Israel 'Determined' to Halt Gaza Flotilla, UN Envoy Says
Since 2008, activists have repeatedly sailed toward Gaza to challenge the blockade. Israel has stopped every flotilla, and the 2010 raid on the Mavi Marmara still shapes the debate.
In mid-2011, as activists prepared a second "Freedom Flotilla" to sail to Gaza, a UN envoy warned that Israel was determined to stop the boats, and urged governments to discourage their citizens from taking part. The warning reflected the shadow of what had happened a year earlier.
The Mavi Marmara
On 31 May 2010, Israeli naval commandos boarded the Mavi Marmara, the Turkish-owned lead ship of a flotilla carrying activists and aid toward Gaza, in international waters. Nine Turkish activists were killed, one more died later of his wounds, and several Israeli soldiers were injured. The raid provoked an international outcry and a deep rupture in relations between Israel and Turkey. The two countries did not fully restore relations until 2016.
Competing views
Israel argued that its naval blockade of Gaza, imposed after Hamas took control in 2007, was lawful and necessary to prevent weapons smuggling, and that its soldiers had been attacked. A UN panel led by Sir Geoffrey Palmer found in 2011 that the blockade was legal but that Israel's use of force had been "excessive and unreasonable". Other UN bodies and human rights groups considered the blockade itself to be collective punishment.
Later flotillas
Activists have continued to organise sailings to Gaza, and Israel has intercepted every one, usually without loss of life, detaining and deporting participants. After the war that began in October 2023, new flotillas drew renewed attention to the humanitarian situation in Gaza.
The flotillas have never broken the blockade. Their purpose, their organisers say, has always been to keep international attention on it.