Why Sailing More Ships Is the Only Answer to Israel's Genocide and Siege on Gaza

Israel’s naval blockade on Gaza was never about security — only starvation. Israel attacks humanitarian ships in international waters simply because the world is letting it

In 2008, a small fleet of six boats did what few believed was possible: they broke through Israel’s illegal blockade of Gaza. These ships weren’t carrying weapons. They weren’t delivering arms to militants. They were carrying hope—along with food, medical supplies, and the unwavering message that Gaza would not be forgotten.

At the time, Israel chose not to intercept them. Not because it recognized their right to sail. Not because it respected the humanitarian intent. But because it feared global outrage. It gambled that the international flotilla movement would be a passing wave—that these ships would tire themselves out, that the momentum would fizzle, that the world’s attention would drift elsewhere.

But the ships kept coming.

And so, Israel shifted tactics. It began attacking them; most notably with the Mavi Marmara assault where Israel killed 9 activists.

From that point forward, Israel claimed its naval blockade was a matter of “security.” Officials insisted it was necessary to prevent weapons, ammunition, money, and so-called “terrorist elements” from entering or leaving Gaza by sea. The claim was so incredibly bizarre: these humanitarian vessels posed a threat not only to Israel’s borders, but to the stability of the region.

And yet, in all the years of intercepting flotillas, boarding boats in international waters, detaining peace activists, seizing cargo, and enforcing a military siege on a besieged people—Israel has not found a single weapon on board. Not one gun. Not one crate of ammunition. Not one shipment of contraband.

Even senior Israeli officials have admitted this fact. Knesset member Einat Wilf openly conceded that “the armaments for Hamas were not coming from this flotilla,” and that the attempt to reach Gaza “had nothing to do with [Israel’s] security.”

The flotillas were never about smuggling. They were—and remain—about exposing a brutal, illegal, and dehumanizing siege. They are an act of civil disobedience on the high seas, aimed at breaking a blockade that has turned Gaza into the largest open-air prison on Earth.

Today, the mask has fallen completely. Israel didn’t even pretend to justify its most recent assault on the Sumud Flotilla. It ambushed the vessel in international waters, kidnapped the peaceful activists on board, and continues to hold them captive at the time of this writing—without charges, without due process, and without even the pretense of a legal rationale.

No claims of weapons or security threats.

Israel’s message is now stark, simple, and undisguised: We are starving Gaza to death. The so-called civilized world is letting us. And there is nothing you can do to stop it.

This is not security policy. It is state piracy. It is collective punishment. It is a siege designed not to disarm an enemy, but to break the spirit of an entire people. It is, by every moral and legal standard, a form of genocide.

Last June, Israel intercepted another vessel, the Madleen, and later admitted that the motive wasn’t what it carried—but what it represented. If that ship had reached Gaza, officials feared, many more would follow. That fear says everything. The greatest threat to the blockade isn’t weapons—it’s resistance.

And that’s why the answer must be exactly what Israel fears most. More ships. More convoys. More peaceful defiance. More refusal to accept the slow strangulation of an entire population as “normal.”

Gaza does not need permission to breathe.
Humanitarian solidarity is not a crime.
And the sea does not belong to the oppressor.

So let the ships sail. Let the blockade be broken. Again, and again, and again.