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By Dr Zahra Mohebi-Pourkan

Abstract

 The systematic destruction of healthcare infrastructure in conflict zones represents one of the most severe humanitarian crises in modern warfare. This article examines the medical consequences of intensive bombing campaigns in the Gaza Strip through immediate, medium-term, and long-term frameworks, drawing on recent data from the World Health Organization (WHO), peer-reviewed studies, and humanitarian reports. The second part explores destructive bombing patterns elsewhere, revealing alarming commonalities in the targeting of medical facilities and the resulting public health catastrophes. As physicians witnessing these events unfold, we document not only the clinical effects of this violence but also the structural collapse of healthcare systems, which will take generations to rebuild.

1. Introduction

Practicing medicine in conflict zones presents unique challenges that test the very foundations of medical ethics and humanitarian principles. This is especially evident in the Gaza Strip, which has experienced one of the most intense bombing campaigns in history, with over 12,000 bombs, ranging from 150 kg to 1000 kg, dropped on this densely populated area. As physicians, we are trained to prioritize life above all else, yet we now observe the deliberate targeting of the very institutions and personnel dedicated to preserving life. This article examines the medical consequences of these bombings through a temporal lens—immediate, medium-term, and long-term—while contextualizing Gaza’s experience within broader global patterns of healthcare destruction in conflict zones.

2. Gaza: Immediate Medical Consequences (First Weeks)

2.1 Traumatic Injury Patterns

The immediate medical consequences of the bombing campaign in Gaza illustrate the devastating impact of modern explosive weapons on the human body. Physicians on the ground have reported complex injury patterns, including multiple fractures, peripheral nerve injuries, traumatic brain injuries, severe burns, and spinal cord injuries. These cases of polytrauma often involve combinations of injuries that are extremely difficult to treat, even in advanced trauma centers, let alone in facilities that are already compromised due to the ongoing attacks. The scale of these injuries is staggering: as of October 2025, over 167,300 people have been injured, with nearly 42,000 sustaining life-changing injuries, including more than 5,000 amputations. These numbers represent not just statistics, but generations of Palestinians who will endure permanent disabilities, which will have profound implications for their quality of life and the potential for societal recovery.

2.2 Hospital Overload and Emergency Care Collapse

Gaza’s healthcare system, which was already fragile before the current escalation, has been overwhelmed by mass casualty incidents occurring at an average of eight per day. Hospitals such as Al-Shifa and Al-Ahli are operating at nearly 300% over capacity, facing a constant influx of complex trauma injuries that would challenge even the world’s most advanced medical centers. The destruction of 94% of hospitals has created a dire situation where the remaining facilities must manage not only the daily flow of new traumatic injuries but also the routine medical needs of the population.

3. Gaza: Medium-Term Public Health Crisis (Months)

3.1 Disease Outbreaks and Environmental Health

In the medium term, the destruction of water and sanitation infrastructure has created conditions conducive to the transmission of epidemic diseases. Physicians are reporting a rise in respiratory illnesses as families, deprived of basic supplies, are forced to burn plastic and cardboard for cooking and heating, releasing toxic fumes into overcrowded shelters. Dr. Khalil Al-Daqran, spokesperson for the Ministry of Health in Gaza, confirms that the use of plastics in clay kilns is contributing to the spread of pneumonia and asthma among the displaced population. The water supply system has been significantly damaged or rendered unusable, resulting in a catastrophic impact on hygiene and sanitary conditions. Without access to clean water, people are compelled to use contaminated sources, leading to the spread of waterborne diseases such as cholera, dysentery, and typhoid—conditions that were rarely seen in Gaza before the current escalation.

3.2 Maternal and Child Health Deterioration

The reproductive health crisis represents another critical dimension of the medium-term public health emergency. The UN reproductive health agency (UNFPA) estimates that 55,000 pregnant women are trapped in Gaza, facing displacement, bombardment, severe hunger, and malnutrition. Approximately 130 babies are born daily in these harsh conditions, with more than a quarter delivered by Caesarean section under increasingly precarious circumstances. Tragically, estimates indicate that every week in Gaza, at least 15 women give birth outside of healthcare facilities without skilled assistance, and around one in five newborns are born premature or with low birth weight. James Elder from UNICEF described the situation at Al Aqsa and Nasser hospitals: “We are witnessing large numbers of mothers with newborns in hospital corridors; the hospitals are simply overwhelmed due to the devastation of the healthcare system.”

3.3 Disruption of Chronic Disease Management

The conflict has severely disrupted care for patients with non-communicable diseases (NCDs), which affect approximately 40% of Gaza’s population. A recent cross-sectional survey of 968 patients with NCDs found that adherence to regular follow-ups decreased from 96.7% before the war to 40.7% during the conflict. Satisfaction with primary healthcare dropped from 92.9% to 57.3%, reflecting a systemic deterioration in the management of chronic diseases under bombardment. Medication unavailability or high costs were the most frequently reported reasons for non-compliance during the war, cited by 42.7% and 18.1% of respondents, respectively. Nearly one in five participants went without medication for their chronic conditions for two or more consecutive months, leading to guaranteed future complications and increased mortality from manageable diseases.

4 Gaza: Long-Term Healthcare System Collapse (Years)

4.1 Destruction of Healthcare Infrastructure

The systematic dismantling of Gaza’s healthcare system has been described by some scholars as “healthocide,” referring to intentional attacks on medical facilities, health workers, and infrastructure aimed at undermining civilian resilience and denying access to care. According to documentation from the World Health Organization (WHO), 94% of hospitals in Gaza have been damaged or destroyed, and all facilities lack basic medical supplies, electricity, and clean water. The scale of the assaults on healthcare is unprecedented; in 2024 alone, there were 940 attacks on healthcare facilities in Gaza, accounting for approximately one-quarter of all such attacks worldwide, despite Gaza making up only 0.03% of the global population. The rehabilitation sector has suffered particularly severe damage, with less than one-third of pre-conflict rehabilitation services still operational, and many of these are at risk of imminent closure. This crisis comes at a time when nearly 42,000 people in Gaza are living with life-changing injuries that require comprehensive rehabilitation services. The destruction of WHO’s main warehouse in Deir Al-Balah in July 2025 further compromised the medical response capacity. Concurrently, reports from the Ministry of Health indicate that 52% of essential medications and 68% of medical disposables are out of stock.

4.2 Rehabilitation Crisis and Disability

The crisis of amputations will have lasting effects on Gaza’s population. With over 5,000 individuals facing amputations and severe injuries to their arms, legs, and spinal cords, the need for prosthetic services and rehabilitation far exceeds the current capacity. These life-altering injuries account for one-quarter of all reported injuries, making physical disability a pervasive issue in Gazan society for decades to come. The WHO has emphasized the urgent need for prosthetics and assistive devices, stating that more than 15,000 individuals, including 3,800 children, require specialized treatment outside of Gaza. The term “healthocide” accurately captures the systematic destruction of rehabilitation capabilities while creating massive need, ensuring that long-term disability will be inevitable for thousands.

4.3 Mental Health and Psychosocial Impact

The psychological trauma inflicted on the population of Gaza represents another critical aspect of the long-term medical consequences. Dr. Peeperkorn from the WHO noted that “survivors struggle with trauma and loss, often facing daily survival challenges, while psychosocial referral services remain scarce.” The mental health impacts extend beyond direct victims to the healthcare workers themselves, who operate under constant threat of bombardment while witnessing their patients suffer and die from otherwise treatable conditions. A study of patients with non-communicable diseases revealed that 92.8% rated their pre-war quality of life as excellent or good, while 81.3% reported that their quality of life during the war had declined to poor. This drastic decline in subjective well-being reflects the compounded trauma of displacement, injury, loss of family members, and the destruction of homes and communities—all occurring while basic survival needs remain unmet.

5 Comparative Global Analysis: Impacts of Bombing on Healthcare Globally

5.1 Ukraine: Attacks on Healthcare and Rehabilitation Needs

The systematic targeting of healthcare infrastructure is not unique to Gaza, although the scale and intensity there are unprecedented. In Ukraine, the World Health Organization (WHO) has documented over 2,254 attacks on healthcare facilities since the full-scale war began three years ago. These attacks continue almost daily, with 42 recorded in 2025 alone, resulting in 12 injuries and three deaths among healthcare workers and patients. The rehabilitation crisis in Ukraine mirrors some aspects of the situation in Gaza, although on a different scale. The Ministry of Health estimates that by mid-2024, approximately 100,000 amputations had been performed due to the war, creating a massive demand for trauma care and rehabilitation services. WHO reports a severe shortage of trauma specialists, prosthetics, and rehabilitation services, emphasizing that “healing is often a matter of time but can also be a matter of opportunity.”

5.2 The “Healthocide” Pattern Across Conflict Zones

The term “healthocide” describes the calculated targeting of medical facilities, healthcare workers, and infrastructure across multiple conflict zones. This pattern is evident not only in Gaza but also in Sudan, where over 70% of hospitals have closed amidst ongoing fighting that disrupts water and power supplies to medical facilities. In Yemen, a decade of conflict has led to the gradual collapse of healthcare, with some hospitals shutting down due to a lack of fuel or security threats. What distinguishes the current situation in Gaza is the systematic destruction of healthcare. As noted by Leonard Rubenstein and Feroze Sidhwa, “over the past 20 months, Israel, fully backed by the United States, has abandoned any pretense of respecting the protections enjoyed by hospitals under international law.” The population-adjusted rate of injury to healthcare workers was 46 times higher, the rate of killings of healthcare workers was 143 times higher, and the rate of incidents obstructing access to healthcare facilities was 250 times higher in Gaza than in Ukraine.

5.3 Common Challenges and Systemic Implications

Across conflict zones, several common challenges emerge following bombing campaigns: prioritizing trauma care over other health needs, disrupting chronic disease management, the emergence of communicable disease outbreaks due to damaged water and sanitation systems, and creating long-term disability crises due to inadequate rehabilitation services. These patterns reveal the systematic nature of modern conflicts and their impact on health systems. The humanitarian system itself is overwhelmed and “not fit for purpose,” according to Paul Spiegel, a humanitarian health expert at Johns Hopkins University. The number of humanitarian emergencies has reached unprecedented levels, stretching the capacity of responding organizations beyond their limits. Spiegel notes that the system must “operationalize the concept of centrality of protection, integrate affected persons into national health systems, remake leadership and coordination, and make interventions efficient, effective, and sustainable.”

6 Conclusion and Recommendations

The medical consequences of bombing campaigns extend far beyond immediate trauma; they encompass medium-term public health crises and long-term healthcare system collapse. As physicians, we witness these impacts not as abstract statistics but as the daily reality for our patients and colleagues in conflict zones. The situation in Gaza represents an unprecedented escalation in the targeting of healthcare, but it follows patterns observed in Ukraine, Sudan, Yemen, and other conflict areas. We recommend:

1. Immediate protection of healthcare facilities and personnel through enhanced adherence to international humanitarian law.

2. Restoration of medical neutrality as a fundamental principle in conflict zones.

3. Investment in rehabilitation services to address the long-term disability needs created by these conflicts.

4. Strengthening of humanitarian systems to respond more effectively to complex emergencies.

5. Establishing accountability mechanisms for attacks on healthcare, including documentation and prosecution of war crimes.

A thorough examination of bombings from a medical perspective reveals that the health impacts extend beyond immediate casualties to encompass generational trauma, disability, and systemic collapse. As physicians, we have a professional and ethical obligation to document these impacts, advocate for the protection of healthcare, and work toward solutions that prioritize human health over military objectives. The future of medical care in conflict zones—and the lives of millions who depend on it—hangs in the balance.

Dr Zahra Mohebi-Pourkani is a general practitioner and family doctor who manages a government clinic in Kerman province, Iran. Alongside her medical practice, she writes about topics related to medicine and politics, medicine and society, and medicine and development.

6 October 2025

Source: countercurrents.org

By Rima Najjar

The flotilla, though intercepted, continues to sail: in memory, in mobilization, and in the refusal to be silenced

Author’s Note

This essay traces the October 2025 mobilizations — the mass demonstrations that erupted and surged across Madrid, Rome, Berlin, Paris, and London following Israel’s interception of the Global Sumud Flotilla and Minister Ben Gvir’s public accusation of the activists involved as “terrorists.” Each city’s response builds on its own history of pro-Palestine and anti-zionist activism: migrant-led coalitions, legal defense campaigns, and cultural resistance. Though slow, these inroads have become sustained. The mobilizations mark a shift from symbolic protest to strategic refusal, where memory and infrastructure confront Zionism as state doctrine.

I. Introduction

“The moment Israel definitively lost Europe was when Minister Ben Gvir stood before the detained passengers of the Flotilla and branded them ‘terrorists.’ Europe erupted in a rage from which there is no return.”

— Sani Meo, Facebook

The weekend of October 4, 2025, marked a political rupture. In response to Israel’s interception of the Global Sumud Flotilla — a humanitarian convoy bound for Gaza — tens of thousands mobilized across Europe in a coordinated wave of outrage. The detention of activists from 44 countries in international waters was a catalyst, but it was Israeli Minister Itamar Ben Gvir’s public accusation that the passengers were “terrorists” that detonated long-simmering tensions. However, to dismiss these demonstrations as mere reactions to a single event would be to misunderstand them entirely. They represented the latest, most potent articulation of a deep and enduring infrastructure of resistance: a strategic indictment built on years of organizing against Israeli apartheid, Zionist militarism, and the global normalization of Jewish supremacy as state doctrine.

From Madrid to Marseille, Berlin to Birmingham, these mobilizations affirmed a collective commitment not only to Palestinian liberation but also to confronting a central contradiction in European politics: governments that symbolically condemn civilian casualties abroad simultaneously criminalize meaningful solidarity at home. This bifurcation is structural, designed to ensure that support for Palestine remains a permissible symbol but never becomes a threat to trade, arms, or diplomatic alignment.

This activist foothold, evident in the major cities of Madrid, Paris, Berlin, London, Amsterdam, and Rome, did not emerge overnight. It is the product of decades of groundwork, rooted in migrant solidarity networks, anti-colonial movements, and leftist student organizing. Through early opposition to the Oslo Accords, mass protests during the 2008–2009 Gaza War, and the persistent work of community centers, legal defense networks, and boycott campaigns, these movements have chipped away at the normalization of Israeli impunity. What appeared to be a sudden awakening was, in fact, a culmination — the moment when years of testimony, memory, and strategic refusal coalesced into a visible rupture.

The stark silence in the United States that same weekend, despite the presence of American citizens on the flotilla, underscores the precarity of this kind of dissent and throws Europe’s assertive response into sharper relief. In the face of intense repression and criminalization, European pro-Palestine and anti-Zionist activism is gaining ground not as a fleeting spectacle, but as a resilient political infrastructure. The ground is shifting. The detained flotilla has become a node of transnational testimony, and the archive of resistance is expanding.

— –

II. Spain

The weekend of Oct 4, 2025: Over 70,000 people marched in Barcelona, with parallel actions erupting in Madrid and Valencia. The scale and coordination of these demonstrations reflect a long-standing tradition of pro-Palestine activism in Spain, rooted in the country’s post-Franco democratic transition.

The mobilizations did not emerge from a vacuum. They are the latest expression of a decades-long infrastructure of solidarity, built through student coalitions, migrant-led organizing, and postcolonial memory work. From the anti-Iraq War protests of 2003 to the cultural boycotts of Israeli institutions in the 2010s, Spanish cities have served as key nodes in the European pro-Palestine landscape. Barcelona’s municipal government, for instance, suspended institutional ties with Israel in 2023, citing apartheid conditions — a move shaped by years of pressure from local BDS chapters and migrant coalitions. Madrid’s activist networks have long foregrounded the intersection of Palestinian liberation with anti-fascist and anti-austerity struggles, linking the siege of Gaza to the carceral logics of Spain’s own border regime.

The presence of Spanish parliamentarians aboard the Global Sumud Flotilla was not anomalous — it was the result of sustained lobbying, cultural work, and testimonial amplification. Activists like Jaldía Abubakra — who would later join a segment of the Global Sumud Flotilla’s journey — have not only resisted criminalization but have helped shape the language of solidarity itself, insisting on the right to name zionism as a structure of violence and to treat Palestine not as a humanitarian crisis but as a political cause. The demonstrations of October 4, 2025 — massive, coordinated, and defiant — are testament to this slow, strategic buildup. They mark not just a rupture, but a reckoning: the moment when symbolic solidarity gave way to infrastructural refusal.

Yet these ethical stances are routinely contradicted by state practice. Repression of antizionist and pro-Palestine activism is not incidental; it is structural. In 2024, Palestinian activist Jaldía Abubakra and organizer Miriam Ojeda were summoned before Spain’s National Court after the far-right party VOX accused them of “glorifying terrorism” for statements made during a solidarity conference in the Spanish Congress. While Ojeda’s case was dismissed, Abubakra remains under investigation — a move widely condemned as lawfare, designed to chill dissent and isolate Palestinian voices.

The flotilla, carrying humanitarian aid to Gaza, included 47 Spanish passengers, among them doctors, journalists, and members of parliament. When Israeli forces intercepted the vessel in international waters and detained the passengers, outrage erupted across Spain. Civil society groups, including Solidaridad con Palestina and Red Solidaria contra la Ocupación de Palestina, demanded diplomatic accountability, while opposition parties called for sanctions. The incident catalyzed renewed mobilization, with protesters citing the flotilla’s seizure as emblematic of both Israeli impunity and Spanish governmental passivity.

On October 4, 2025, Spanish police responded to mass mobilizations in Barcelona and Madrid by deploying riot units and detaining several organizers from Solidaridad con Palestina. The Interior Ministry later named the group in a press release, accusing it of “inciting unrest” — a rhetorical maneuver that echoes the language used to criminalize Abubakra and others. These actions are enabled by Spain’s still-active “Gag Law” (Ley Mordaza), which grants police broad powers to penalize protest and restrict the dissemination of images of law enforcement.

In this context, the criminalization of activists like Abubakra signals more than censorship; it marks a judicial turn toward political disciplining, where solidarity is tolerated only when it is symbolic, and punished when it is strategic. Spain’s dual posture — ethical abroad, punitive at home — reveals the limits of European liberalism when confronted with sustained, intersectional resistance.

— –

III. Italy

On the same weekend, Italy witnessed one of the largest coordinated pro-Palestine mobilizations in its recent history, with over two million people participating in strikes and demonstrations across more than 100 cities — from Palermo to Turin, Milan to Rome. The protests, organized under the banner Blocchiamo tutto (“Let’s block everything”), were catalyzed by Israel’s interception of the Global Sumud Flotilla, which included 47 Italian activists and four opposition parliamentarians. The flotilla, carrying humanitarian aid to Gaza, was boarded in international waters by Israeli forces; the Italians were detained and later deported, prompting widespread outrage. In response, dockworkers shut down ports in Livorno, Genoa, Trieste, and Venice, echoing historic refusals to load arms for Israel in 2014. Highways were blocked near Pisa, Bologna, and Milan, and over 80,000 marched through Milan alone, waving Palestinian flags and chanting “Free Palestine, Stop the War Machine.”

Despite the scale of dissent, Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni dismissed the mobilizations as opportunistic, suggesting strikers were exploiting the moment for a “long weekend.” Her government has refused to recognize Palestinian statehood unless Hamas is excluded from governance and Israeli hostages are released — a conditional stance that contrasts sharply with the unconditional recognition adopted by Spain, Ireland, and other EU states. Meloni’s coalition partner, Matteo Salvini, denounced the strike as “illegal chaos” and called for punitive measures against unions. Yet the protests have forced a reckoning: polling shows broad public support for the flotilla activists, and EU officials suggest that mounting domestic pressure could push Italy to endorse trade sanctions against Israel over human rights violations.

This contradiction — between public solidarity and governmental alignment with Israel — has deep historical roots. Italy’s pro-Palestine activism emerged from post-1968 leftist networks, labor unions, and anti-imperialist brigades that hosted PLO representatives and sent medical teams to Lebanon and Gaza. Today, groups like Assopace Palestina, Rete dei Comunisti, and the Palestinian Student Movement continue that legacy, often facing repression. In 2023, Sapienza University students were violently dispersed for protesting an Israeli ambassador’s visit; in 2024, the Ministry of Interior investigated leftist organizations for “subversive propaganda.” The criminalization of dockworker unions in 2025 — accused of obstructing national infrastructure — marks a securitization of labor solidarity.

Amid this landscape, UN Special Rapporteur Francesca Albanese remains a pivotal figure. An Italian jurist and international law expert, Albanese has consistently condemned Israel’s actions in Gaza as violations of international law and apartheid. Her reports have been cited by Italian activists and unions to legitimize calls for sanctions and boycott. Though Meloni’s government has distanced itself from Albanese’s findings, her voice continues to galvanize civil society. In recent weeks, banners reading “Albanese is right” have appeared at protests, and her work has been featured in teach-ins across Italian universities.

Italy’s pro-Palestine mobilizations this weekend did not erupt spontaneously — they are the culmination of decades of infrastructural resistance. From the post-1968 brigades to the dockworker militancy of 2014, Italian solidarity has long operated at the intersection of labor, law, and internationalism. The mobilizations of October 2025 — massive, militant, and multisectoral — mark a strategic escalation. They are not merely symbolic; they are infrastructural refusals that disrupt ports, highways, and the rhetorical monopoly of the state. Italy’s rupture, like Spain’s, is not a break from history — it is its continuation.

— –

IV. France

This same weekend, tens of thousands across France mobilized in solidarity with Palestine, with major demonstrations in Paris, Marseille, Lyon, and Toulouse. In Paris, over 60,000 gathered at Place de la République, where chants of “Palestine vivra, Palestine vaincra” echoed through the square. The mobilizations were catalyzed in part by Israel’s interception of the Global Sumud Flotilla, which included 38 French passengers — among them doctors, journalists, and members of the Union Juive Française pour la Paix (UJFP). The flotilla’s seizure in international waters and the detention of French nationals sparked outrage: opposition parties demanded diplomatic accountability, and civil society groups accused the Macron government of “complicity through silence.” Activist Olivia Zémor, president of CAPJPO-EuroPalestine, who helped coordinate the French delegation, called the incident “a test of France’s moral sovereignty.”

France’s pro-Palestine activism is deeply rooted in postcolonial and anti-racist organizing. Since the 1970s, groups like Comité Palestine, UJFP, and Collectif 69 have foregrounded testimonial advocacy, linking Palestinian liberation to struggles against French imperialism and police violence. In 2009, France became one of the first European countries to criminalize BDS activism, with courts prosecuting activists under anti-discrimination laws. This repression intensified in 2020, when Interior Minister Gérald Darmanin attempted to ban pro-Palestine demonstrations following Israel’s annexation threats. In 2023, student organizers at Sciences Po Paris faced disciplinary hearings for hosting teach-ins on zionism and settler colonialism. And in 2024, the government dissolved Collectif Palestine Vaincra, citing “incitement to hatred” — a move condemned by Amnesty International as politically motivated.

Despite this repressive climate, French activists continue to force institutional rupture. In 2025, the city councils of Saint-Denis, Ivry-sur-Seine, and Montreuil passed resolutions declaring themselves “apartheid-free zones,” committing to boycott companies complicit in Israeli occupation. The Confédération Générale du Travail (CGT), France’s largest labor union, endorsed the Global Sumud Flotilla and called for an arms embargo. Cultural institutions like the Institut du Monde Arabe have hosted Palestinian artists and filmmakers censored elsewhere in Europe, while student assemblies at the University of Grenoble and Toulouse have voted to sever academic ties with Israeli institutions.

France’s contradiction is stark: while President Emmanuel Macron has condemned Israeli strikes on civilian infrastructure and called for humanitarian access to Gaza, his government continues to criminalize antizionist speech and suppress mobilization. This bifurcation — ethical abroad, punitive at home — reflects a broader tension between France’s republican universalism and its colonial legacy.

France’s mobilizations on this weekend in October are not an anomaly — they are the latest expression of a long and defiant trajectory of pro-Palestine activism. From the migrant-led coalitions of the 1970s to the post-Charlie Hebdo anti-racist alliances, French solidarity with Palestine has been forged in the crucible of postcolonial reckoning and urban resistance. The mobilizations of October 2025 are not reactive — they are the culmination of years of groundwork, where testimony, memory, and refusal have coalesced into rupture.

— –

V. United Kingdom

This same weekend, tens of thousands across the UK mobilized in solidarity with Palestine, with major demonstrations in London, Manchester, Glasgow, and Birmingham. In London, over 100,000 gathered in Trafalgar Square and along Whitehall, where chants of “From the river to the sea” were met with heavy police presence and surveillance drones. The mobilizations were intensified by Israel’s interception of the Global Sumud Flotilla, which included 29 British passengers — among them doctors, trade unionists, and members of Parliament. The flotilla’s seizure in international waters and the detention of British nationals sparked outrage: Palestine Solidarity Campaign (PSC), Friends of Al-Aqsa, and Jewish Voice for Labour issued joint statements demanding diplomatic action, while Labour MPs like Zarah Sultana and Apsana Begum condemned the government’s silence. The Foreign Office’s tepid response — expressing “concern” but refusing to censure Israel — was widely criticized as a betrayal of British citizens and international law.

The UK’s pro-Palestine activism is rooted in decades of anti-imperialist and anti-racist organizing. From the 1982 protests against Israel’s invasion of Lebanon to the 2009 mobilizations during Operation Cast Lead, British civil society has consistently foregrounded Palestinian testimony. Groups like PSC, Stop the War Coalition, and War on Want have built enduring coalitions across labor, student, and faith communities. In 2014, the National Union of Students endorsed BDS, and in 2021, the University and College Union (UCU) reaffirmed its support for academic boycott. Yet repression has escalated: in 2023, the UK government passed the Economic Activity of Public Bodies (Overseas Matters) Bill, designed to ban public institutions from boycotting Israeli goods — a move condemned by Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch as an attack on ethical procurement.

In 2024, police arrested student organizers at SOAS and the University of Manchester for “unauthorized protest,” and the Charity Commission launched investigations into Muslim-led organizations accused of “political bias.” The government’s Prevent strategy — nominally aimed at countering extremism — has been used to surveil and discipline pro-Palestine educators and students, with whistleblowers revealing that schoolchildren were questioned for wearing keffiyehs or expressing solidarity online.

Despite this repressive apparatus, UK activists continue to achieve tangible victories. In 2025, the Trades Union Congress (TUC) passed a resolution calling for an arms embargo on Israel and endorsing the Global Sumud Flotilla. Local councils in Tower Hamlets, Lambeth, and Glasgow passed motions condemning Israeli apartheid and committing to divestment. Cultural institutions like the Palestine Film Festival and Shubbak have foregrounded censored voices, while grassroots campaigns have pressured retailers to drop contracts with companies complicit in settlement infrastructure.

The UK’s contradiction is sharp: while Foreign Secretary David Lammy has condemned civilian casualties in Gaza and called for humanitarian access, his government continues to criminalize antizionist speech and suppress mobilization. This bifurcation — ethical abroad, punitive at home — mirrors the colonial logic that underpins British foreign policy: solidarity is permitted only when it is symbolic, and punished when it is strategic.

Yet activists persist. By foregrounding testimony, obstructing complicity, and refusing erasure, they are not merely protesting — they are reconfiguring Britain’s political terrain.

— –

VI. Germany

This same weekend, tens of thousands across Germany mobilized in solidarity with Palestine, with major demonstrations in Berlin, Hamburg, Frankfurt, and Cologne. In Berlin, over 50,000 gathered at Alexander Platz, where chants of “Freiheit für Palästina” and “zionismus ist kein Schutzschild” echoed through the square. The mobilizations were catalyzed by Israel’s interception of the Global Sumud Flotilla, which included 26 German passengers — among them doctors, legal scholars, and members of Jewish Bund and Palästina Spricht. The flotilla’s seizure in international waters and the detention of German nationals sparked outrage: Die Linke and members of the Green Party demanded diplomatic accountability, while civil society groups accused the Scholz government of “moral cowardice.” Jewish Bund organizer Judith Bernstein, who helped coordinate the German delegation, called the incident “a test of Germany’s post-Holocaust ethics.”

Germany’s pro-Palestine activism is shaped by a complex terrain of memory, repression, and testimonial resistance. Since the 1970s, migrant-led coalitions — particularly from Turkish, Arab, and Kurdish communities — have foregrounded Palestine as a site of anti-imperialist struggle. Groups like Palästina Spricht, Jüdische Stimme für gerechten Frieden, and BIPoC Berlin have built infrastructures of resistance through teach-ins, cultural festivals, and archival initiatives. Yet repression has intensified: in 2020, Berlin police banned Nakba Day demonstrations, citing “security concerns.” In 2023, the Bundestag reaffirmed its 2019 resolution equating BDS with antisemitism, despite widespread criticism from Jewish and human rights organizations. In 2024, Palestinian-German journalist Hebh Jamal was barred from speaking at a university panel, and in 2025, the Interior Ministry launched investigations into migrant-led organizations accused of “delegitimizing Israel.”

Germany’s repression of Palestinian solidarity activism has particularly targeted figures associated with Samidoun, a prisoner solidarity network banned in Germany for alleged ties to the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP). Among the most emblematic cases is that of Charlotte Kates, an American lawyer and international coordinator of Samidoun, and Khaled Barakat, a Palestinian writer and political organizer. Both have been barred from entering Germany and the broader European Union due to their affiliations and public statements.

Despite this repressive climate, German activists continue to force institutional rupture. In 2025, the city councils of Neukölln and Kreuzberg passed resolutions condemning Israeli apartheid and committing to boycott companies complicit in settlement infrastructure. Jewish Bund and Jüdische Stimme have foregrounded post-Holocaust ethics to challenge the state’s weaponization of memory, insisting that “Never Again” must include Palestinians. Cultural institutions like Oyoun and the Maxim Gorki Theater have hosted censored Palestinian voices, while archival projects like the Nakba Archive Berlin have documented intergenerational testimony from displaced families. Student assemblies at Humboldt and Freie Universität have voted to sever academic ties with Israeli institutions, despite administrative pushback.

Germany’s contradiction is acute: while Chancellor Olaf Scholz has condemned civilian casualties in Gaza and called for humanitarian access, his government continues to criminalize antizionist speech and suppress mobilization. This bifurcation — ethical abroad, punitive at home — is rooted in Germany’s post-Holocaust identity politics, where support for Israel is treated as moral obligation, and Palestinian solidarity as historical transgression. In this context, the criminalization of groups like Palästina Spricht and the silence surrounding the flotilla’s seizure signal a state logic that tolerates solidarity only when it is abstract, and punishes it when it is embodied.

Yet activists persist.

— –

VII. The Netherlands

On October 4, Amsterdam erupted — not in chaos, but in clarity. An estimated 250,000 demonstrators flooded Museumplein and its surrounding streets, forming a crimson tide of dissent against the Dutch government’s complicity in Israeli violence. Dressed in red to mark the “red line” they say has been crossed, protesters carried placards reading “No peace without justice,” “Your silence is violence,” and “Ashamed of the government.” The chants — “Free Palestine,” “Stop the genocide,” — echoed through PC Hooftstraat, where luxury storefronts stood in mute contrast to the moral urgency outside.

This was the third “Red Line” protest in six months, following earlier mass mobilizations in The Hague. But October 4 marked a turning point: not just in scale, but in tone. Families with children, elders in red scarves, students with hand-painted signs — all converged to demand rupture. The Netherlands, long a staunch supporter of Israel, now faced internal fracture. Jewish groups joined the protest, rejecting the conflation of Zionism with Jewish identity. Protesters invoked the Gaza Sumud Flotilla, intercepted days earlier, and demanded the release of Dutch detainees held in Israel’s Ketziot Prison.

The timing was strategic. Less than four weeks before national elections, the crowd pressed for policy — not platitudes. Foreign Minister David van Weel, under pressure from both the Supreme Court and public opinion, signaled a shift: travel bans on far-right Israeli ministers, a proposed halt to settlement-produced imports, and hesitation over F-35 fighter jet parts. But the demonstrators were not appeased. As one protester declared, “We’re here because our government refuses to draw a red line. So we’ll draw it for them.”

The Netherlands did not simply host a protest. It staged a reckoning.

The Netherlands has long styled itself as a bastion of liberal democracy and resistance. Its underground press and partisan networks during World War II are held up as emblems of moral courage. The Dutch resistance sheltered Jews, sabotaged Nazi infrastructure, and defied occupation. But this legacy, invoked often in national mythmaking, has not extended to Palestine.

Since 1948, successive Dutch governments have offered near-unconditional support to Israel — militarily, diplomatically, and economically. The Hague, home to the International Criminal Court, has paradoxically shielded Israeli officials from prosecution while prosecuting Palestinian resistance as terrorism. Dutch arms exports have included components for Israeli drones and F-35 fighter jets used in Gaza. In 2021, the Netherlands cut funding to Palestinian NGOs based on unsubstantiated Israeli claims of “terrorist ties” — a move later condemned by EU legal experts.

Dutch universities have partnered with Israeli institutions involved in settlement expansion and surveillance technologies. Protesters demanding divestment have faced disciplinary action, police violence, and media vilification. In 2023, the University of Amsterdam suspended students for staging a sit-in against Elbit Systems, an Israeli weapons manufacturer. The repression was swift, but the resistance persisted.

What October 4 revealed is not a rupture from Dutch history, but a confrontation with its contradictions. The same country that celebrates Anne Frank has criminalized Palestinian solidarity. The same government that funds Holocaust education has refused to name the Nakba. The crowd on Museumplein did not forget this. They carried signs that read “From Amsterdam to Gaza: Never Again Means Now.”

The Netherlands is not neutral. It is a site of contestation—between myth and memory, complicity and clarity. And on October 4, the crowd chose clarity. The demonstration was organized by a coalition of groups including The Rights Forum, DocP (Dutch Coalition for Palestine), Palestine House, Students for Justice in Palestine NL, and Jewish Voice for Peace Netherlands. Their coordination was not just logistical—it was ideological. They refused euphemism, rejected false equivalence, and demanded rupture. As their joint statement declared: “We do not protest for balance. We protest for liberation.”

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VIII. Synthesis: From Local Refusals to Transnational Testimony

The mobilizations of October 4, 2025 are not isolated eruptions — they are coordinated refusals, rooted in decades of infrastructural resistance. From Barcelona’s migrant coalitions to Milan’s dockworker strikes, Paris’s municipal boycotts to Berlin’s archival insurgencies, London’s union-led divestments to Rome’s legal indictments, each city carries its own historical burdens and strategic capacities. And yet, a shared grammar emerges: solidarity that refuses to be symbolic, testimony that refuses erasure, and mobilization that refuses to be criminalized.

The Global Sumud Flotilla’s interception has become a flashpoint, its passengers a chorus of transnational indictment. The flotilla did not merely carry aid; it carried memory, strategy, and refusal. Its seizure in international waters exposed the impunity of Israeli militarism and the complicity of European governments. But it also activated a network of resistance that had been building quietly, persistently, across borders and generations.

These demonstrations were not reactive — they were the latest articulation of a global movement that treats Palestine not as a humanitarian crisis but as a political cause. They foreground the right to name zionism as a structure of violence, to confront Jewish supremacy as state doctrine, and to demand Palestinian liberation not as charity but as justice. They expose the bifurcation of liberal democracies: ethical abroad, punitive at home. And they insist that solidarity must be infrastructural — not permitted when abstract, but defended when embodied.

Across Europe, activists are redrawing the ethical map. They are building testimonial archives, disrupting trade routes, severing institutional ties, and foregrounding censored voices. They are not merely protesting, they are reconfiguring the terrain of possibility. The flotilla, though intercepted, continues to sail: in memory, in mobilization, and in the refusal to be silenced.

Note: First published in Medium

____________________
Rima Najjar is a Palestinian whose father’s side of the family comes from the forcibly depopulated village of Lifta on the western outskirts of Jerusalem and whose mother’s side of the family is from Ijzim, south of Haifa.

6 October 2025

Source: countercurrents.org

By Quds News Network

Gaza (QNN)- The Government Media Office in Gaza has released a harrowing two-year report detailing the scale of Israel’s ongoing genocide in the Strip. The document marks 730 consecutive days of mass killing, starvation, and forced displacement that have left almost all of Gaza in ruins.

According to the report, more than 76,600 Palestinians are dead or missing since the start of Israel’s genocide on October 7, 2023. Over 20,000 of them are children. At least 12,500 women have been killed, alongside 1,670 medical workers and 254 journalists. The report says 2,700 families were completely annihilated, while another 6,000 lost nearly every member.

Israeli forces have dropped more than 200,000 tons of explosives on Gaza, flattening homes, hospitals, and schools. About 90% of the Strip lies in ruins, and two million people are now displaced.

Hospitals have been bombed repeatedly. Thirty-eight hospitals and 96 clinics no longer function. 197 ambulances and 61 rescue vehicles were directly targeted. The health system, once strained, has completely collapsed. Thousands of patients with cancer, kidney failure, and chronic diseases have died after Israel blocked medical evacuations and destroyed infrastructure.

Hunger has become a weapon as Israel has closed all Gaza crossings for 220 days, blocking over 120,000 aid trucks. At least 460 people have died of starvation, including 154 children. The report warns that 650,000 children face death from hunger and malnutrition and more than 22,000 patients need treatment abroad but are denied travel.

The education sector is in ruins with ninety-five percent of schools damaged, and 165 universities and schools completely destroyed. More than 13,500 students and 830 teachers have been killed, according to the report.

Religious sites have also been wiped out. Israel has destroyed 835 mosques, three churches, and 40 cemeteries. The report says Israeli forces desecrated graves, stealing 2,450 bodies and digging seven mass graves inside hospitals.

Infrastructure across Gaza has collapsed. 725 water wells and over 5,000 kilometers of power lines were destroyed. Israel’s bombing of freshwater projects caused 9,400 deaths, mostly children. The Strip has been left without safe water, electricity, or sewage systems.

The report lists total direct losses of $70 billion across 15 key sectors, with $28 billion in housing destruction alone. Nearly 268,000 housing units were completely leveled, leaving over 288,000 families homeless.

Gaza’s agriculture and fishing sectors no longer exist as over 94% of farmland and all fishing facilities have been destroyed, plunging the population into deeper starvation.

6 October 2025

Source: countercurrents.org

By Ismail Al Sharif

“I don’t admit that a wrong was done to the Native Americans in America or the Blacks in Australia. Rather, stronger peoples of a higher standard than the rest of the world came and took their place… That’s the way of life” – Churchill.

Last 26 August, US ambassador to Turkey—and President Trump’s special envoy to Lebanon—went up to the press conference podium following the US delegation’s meeting with Lebanese President Michel Aoun. In a familiar scene repeated in world capitals, journalists in the crowded room rushed to ask their questions simultaneously, all seeking direct answers from the ambassador.

This time, however, the ambassador confronted the Arab journalists addressing them with a tone of arrogance filled with contempt. He said: “The moment things turn into chaos, as if you were behaving like animals, we will leave immediately. Behave in a civilized manner; this is the essence of the problem in this region.” He then reiterated: “Please remain calm… The moment things devolve into animal-like chaos, we will withdraw immediately.”

His remarks sparked a wave of anger and condemnation. The Lebanese Journalists Syndicate demanded an official apology, while the Lebanese presidency issued a statement expressing its rejection of these offensive remarks. Ambassador Tom Barrack was later forced to backtrack, acknowledging his use of the term “animal” was inappropriate.

But Barrack is merely a recurring example of a colonialism that has not changed. He reminds us of Leopold II, King of Belgium, who displayed Africans as exhibits in humiliating human zoos. He is no different from the ex-Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Galant, the war criminal who called Palestinians “human animals.”

He is a natural extension of a deeply-rooted colonial mentality, embodied in the Sykes-Picot Agreement, which divided the Ottoman Empire’s legacy as spoils of war, or the Berlin Conference, when Bismarck distributed the African continent as gifts among the European colonial powers. The bitter truth is that colonialism’s view of us has never changed.

In the past, they labeled us as barbarians and savages and described our peoples as backward and our races as inferior. These old colonial terms evolved, cloaked in glittering and attractive slogans such as sustainable development, good governance, spreading democracy, protecting human rights, promoting reform, fighting terrorism, and establishing peace. But the essence and ultimate goal remained the same: Plundering our wealth and tightening control over our peoples.

In the Belgian Congo under Leopold II, in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, rubber-mining companies imposed mandatory production quotas on African villages, and anyone who failed to meet the required quota had their hands amputated as punishment.  Today, the same scene is being repeated in different forms: A million Iraqi children being killed to control oil under the false pretext of “weapons of mass destruction.”

In Gaza, the most heinous crimes of modern genocide are being committed to plunder gas resources, simply because Hamas dares to challenge Western hegemony and refuses to submit to it.

Barrack represents the naked face of colonialism, without embellishment or falsification; he is the blunt and frank expression of the Western view of us. In an interview with National News on 22 September, he stated with shocking clarity: “We don’t trust any of you; our interests are incompatible. The term ‘ally’ is inaccurate in describing our relationship with you, but our relationship with Israel is completely different; it is an exceptional and emotional relationship. As for peace, it is just an illusion that will never be achieved. Might makes right, and I personally oppose the establishment of a Palestinian state.”

In a subsequent statement to Al Jazeera, Barrack went further, saying with disdain: “There is no such thing as the Middle East; it is just a collection of scattered tribes and villages.” As for the countries you claim exist, they were created by the British and the French.”

Barrack’s statements may have been intentional and deliberate, aiming to reveal the true face of the colonial project, as part of an American strategy to pressure the Arabs in the context of redrawing the map of the region. Perhaps the deeper goal behind this rhetoric is to implant concepts of backwardness, impotence, and division deep within our collective consciousness, so that we internalize and believe in them, and thus act accordingly, making it easier for colonial powers to subjugate us and impose their control over us.

The late intellectual Edward Said expressed this truth profoundly when he said: “The most dangerous form of domination is not direct military occupation, but rather internalizing and believing the stereotype that the colonizer paints about us.” From this perspective, every word Barrack utters is not merely a passing blunder or a spontaneous slip of the tongue, but rather a clear embodiment of a deeply rooted colonial mentality that views Arabs, Muslims, and all other oppressed peoples of the earth as inferior and worthless to Westerners.

Similarly, the late intellectual, thinker and activist Frantz Fanon, and one of the prominent pioneers of anti-colonial thought, emphasized that true and most dangerous colonialism begins when we view ourselves through the eyes of the colonizer. Therefore, the first and fundamental step on the path to true liberation is to reject these imposed terms, which seek to define our inferior status and portray us as nations of lesser value and civilization than others.

We are not merely the “Middle East,” the “Third World,” or the “developing countries,” as they like to classify us. We are an ancient nation with deep roots in history. We are the bearers of one of the greatest and oldest human civilizations, the Arab-Islamic civilization, with our authentic and deeply-rooted identity, our immortal Arabic language, our deeply-rooted culture, and our history spanning thousands of years. We have made sublime civilizational contributions to the progress of humanity as a whole, and we are a beacon that has illuminated the paths of science, thought, knowledge, and enlightenment for the world.

This article by Ismail Al Sharif was originally written in Arabic for the Addustour daily and translated for crossfirearabia.com.

5 October 2025

Source: countercurrents.org

By Dr. Mahboob A. Khawaja

Are We, the People, at the end of a world of wars or at the end of an age of reason, peace and accountability? The preposterous 20 points ‘Gaza Peace Plan’ is a paper plan, a recipe of cataclysmic process unfolding in historic but complex hybrid culture of politics. Decades earlier, George W. Bush called Ariel Sharon  a “ man of peace”, the known killer of Palestinian refugees in Lebanon and his “Road Map” to peace between Israel and Palestine. Time and history are repeating dreadful cruelties  and pursuit of unbridled ambitions and power for fame and fortune – a plan full of absurdities and contradictions.  Both Trump and Netanyahu  care for greed and glory, not peace or people or laws. Somehow, they dream of a Nobel Peace Prize to come from somewhere. Professor Norman Finkelstein (Al-Jazeera interview:10/4/25), is correct: “Trump and Netanyahu are using genocide to make peace and it is not going to work.” A rational peace plan should have engaged both parties to the conflict in Gaza and other parts of Palestine. President Trump claims credit as the chairman of the authority( to be formed) to supervise its implementation. The plan has no logical framework to end the war, the release of hostages, resumption of law and order, restoration of the supplies of essentials of life, foods, medicine, functional service infrastructures and accountability for the crimes against humanity and genocide in Gaza. Conflicting interpretations and contrasts appear inherent as PM Netanyahu clarified, IDF will stay in Gaza and President Trump assumes the end of war, Palestinians will stay in Gaza and it will be free of Israeli occupation. If the Arab-Muslim leaders  were intelligent and responsible  and had the capacity to challenge the unwarranted outcome, simply not to wait and watch the multiple humanitarian tragedies unfolding without an end. Their complicity and failure helped Israel and the US to continue the war and destroy all forms of life and future for the 2.5 million people of Gaza. Would the future generations curse them or cure them?

The Arab-Muslim Leaders live in Abyss

Do people and nations learn from critical challenges and misfortunes of time? The oil discovery propelled fake economic prosperity and the Arabian gulf region and masses fell victims to consumerism and its aftermath.  Often people and nations go astray, galvanized by economic prosperity. Western opportunists encouraged authoritarianism and militarization to produce tyrants from systematic tyranny across the region.  Islam transformed the Arabs from an age of ignorance and tribalism unto ‘One Ummah’ – a Nation of moral and intellectual characteristics to influence the 16^th century European Renaissance of knowledge, scientific discoveries, medicine and human development– as one of the leading forces Arab thinkers and intellectual influenced European thinking hubs, intellectual cultures and scientific -technological advancements. The Arab culture lost all those values when they left Islamic heritage and adapted to copy-cat foreign traditions of materialism and superficial oil-led happiness.

Gaza and the West Bank are obliterated by Israeli war over 23 months of continuous bombardments of civilian infrastructures. If the leading Arab leaders had capacity and moral-intellectual foresight, they should have challenged the insanity of war and protected the innocent masses of Gaza. But they look for escape from reality under the US military shield. If Israel is not stopped, soon the leading oil exporting Arab states could fly Israeli-American flags for a change.

The Peace Plan has No Peace but Continued Occupation and War

The Trump-Netanyahu’s 20 Points Peace Plan mocks common sense and negates on-going bombardments and prevalent truth of deaths and destruction across Gaza. The UN or any other legitimate international body is not part of the supervision  or surety of its implementation. Hamas and PLO leaders are gone and most Arab-Muslim leaders are in moral and intellectual disarray and dead conscious. There is no international humanitarian law, no UN Security Council and no other global mechanism of conflict resolution to make Israel-the US abide by its obligations within the international systems of governance. When cold blooded massacres are a daily event, foods and medicines are blocked and starvation becomes a weapon to dehumanize mankind, no conscientious leaders dare to stop the insanity as if Palestinians are not normal human beings. Are the people of Gaza and Palestine for trades-in to the Arab-Muslim leaders? All of the UNO’s Charter, Geneva Conventions and the Universal Declarations of Human Rights appear in books just in dry ink and meaningless words. Please see: “Israel Lost the War and America Betrayed Humanity in Gaza.” https://www.uncommonthought.com/mtblog/archives/2024/05/15/israel-lost-the-war-and-america-betrayed-humanity-in-gaza.php

Insane Leaders Bomb the Living Earth that Sustains Life and Humanity

Israel so far, has dropped more than 70,000 ton of bombs on Gaza- more insane than what happened at Hiroshima and Nagasaki during World War 2. The earth is living and spins at 1670 km per hour and orbits the Sun at 107,000 km per hour. Imagine, if this spinning fails, what consequences could occur to the living beings on Earth. Think again, about the average distance of earth from moon is 93 million miles -the distance of Moon from Earth is currently 384,821 km equivalent to 0.002572 Astronomical Units. Earth is a “trust” to mankind for its existence, sustenance of life, survival, progress and future-making. The Earth exists and floats without any pillars in a capsule by the Will of God, so, “Fear God Who created life and death.” Is human intelligence still intact to understand this reality? Wherever there is trust, there is accountability. All human beings are accountable for their actions. The Divine warning (The Quran: 7: 56), warns: Do no mischief on the Earth after it hath been set in order, but call on God with fear and longing in hearts; For the Mercy of God is always near to those who do good.

The Divine Message (Quran:40:64), clarifies:

It is God Who made for you the Earth as a resting place and the sky as a canopy; And has given you shape and made your shapes beautiful, And has provided for your Sustenance, of things pure and good; Such is God your Lord. So Glory to God, The Lord of the Worlds.

The Jewish people (progeny of Jacob), followers of Moses  were warned  and prohibited of killing of innocent people as enshrined in the Ten Commandments (Torah):

‘Thou shalt not kill’ (Exod. 20:13; also Deut. 5:17). Jewish law views the shedding of innocent blood very seriously, and lists murder as one of three sins (along with idolatry and sexual immorality), that fall under the category of yehareg ve’al ya’avor – meaning “One should let himself be killed rather than violate it.

Dr. Mahboob A. Khawaja specializes in international affairs-global security, peace and conflict resolution and has spent several academic years across the Russian-Ukrainian and Central Asian regions knowing the people, diverse cultures of thinking and political governance and a keen interest in Islamic-Western comparative cultures and civilizations.

5 October 2025

Source: countercurrents.org

By Rima Najjar

Hamas’s Conditional Acceptance Disrupts the U.S.-Israeli Containment Strategy

Author’s Note

This essay argues that Hamas’s conditional acceptance of the Trump administration’s Gaza peace proposal represents a strategic reconfiguration of its political identity, not a retreat, but a recalibration. By leveraging the language of international law and regional consensus, Hamas disrupts the U.S.-Israeli policy of containment and exposes the underlying asymmetry of a diplomatic process that demands Palestinian capitulation while enabling Israeli impunity. The analysis traces Hamas’s evolution from a purely militant organization to a savvy diplomatic actor, demonstrating how its response exploits the contradictions within the U.S.-Israeli alliance. Finally, the essay explores the regional ramifications of this move, particularly for Lebanon’s Hezbollah, where the perceived success or failure of Hamas’s diplomatic gambit could determine the future of the “axis of resistance.” This act of conditional refusal transforms Hamas from a subject of coercion into an agent of strategic disruption, challenging the very spectacle of U.S.-led diplomacy in the region and reasserting resistance as a force of regional recalibration.

— –

I. Introduction

In a region where every gesture is freighted with existential stakes, Hamas’s partial acceptance of Trump’s 20-point proposal marks a moment of calculated diplomacy that disrupts the spectacle of U.S.-Israeli diplomacy — a performance designed to orchestrate a managed surrender rather than achieve a just peace. Far from capitulation, the move signals a strategic pivot — one that reframes Hamas not merely as a militant actor but as a negotiator capable of leveraging international law, regional consensus, and symbolic restraint.

II. From Armed Resistance to Political Legitimacy

Founded in 1987 during the First Intifada, Hamas emerged from the Muslim Brotherhood’s social infrastructure in Gaza, positioning itself as an Islamist alternative to the secular Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO). Its early charter rejected any compromise with Israel and embraced armed struggle as the sole path to liberation. This uncompromising stance earned Hamas both grassroots support and international isolation.

Yet even in its early years, Hamas demonstrated a capacity for strategic recalibration. During the 1990s, while opposing the Oslo Accords, it began participating in municipal elections and cultivating a parallel governance structure through charitable networks. This duality — resistance and service — laid the groundwork for its political ascent.

That trajectory deepened in 2017, when Hamas issued a revised political document that removed language previously deemed antisemitic — not in the Western European sense rooted in racialized exclusion and genocidal ideology, but in a cultural-religious framework shaped by centuries of theological contestation and colonial experience. This revision reframed Hamas’s opposition as directed not against Judaism as a faith, but against Zionism as a settler-colonial project that instrumentalizes religious narratives to justify territorial dispossession. Yet this ideological recalibration is often flattened in Western discourse, which continues to cast Hamas as a monolithic militant entity — not to mention its designation as a terrorist organization by a small subset of Western-aligned states—including the United States, Canada, and the United Kingdom and all 27 member states of the European Union—as well as by the European Union, which, while not a state, has adopted similar classifications through Council-level sanctions.

This label, deployed as a tool of diplomatic exclusion, forecloses engagement with Hamas’s evolving political posture and reinforces a securitized lens that privileges Israeli strategic narratives over Palestinian testimonial sovereignty (the ethical right to narrate one’s experience without external reframing). It functions less as a legal classification than as a rhetorical weapon, one that delegitimizes any form of resistance while elevating Israeli state violence as self-defense. In this framework, Hamas’s charter revision, its engagement with international law, and its overtures toward regional consensus are rendered invisible, dismissed as tactical ploys rather than substantive shifts.

Even strategic analyses that acknowledge Hamas’s deterrence logic — such as those by Israeli scholar Daniel Sobelman — operate within frameworks that abstract Palestinian resistance into metrics of military leverage. Sobelman’s work on asymmetric deterrence offers valuable insight into Hamas’s evolving posture, but his positionality as a former Israeli intelligence officer embedded in Zionist institutions must be critically contextualized. His voice is amplified in Western academic and policy circles, while Palestinian scholars like Omar Barghouti, whose work on BDS foregrounds nonviolent resistance and international law, are systematically vilified and excluded. To counter this asymmetry in ways of knowing, it is essential to pair strategic readings with testimonial accounts from Palestinian and Arab intellectual traditions. Scholars such as Lama Abu-Odeh and Fawwaz Traboulsi emphasize the ethical and historical dimensions of resistance, framing Hamas not merely as a security threat but as a political actor embedded in a decolonial tradition. Juxtaposing these perspectives restores narrative sovereignty and affirms the necessity of reading Hamas’s diplomacy through both strategic and ethical lenses.
 
 With its evolving political identity established, Hamas’s engagement with Trump’s proposal emerges as a strategic continuation — not a deviation.

III. Hamas’s Diplomatic Engagement with Trump’s Proposal

Despite its pariah status in the West, the movement has steadily expanded its diplomatic footprint, engaging with regional powers like Qatar, Turkey, and Iran, and more recently with Russia and China. These relationships have served multiple purposes: securing humanitarian aid, legitimizing its governance in Gaza, and positioning itself as a stakeholder in regional stability.

Hamas’s diplomatic turn accelerated in the aftermath of the October 7 attacks. According to Hamas Political Bureau, it conducted over 130 diplomatic meetings in 2024 — nearly five times its previous annual average. These included engagements with 23 countries and numerous non-state actors, insisting on the fact that it is both a militant movement and a negotiator.

The movement’s rhetoric continues to foreground international laws and resolutions — not as a newfound concession, but as a longstanding framework through which it contests occupation, siege, and displacement. By invoking these norms in its response to Trump’s proposal, Hamas reasserts its position within globally recognized legal discourse, even as it refuses to abandon its resistance credentials.

In contrast, Israel’s continued defiance of international law, its repeated violations of UN resolutions, its refusal to comply with ICJ rulings, and its systematic targeting of civilian infrastructure, positions it outside the legal order entirely. What more dramatic indictment is needed than its public shredding of the UN Charter, broadcast live to an international audience that watches, condemns, and ultimately enables?

This extralegal posture reverberates through the current negotiations, where Israel enters not as a state bound by law, but as a sovereign exception to it — i.e.,where legal norms are suspended to consolidate state power. The very premise of dialogue is distorted: demands for ceasefire, humanitarian access, or accountability are reframed as concessions rather than obligations. Palestinian negotiators, civil society actors, and international legal advocates find themselves pleading for adherence to norms that Israel has already voided. The result is not negotiation but coercion — an asymmetrical theater in which law is invoked only to be suspended, and where the architecture of impunity is mistaken for diplomacy.
 
 This legal and diplomatic positioning by Hamas exposes the fundamental pitfalls and contradictions within the U.S.-Israeli approach, which relies on brinkmanship and bad faith.

IV. The Pitfalls: Trump’s Brinkmanship and Netanyahu’s Contradictions

1. Trump’s Brinkmanship

President Trump’s framing of the Gaza proposal — delivered with the threat that “all HELL, like no one has ever seen before” would follow Hamas’s rejection — is emblematic of his coercive, zero-sum approach to diplomacy. The tweet did not respond to an actual rejection; rather, it preemptively cast refusal as illegitimate, foreclosing dissent before it could be voiced. This ultimatum, couched in apocalyptic language, reveals a strategy less concerned with negotiation than with domination. But coercion cannot substitute for consensus, especially when the proposal itself is riddled with ambiguities and lacks enforceable guarantees.

Hamas’s partial acceptance, articulated in its official statement titled Important Statement on Hamas’ Response to U.S. President Trump’s Proposal, exposes the fragility of Trump’s timeline. The movement’s insistence on clarification, its rejection of the economic framework, and its call for national consensus before any technocratic transition all signal a refusal to be boxed into a binary of compliance or annihilation. By invoking international law and regional consultation, Hamas reframes the proposal not as a peace offer but as a pressure tactic — one that demands resistance through diplomatic engagement rather than military escalation.

Trump’s claim that “every country has signed on” is contradicted by the cautious responses of key regional actors. Egypt and Qatar have emphasized the need for Palestinian unity and a sustainable ceasefire, while Jordan and Turkey have expressed concern over the plan’s unilateralism. Hamas’s engagement with these mediators — rather than direct submission to Trump’s terms — reveals the hollowness of the claim and the performative nature of the ultimatum.

2. Israel’s Negotiation Deceptions and Strategic Dissonance
 Israel’s endorsement of Trump’s proposal is undermined by its actions on the ground. While Netanyahu publicly supports the plan, the Israeli military continues its operations in Gaza, including targeted assassinations and the destruction of civilian infrastructure. These actions contradict the spirit of the proposal, which ostensibly calls for a phased withdrawal and the release of hostages.

Moreover, Israel has refused to commit to the full terms outlined in the plan, particularly those involving the transfer of Gaza’s administration to a Palestinian technocratic body. Netanyahu’s government has issued statements suggesting that any such transition must be vetted by Israeli security agencies — a move that effectively nullifies Palestinian sovereignty and reasserts Israeli control under the guise of coordination.

This strategic dissonance reveals a deeper fissure between the U.S. and Israel. While Trump seeks a legacy-defining peace accord, Netanyahu appears more invested in preserving Israel’s military leverage and domestic political capital. His maneuvering reflects a familiar pattern: endorsing peace frameworks for international optics while sabotaging their implementation through on-the-ground escalation and bureaucratic obstruction.

Hamas, recognizing this duplicity, has chosen to engage with regional and international mediators rather than rely solely on U.S.-Israeli channels. Its response to Trump’s proposal — conditional, consultative, and grounded in international law — exploits the contradictions within the alliance and repositions Hamas as a diplomatic actor navigating asymmetrical terrain with strategic precision.

V. What Hamas’s Agreement Means for Lebanon
 The ultimate success of Hamas’s diplomatic gambit will be measured not only in Gaza but in its ripple effects across the region, with Lebanon serving as the most immediate and volatile barometer, where Hezbollah’s posture is tethered to Hamas’s resistance credentials and regional standing.

Crucially, Hamas did not agree to disarm. Instead, it deferred the question, insisting that any decision regarding weapons must emerge from a “comprehensive national stance” and align with “relevant international laws and resolutions.” Senior official Mousa Abu Marzouk clarified that Hamas would only hand over its weapons to a future Palestinian state — not to Israel, not to the U.S., and not to any externally imposed authority.

This rhetorical precision is strategic: Hamas is acutely aware that even the optics of disarmament, however deferred or symbolic, risk undermining Hezbollah’s claim to be the region’s last uncompromised axis of resistance. In resistance politics, symbolism is strategy. The mere suggestion that Hamas might relinquish arms threatens to isolate Hezbollah as an outlier — no longer part of a unified front, but a relic of a fading paradigm. In this context, Lebanon becomes a mirror: not of Gaza’s liberation, but of its containment. The transition in Gaza, framed as peace, may in fact signal the managed pacification of resistance — an outcome Lebanon is pressured to emulate or resist.

Yet the stakes are not unilateral. If the agreement is perceived as surrender — an externally imposed framework that dissolves Hamas’s authority without securing Palestinian sovereignty — it could trigger backlash across Lebanon’s political spectrum. Hezbollah, which has long positioned itself as a strategic partner to Hamas in a united front against Israeli expansionism, would seize the moment to reaffirm that negotiation is capitulation, that resistance remains the only viable path. This alliance is not symbolic — it is infrastructural, forged through joint operations, shared intelligence, and a common understanding that Israel’s military doctrine treats Gaza and Lebanon as interchangeable theaters of containment. A perceived weakening of Hamas’s resistance posture would embolden Hezbollah’s military stance, justify cross-border escalation, and silence reformist factions calling for de-escalation and political restructuring. The outcome hinges on whether Hamas can maintain its resistance credentials while navigating the diplomatic terrain — a balancing act that Lebanon is not merely watching, but absorbing into its own strategic calculus.
 
 VI. Conclusion
 In conclusion, Hamas’s conditional refusal has disrupted the diplomatic script in ways armed resistance alone could not. By accepting the frame of negotiation while rejecting its coercive content — its asymmetrical terms, deferred sovereignty, and juridical traps — Hamas has exposed the hollow core of a peace process never designed to deliver sovereignty. The spectacle has been broken. No longer shielded by diplomatic theater, the world must now witness not a managed surrender, but a real, messy, and strategically fraught political struggle — one whose outcome will redefine the balance of power and the meaning of resistance in the Middle East for years to come.

Note: First published in Medium

____________________
Rima Najjar is a Palestinian whose father’s side of the family comes from the forcibly depopulated village of Lifta on the western outskirts of Jerusalem and whose mother’s side of the family is from Ijzim, south of Haifa.

5 October 2025

Source: countercurrents.org

By Quds News Network

Gaza (QNN)- Several international activists deported from the occupation state of Israel after joining a Gaza aid flotilla have revealed details about mistreatment by Israeli forces of young climate campaigner Greta Thunberg.

The 137 deportees landed in Istanbul on Saturday, including 36 Turkish nationals and activists from the United States, Italy, Malaysia, Kuwait, Switzerland, Tunisia, Libya, Jordan, and other countries, Turkish officials confirmed.

Turkish journalist and flotilla participant Ersin Celik told local media he witnessed Israeli forces torture Greta Thunberg. He said she was “dragged on the ground” and “forced to kiss the Israeli flag.”

[https://twitter.com/QudsNen/status/1974486467758960798]

[https://twitter.com/QudsNen/status/1974485692802609503]

Malaysian activist Hazwani Helmi and American participant Windfield Beaver gave similar accounts at Istanbul Airport. They said Thunberg was shoved and paraded with the flag.

“It was a disaster. They treated us like animals,” Helmi said. Detainees were denied food, clean water, and medication. Beaver added that Thunberg was “treated terribly” and “used as propaganda,” recalling how she was pushed into a room as National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir entered.

Italian journalist Lorenzo Agostino said, “Greta Thunberg, a brave woman, is only 22 years old. She was humiliated, wrapped in an Israeli flag, and exhibited like a trophy.”

Other activists reported severe mistreatment. Turkish TV presenter Ikbal Gurpinar said, “They treated us like dogs. They left us hungry for three days. We had to drink from the toilet… It was a terribly hot day, and we were all roasting.” She added the ordeal gave her “a better understanding of Gaza.”

Turkish activist Aycin Kantoglu described bloodstained prison walls and messages left by previous detainees. “We saw mothers writing their children’s names on the walls. We actually experienced a little bit of what Palestinians go through,” she said.

Italy’s Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani confirmed that 26 Italians had been deported, while 15 remained in Israeli custody awaiting expulsion. Italian MP Arturo Scotto, who joined the flotilla, told reporters, “Those who were acting legally were the people aboard those boats; those who acted illegally were those who prevented them from reaching Gaza.”

Adalah, a rights group, reported detainees were forced to kneel with zip-tied hands for hours, denied medication, and blocked from speaking with lawyers.

Israel has faced mounting international criticism for the flotilla raid, which saw its navy intercept around 40 boats carrying aid to Gaza and detain more than 450 people. The operation highlights the illegality of Israel’s blockade, which has trapped Gaza’s 2.3 million residents amid ongoing genocide.

Launched in late August, the flotilla was the latest international attempt to break Israel’s siege and deliver aid to Palestinians.

Hundreds of Global Sumud Flotilla Activists Remain Detained by Israeli Forces

Around 450 activists from the Gaza-bound Global Sumud Flotilla remain in Israeli detention after Israeli forces boarded their aid boats, abducted them, and forcibly taken them to Israel for deportation.

On Friday, four Italian activists detained on board the Global Sumud Flotilla were deported after they were forcibly taken to Israel.

Israel’s Foreign Ministry said procedures were under way to send all remaining participants to other countries.

Some 450 activists are in Israeli detention, including Swedish campaigner Greta Thunberg.

This week, Israeli forces “illegally intercepted” 42 civilian vessels and arrested about 500 activists from the Global Sumud Flotilla.

The boats were carrying “humanitarian aid, volunteers, and the determination to break Israel’s illegal siege on Gaza”, the group said.

According to US outlet CBS News, citing American intelligence officials briefed on the matter, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu directly approved an illegal drone attack on two boats from the Global Sumud Flotilla docked in Tunisia.

Israeli forces launched drones from a submarine and dropped incendiary devices onto the boats, which were moored outside Tunisian port Sidi Bou Said, causing a fire.

No one was killed or injured in the attacks, which targeted a Portuguese-flagged vessel and a British-flagged vessel in separate incidents on September 8 and 9.

The use of incendiary weapons against civilian populations or objects is prohibited in all circumstances under international humanitarian law and the law of armed conflict.

Israel has a long history of intercepting and attacking flotillas bound for the Gaza Strip, particularly since it imposed a blockade on the enclave in 2007.

5 October 2025

Source: countercurrents.org

By Quds News Network

Gaza (QNN)- The Gaza Strip has been under relentless Israeli attacks, with dozens killed and designated safe zones targeted, despite US President Donald Trump claiming that Israel had “temporarily stopped the bombing.”

What We Know?

Hamas submitted on Friday its response to Trump’s Gaza plan to end the two-year genocide, agreeing to release all Israeli captives. The group said it is ready to “immediately enter negotiations through mediators to discuss the details” of the exchange.

Trump welcomed the Hamas response, and wrote on his Truth Social site that he believes the Palestinian group is “ready for a lasting PEACE”.

In a major announcement, he also said that “Israel must immediately stop the bombing of Gaza” so that the captives could be released.

World leaders also welcomed the group’s response and called on Israel to stop the genocide immediately.

Early on Saturday, Trump also said he appreciated that Israel had “temporarily stopped the bombing” to give a “chance” to the deal to be completed.

Israeli Claims of Reducing Assault

Unconfirmed reports from Israel’s Army Radio also claim Israel has instructed the military to reduce Gaza operations to a “minimum”, following Trump’s order, and only “carry out defensive actions” in Gaza.

“The practical implication: the operation to conquer [Gaza City] has been blocked – and halted for now,” Army Radio’s military correspondent, Doron Kadosh, said in a post on X.

Israel Continues to Pound Gaza

However, local sources and residents reported that since Trump’s order to stop the bombing, there has been relentless and indiscriminate Israeli bombardment across the Gaza Strip.

According to medical sources, Israeli attacks across Gaza have killed at least 70 Palestinians in the past 24 hours.

In the Israeli-designated so-called “safe zones” in southern Gaza, where people are ordered to flee by the Israeli military, the sound of relentless heavy artillery and fighter jets filled the night.

At least 47 of the victims killed in bombardments and air strikes on Saturday were in the famine-struck Gaza City, where the Israeli forces have been pressing an offensive in recent weeks, forcing some one million residents to flee to the overcrowded south amid plans to occupy the city.

Hamas said in a statement that the ongoing attacks on the enclave proved that Israel was continuing its “horrific crimes and massacres” on Palestinians.

According to a statement published by Gaza’s Government Media Office late last night, since dawn on Saturday, Israeli forces have launched over 93 air and artillery strikes across Gaza, hitting densely populated areas filled with civilians and displaced families.

5 October 2025

Source: countercurrents.org

OCTOBER 7, 2025

By Jonathan Kuttab

Next Tuesday is the two year anniversary of October 7. For many people,
that day is a pivotal day in the history of Palestine/Israel, to the
point that it is often necessary to remind people that the crisis in the
Holy Land did not start on October 7, 2023. Also, so much false
information has been circulated as to what actually happened, that, even
though much of it has been categorically debunked (“40 beheaded
babies,” “babies burnt alive in front of their parents,” “mass
rapes,” etc…) , such myths continue to be used as justification for
the ongoing genocide and as an excuse to refrain from genuine
peacemaking.

One year ago, on the first anniversary of October 7, I wrote three
articles, titled October 6 [3], October 7 [4], and October 8 [5], which
I urge all readers to read again and disseminate. The first discussed
the situation on October 6, reminding readers of the context for October
7, showing that it was not an “unprovoked assault but one episode in a
long and protracted struggle between Palestinians and Israelis. Gaza was
already under siege and facing a blockade and siege that was suffocating
the people and making Gaza uninhabitable. The second article discussed
what actually happened on that fateful day, noting that many of the
activities of Hamas were aimed at military targets and included
breaching the wall surrounding Gaza in 30 places simultaneously and
overrunning two army bases. These included the Gaza Battalion
Headquarters, killing over 340 soldiers and capturing over 50 others to
be exchanged for the release of Palestinian prisoners held in Israeli
jails. Hamas also carried the battle into Israeli towns and kibbutzim,
and this included the attacks on innocent civilians, a music festival
and other civilian structures, as well as taking civilians as
hostages—all of which are actions prohibited under international law
and which were condemned universally. It must be noted that many of the
civilians killed that day were actually killed by Israeli forces in the
panic and confusion of those early hours, as well as victims of the
Hannibal Directive whereby the Israeli army preferred to kill its own
citizens and soldiers rather than risk their being captured. I say this
not to minimize the trauma and suffering of Israelis, both soldiers and
civilians, but to set the record straight since the events of October 7,
including the taking hostage and killing of Israelis, have been used as
a justification for the much greater and ongoing killing and suffering
inflicted upon Palestinian civilians, from October 8 until the present
day.

The position of FOSNA since that day has been clear and consistent:
Civilian hostages were to be released immediately and without
conditions; Food and medicine should be allowed freely into Gaza,
immediately and without conditions; and civilians and noncombatants
should not be targeted but protected by either party. Violence is not
the answer. A ceasefire should be implemented so that peaceful
negotiations could be carried out and a prisoner exchange for the
combatants be achieved.

Since that day, however, the events of October 7 have been a prelude to
a vicious and ongoing campaign of genocide, starvation and ethnic
cleansing aiming not only to avenge Israel’s losses on that day and
degrading Hamas’ military capabilities and ability to mount such an
attack again, but rather to utterly destroy Gaza and to expel, if
possible, its population to Egypt. There was also talk of pressuring
Jordan, so that Israel can expel a million Palestinians from the West
Bank to Jordan. Secretary of State Blinken actually tried to pressure
both Egypt and Jordan inthat direction. The issue is no longer what
happened or did not happen on October 7, or what the future is of Hamas
or even of Gaza. Israel has chosen the opportunity of October 7, along
with a weak Arab response and pliant US presidents, to break all the
rules, exercise its massive military, technological, and political power
to enact a Final Solution to the problem of Palestine. As Israel
recognized that it can get away with genocide and that the US and the
world community will not put a stop to it, right wing elements felt this
was a divine opportunity to finish the Palestinian question once and for
all. There is no more talk of a Palestinian state, no horizon for self
determination and no dignified coexistence. The 20 point plan that Trump
and Netanyahu have proposed calls for indefinite Israeli hegemony over
Gaza, with Arab and Muslim support or acquiescence. Palestinians are
offered a choice of subjugation, death or exile. Netanyahu’s ministers
have actually said as much.

In the face of such arrogance, the global grassroots response has been
invigorating. It rejects Netanyahu’s vision and calls for proper
implementation of international law principles. The Sumud Flotilla [6]
is being followed by additional mass protests throughout Europe, and
promises of more ships to try and break the siege. International and
national tribunals are gearing up to bring some hope of accountability,
and the BDS movement (Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions) is beginning
to gather steam. Against all odds, the Palestinian people continue to
exist and to resist.

We do not know what the future will hold. Hamas may agree to some
version of the plan if only to stem the flow of blood and destruction,
at least temporarily, and to bring much needed food and relief to the
exhausted masses. Yet we know this is not the end. The struggle will
continue as long as oppression and injustice remains. But, in the end,
justice will prevail. May this day come quickly and with less and less
suffering and destruction before it arrives.

          [7] Donate: Help FOSNA work towards justice and carry hope for a
better tomorrow [7]

————————-

Friends of Sabeel North America · PO Box 3192, Greenwood Village, CO
80155, United States

Read Online [8]

This email was sent to muzachandra@gmail.com · Unsubscribe [9]

Created with NationBuilder [10]. Build the Future.

By Quds News Network

The last remaining vessel of the Global Sumud Flotilla, carrying aid to the Gaza Strip, has been intercepted and seized by Israeli forces off the coast of the war-torn Palestinian enclave.

Livestream video showed Israeli forces forcing their way onboard the vessel Friday morning.

The Polish-flagged Marinette, which reportedly has a crew of six, was the last remaining operational vessel of the Global Sumud Flotilla – once a 44-strong fleet.

A live video feed of the yacht, active as of 04:00 GMT, shows the crew steering the ship as the sun rises behind them in international waters in the Mediterranean Sea.

A live geo tracker shows the ship located some 43 nautical miles (about 80km) from Gaza’s territorial waters.

[https://twitter.com/gbsumudflotilla/status/1974024941583454461]

On Wednesday and Thursday, Israel’s naval forces stopped dozens of boats carrying humanitarian supplies to Gaza and abducted about 500 activists from more than 40 countries.

Israel’s navy has intercepted each boat and detained its crew before transferring them to Israel, from where they will be deported. Several high-profile figures – including activist Greta Thunberg, former Barcelona mayor Ada Colau, and Member of European Parliament Rima Hassan – are among those being held.

This marks the first time in history that dozens of vessels have sailed together toward Gaza. The coastal enclave, home to 2.2 million people, has been under an Israeli blockade for 18 years and is now under a two-year-long Israeli genocide that has killed more than 66,000 Palestinians since October 2023, alongside an Israeli-made famine.

Israel’s History of Intercepting Gaza-Bound Aid Flotillas Challenging the Blockade

Israel has a long history of intercepting and attacking flotillas bound for the Gaza Strip, particularly since it imposed a blockade on the enclave in 2007. These missions are often organized by international activists or pro-Palestinian groups seeking to deliver humanitarian aid or challenge Israel’s illegal blockade.

The most recent attempt, on October 1 and 2, was the Global Sumud Flotilla — the largest grassroots humanitarian fleet in history.

Below is a timeline of Israel’s interceptions and attacks on Gaza-bound aid flotillas:

Free Gaza Movement, August 2008:

Two small boats, Free Gaza and Liberty, organized by the Free Gaza Movement. Activists from about 17 countries sailed from Larnaca, Cyprus to break Israel’s naval blockade of Gaza, bring attention to the blockade, and deliver aid.

The boats were tracked by Israeli naval vessels for much of the voyage. Their navigation or communication systems were also jammed.

They arrived safely in Gaza on 23 August 2008. They were greeted by many Palestinians and delivered hearing aids and medicine.

Mavi Marmara / Gaza Freedom Flotilla, May 31, 2010:

Part of a flotilla of six ships organized by the Free Gaza Movement and Turkish NGO Humanitarian Relief Foundation. The Mavi Marmara carried about 600 people. It aimed to break the naval blockade of Gaza, to deliver humanitarian goods directly, and to challenge the blockade.

Israeli naval commandos boarded the Mavi Marmara in international waters. The attack killed ten Turkish activists and injured several.

Freedom Flotilla II, 2011:

The flotilla involved more than 300 participants from around the world and was set to sail on 10 vessels as a follow-up to the 2010 mission.

However, intense diplomatic pressure from Israel, coupled with reported sabotage of ships and restrictions by host countries like Greece, prevented most boats from departing. Only one ship, Dignité al‑Karama, managed to sail.

The 17-passenger French vessel announced they were heading for Gaza. Israeli naval commandos intercepted the boat and towed it to Ashdod. The activists were abducted and later deported.

Freedom Flotilla III, 2015:

Freedom Flotilla III was launched as the third major attempt by international activists to break Israel’s naval blockade of Gaza.

Organised by the Freedom Flotilla Coalition (FFC), the mission included several vessels, with the Swedish-flagged Marianne of Gothenburg leading the effort.

On June 29, 2015, Israeli naval forces intercepted the Marianne about 100 nautical miles off the Gaza coast, in international waters. Commandos boarded the ship and diverted it to Ashdod. The activists on board were abducted and later deported, with some crew members released after six days.

Women’s Boat to Gaza, 2016:

One vessel, Zaytouna‑Oliva. The sailing boat was carrying women representing 13 countries from 5 continents who were trying to break the Israeli blockade on Gaza. The women included three parliamentarians, an Olympic athlete, former US Diplomat and CODEPINK Activist Ann Wright, and Nobel Peace Laureate, Mairead Maguire.

On 5 October 2016, the Israeli Navy intercepted it about 35 nautical miles from Gaza’s coast (approximately 65 km). Israeli forces boarded the vessela dn directed it to Ashdod. The interception occurred as Israel was simultaneously bombarding Gaza.

All activists were abducted, then deported to their home countries.

The last message heard from Mairead Maguire stated “We are people of the world, we should be allowed to visit our brothers and sisters in Gaza and not be stopped. We will continue to support the people of Gaza and the people of Palestine until they have their human rights and their freedom.”

Just Future for Palestine / Freedom Flotilla, 2018:

The flotilla included main vessels Al Awda (“The Return”) and Freedom, supported by yachts Mairead and Falestine and organised by Freedom Flotilla Coalition (FFC) to challenge the blockade again, in a symbolic protest to deliver aid.

On July 29 and August 3, 2018, those two main vessels Al Awda and Freedom were intercepted by the Israeli navy in international waters. Ships were seized; persons on board arrested, detained and later deported. Some activists reported being tasered, assaulted, or beaten.

Recent Flotilla Attempts, 2025:

Madleen — June 9:

Organizer: Freedom Flotilla Coalition (FFC)

What it carried: Humanitarian aid — including baby formula, food, medical supplies.

Who was on board: 12 activists; among them Greta Thunberg, MEP Rima Hassan

Location / interception: Intercepted by the Israeli navy in international waters, about 100 nautical miles (about 185 km) from Gaza.

What happened: The ship was boarded; communications (cameras / livestream) disabled before boarding; the ship was towed, crew abducted then deported. The aid was seized.

Handala — July 27:

Organizer: Also the Freedom Flotilla Coalition.

What it carried: Aid (baby formula, food, medicine), civilian supplies.
Who was on board: 19 activists + 2 journalists, from several countries (including French parliamentarians).

Location / interception: Intercepted about 40 nautical miles from Gaza in international waters, late at night (communications cut).

What happened: The ship was boarded after cutting off cameras/communication; passengers detained, brought to the port of Ashdod.

Global Sumud Flotilla — October 1‑2:

Organizer: Global Sumud Flotilla

What it carried: humanitarian aid

Who on board: Approximately 500 activists on about 44‑47 civilian boats; notable figures include Greta Thunberg, Mandla Mandela, Ada Colau (former mayor of Barcelona), others.

Location / interception: Boats were being intercepted about 70 nautical miles (about 130 km) off Gaza; some boats boarded; communication / livestream disrupted. The lead vessels intercepted include Alma, Sirius, Adara, among others.

What happened: Israeli forces boarded some of the boats, some boats reported water cannon use; some vessels had their devices and cameras disabled. Activists on intercepted vessels were abducted to be deported.

3 October 2025

Source: countercurrents.org