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HOW A MASS MOVEMENT ON THE ITALIAN COAST DISRUPTED THE ISRAELI SUPPLY
CHAIN  
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Giacomo Sini, Dario Antonelli
October 27, 2025
The Progressive
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_ In Livorno, a port city off the coast of Tuscany, a coalition of
labor unions, local organizations, and everyday people have blocked
container ships from moving cargo. _

Participants organized by a network of local antifascists
collectives, grassroots trade-unions, dockers, and students, rally at
the Piazza Attias in Livorno, Italy, on September 30., Photo: Giacomo
Sini / The Progressive Magazine

 

"We are writing history together!”

The phrase echoes through the air in Piazza Attias, a square in the
heart of Livorno, Italy, a port city on the edge of Tuscany, as a
packed assembly takes place. It’s September 30, and there are 500
people in attendance, some standing on benches to get a better view.
People on scooters slow down as they pass by, some greeting the crowd
by honking their car horns or raising their fists. When the
announcement is made that an Israeli-flagged container ship has turned
back from the Porto di Livorno, where it was scheduled to carry out
loading and unloading operations, the whole square erupts in applause.

Within a span of of just ten days last month, union workers and
everyday people in Livorno secured two major victories against the
Italian government’s enabling of genocide in Gaza by blocking two
ships believed to be involved in the supply chain of transport of
weapons or other equipment to Israel. Their success was the result of
a solidarity movement led by unions, activist groups, and tens of
thousands of protesters across the city.

In September, the Palestine solidarity movement in Italy gained
significant momentum
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a result of the Global Sumud Flotilla
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whose civilian aid vessels were repeatedly attacked
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while sailing through the Mediterranean Sea toward Gaza. The flotilla
brought the Italian public together in an enormous show of solidarity,
and on September 22—one day before several of its vessels were
damaged by drone attacks off the coast of Greece—Italian workers
declared a general strike.  
Demonstrators block the Variante Aurelia SS 1, a motorway which
passes through Livorno, on October 3 during a general strike promoted
by several Italian unions in solidarity with members of the Global
Sumud Flotilla.  (Photo by: Giacomo Sini / The Progressive Magazine)
 

On the first day of the strike, thousands
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of demonstrators gathered
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at Varco Valessini, an access point to the harbor at the Porto di
Livorno. Led an antifascist port workers’s collective called the
Gruppo Autonomo Portuali
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alongside the grassroots trade union Unione sindacale di Base
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di Carta [[link removed]], they
pitched
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tents and set up a permanent day-and-night protest in front of Wharf
42 at the Molo Italia, where a ship owned by the U.S.-citizen owned
Schuyler Line Navigation Company (SLNC) was scheduled
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at the port the following day.  

 
Protesters walk toward the pier at Varco Valessini, an access point
along the harbor at the Porto di Livorno, on September 22.  (Photo
by: Giacomo Sini / The Progressive Magazine)
 

SLNC’s_ Severn_, a U.S.-flagged bulk carrier used mainly for
military cargo, had been the subject of a previous protest in Livorno
in May. The ship regularly stops at Livorno because it serves the
large U.S. military base at Camp Darby in the nearby province of Pisa.
Documentation by the watchdog site Weapon Watch shows
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that on July 9, the _Severn_ traveled the port in Haifa, Israel, to
unload Caterpillar D9 bulldozers supplied by the United States to the
Israeli Ministry of Defense.

The _Severn_ was scheduled
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to arrive in Livorno on September 23 after stopping at the Israeli
port of Eilat to load generators and construction equipment bound
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Camp Darby, according to the office of the Livorno Prefecture. But the
ship was unable to even enter the Italian port—by the afternoon of
September 25, the protesters in Livorno had succeeded in preventing
the unloading of equipment at Molo Italia. The protesters not only
succeeded in breaking a link in the Israeli defense supply chain, but
also hampered, for the first time in eighty years, the military
logistics of the U.S. base at Camp Darby.

A few days after the _Severn_ incident, leaders of the protest
movement learned that the _Virginia, _a container ship owned by the
Israeli company Zim Integrated Shipping Services, was scheduled to
arrive at the port. The ship had initially attempted
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Genoa on September 27, but instead redirected toward Livorno after
more than 25,000 people in Genoa took to the streets in protest.
Reports of the _Virginia_’s arrival in Livorno had already prompted
The Italian Federation of Transport Workers–Italian General
Confederation of Labour (FILT–CGIL) to call a protest at the Darsena
Toscana terminal, where the ship was due to arrive. Yet another
well-attended joint event was held later that afternoon at Darsena
Toscana, organized this time by GAP. 

 
Participants led by a network of local antifascist collectives,
grassroots trade unions, dockers, and students block the departure of
a passenger ship on October 1, in solidarity with members of the
Global Sumud Flotilla, which was intercepted by Israeli authorities
that day.  (Photo by: Giacomo Sini / The Progressive Magazine)
 

On the morning of September 30, when the _Virginia _arrived at a port
dock at the Porto di Livorno, GAP released a video
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denouncing Zim, claiming that some of the containers waiting to be
loaded onto the ship contained NATO military equipment. “No
unloading, loading, or storage operations will be carried out on that
ship, [[link removed]]” the organizers
announced [[link removed]] on their
social media pages on September 30, adding that “Livorno, its
collectives, and dockworkers have made themselves clear: We will no
longer be complicit in the Zionist economy and the ongoing
genocide.”

When the_ Virginia _docked at Darsena Toscana on the morning of
September 30, regular operations had halted, and the dock was filled
instead with protesters, crossing their arms, chanting slogans, and
sounding the horns of their cars and work vehicles. With the help of
tens of thousands of regular Italian residents, and despite threats of
potential disciplinary action made to the striking port workers by the
management of the port terminal, the _Virginia _ultimately failed
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to upload or unload any cargo—a few hours after the ship’s
arrival, Livorno Prefect Giancarlo Dionisi announced
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would be departing the port. 

 
Protesters block one of the main entrances to Livorno’s harbor
during the general strike on October 3. More than 20,000 people in
Livorno participated in the general strike.  (Photo by: Giacomo Sini
/ The Progressive Magazine)
The working-class struggle in Livorno against war and rearmament has
since continued through subsequent general strikes
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blockades
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of the Porto di Livorno, and the mobilization of tens of thousands of
people joining forces in solidarity with Palestinians under siege. And
with more than two million people
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taking to the streets across more than 100 cities nationwide, the
movement for Palestine solidarity in Italy is far larger than Livorno.

_[GIACOMO SINI was born in Pisa, Italy, but has lived in Livorno his
entire life. He obtained a degree in social sciences at Pisa
University in 2014, and has worked as a freelance journalist and
photojournalist across fifty countries._

_DARIO ANTONELLI born in Livorno, Italy, in 1988. He started working
as a freelance journalist in 2020 covering social change, workers
issues, and migration.]_

 

* Italy
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* Palestine solidarity
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* Tuscany
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* Italian dockworkers
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* Global Sumud Flotilla
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* Italy general strike
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* Gaza
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* Palestine
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* Israel
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* Ceasefire
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* Genocide
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* war crimes
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* Israel-Gaza War
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* IDF
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* Benjamin Netanyahu
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* military weapons
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* Boycott
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* mass movements
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* mass protest
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* nonviolent protests
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* Civil Disobedience
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