stranglehold on international
humanitarian aid has created widespread malnutrition and starvation,
with babies and children the most vulnerable. “One in five people in
Gaza
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about 500,000 people, faces starvation, the Integrated Food Security
Phase Classification platform said on May 12,” according to the UN.
Indeed, the UN calls Gaza the “hungriest place on Earth
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Israel and its fellow perpetrators, including the United States,
refuse to take seriously the rulings by the International Criminal
Court
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and the International Court of Justice
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human-rights groups decrying genocide, and less still the students and
people in the streets making a ruckus for justice.
Perhaps the perpetrators think that ignoring the voice of the people
will make it stop, that heartbroken people will give up their moral
and legal agency. They should think again.
A GLOBAL CIVIL SOCIETY INITIATIVE OF UNARMED CIVILIANS
Huwaida Arraf is a Palestinian-American lawyer and activist. She has
worked with the International Solidarity Movement, the Free Gaza
Movement, and more recently the FFC. Her rationale for sending small,
unarmed boats in nonviolent direct actions against Israeli policy?
“Our governments have failed
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taking action.”
Lawyers Arraf and Luigi Daniele assert that there is a strong legal
basis for citizens taking action, as world governments ignore their
“clear and urgent humanitarian obligations
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In August 2008, the Free Gaza Movement successfully delivered aid to
Gaza
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using two small fishing boats named _Liberty_ and _Free Gaza_.
Participants included 44 activists from 17 countries, and they
promised that they’d keep returning “until the siege on Gaza was
broken [[link removed]].”
Included in the aid they brought were 200 pairs of hearing aids
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short of the 9,000 requested—because so many children were
experiencing hearing loss as a result of Israel’s sonic booms.
Two years later, on May 31, 2010, the Israeli navy swarmed the _Mavi
Marmara_. This ship was part of a larger flotilla
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people, which was attempting to deliver 10,000 tons of humanitarian
aid to Gaza. The Israelis killed 10 activists—one died after being
comatose for four years—and wounded fifty more.
Although the UN Human Rights Council declared the attack illegal
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despite Prime Minister Netanyahu’s apology
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to Turkey, whose citizens were killed—Israel continued its
oppressive blockade.
Between 2010 and 2024, the FFC continued to challenge the siege. But
“all ships were pirated by the IOF
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assaulted, kidnapped, interrogated, imprisoned, and/or deported.”
(“IOF” identifies the IDF as an occupation force.)
By May 2, 2025, the FFC had prepared their next attempt. The ship was
named _Conscience_ as an appeal to the world’s conscience
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It was sitting in international waters near Malta, waiting for the
volunteers to board and set out for Gaza. But the crew heard drones,
and _Conscience_ was struck by two explosives.
“The bombing was a deliberate act
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of aggression and intimidation,” the FFC wrote on their website.
“Four crew members were injured, the ship was set ablaze,
communications were severed, and the vessel was left adrift and taking
on water. The attack occurred in European waters, in violation of
international law.”
MADLEEN: NEVER GIVE UP
The activists say of the _Madleen_, “She may be small, but her
mission is powerful
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silence. To challenge Israel’s illegal blockade through nonviolent
direct action. To stand firmly and unapologetically, with Gaza.”
The_ Madleen_ set sail on June 1, one day after the fifteenth
anniversary of the murderous assault on the _Mavi Marmara_. Activists
gathered in Catania, Sicily, in preparation for their launch. The boat
is named for Gaza’s first gender-role-defying fisherwoman; she
personifies FFC’s steadfastness.
The ship’s namesake, Madleen [[link removed]], fell in
love with the sea as a young child. When she was only 13 years old,
she took over her injured father’s fishing boat and became the main
breadwinner for her family. Although Madleen’s focus was on her
family’s survival—_not_ politics—she shared the fishermen’s
encounters with Israeli patrols. She recounted, “They often directly
attacked my boat. They stole my fishing nets more than once. The thing
was that each time they attacked me, I would get a little stronger. I
never gave up.”
Years later, she hopes her two daughters will become “two strong
fisherwomen.”
May Madleen and the activists happily meet in Gaza this month. And may
this stubbornly committed “civil society initiative of unarmed
civilians [[link removed]]” help the
world see that legal and moral obligations are not overridden by
governments’ corrupt colonial agendas.
To that end, the FFC asks that people raise their voices and contact
the media and government officials to express support for breaking the
siege against Gaza.
Readers can track [[link removed]] the
progress of the _Madleen_ in real time and explore
[[link removed]] ways to support the
FFC’s work. They promise: “We sail until Palestine is free.”
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_Margaret Knapke is a longtime human-rights activist._
* Freedom Flotilla Coalition; Madleen; Humanitarian Aid to Gaza;
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