Anti-Israel activists are planning yet another protest flotilla carrying a symbolic cargo of humanitarian aid to the Gaza Strip after organizers pulled a similar stunt last year that was intercepted before reaching the Hamas-ruled enclave.
The Hamas– and Muslim Brotherhood-linked Global Sumud Flotilla campaigners say they plan to send more than 100 boats to the territory in March, in what they call the largest such mission yet.
They announced the initiative on Thursday at the Nelson Mandela Foundation in Johannesburg, South Africa.
Israel has intercepted several such protest flotillas since 2010.
Mandla Mandela, grandson of the late South African president and a participant in last year’s flotilla, told reporters that more than a thousand activists—including doctors, war crimes investigators and engineers—will join the mission, backed by a land convoy expected to draw thousands more supporters from countries such as Tunisia and Egypt, according to the Associated Press.
The boats are expected to depart from Spain, Tunisia and Italy and sail toward Gaza.
In November, Israeli prosecutors moved to confiscate 50 foreign vessels intercepted during October’s attempt to breach the Israeli blockade of the Gaza Strip.
In a petition to the Haifa District Court, the State Attorney’s Office said that the Sumud Flotilla represented an unprecedented operational challenge to the Israeli Navy, with many boats owned or financed by the Hamas terrorist group.
According to the petition, Israeli forces intercepted 41 vessels on Yom Kippur and nine more the following week, detaining activists and seizing boats that combined carried “less than five tons” of aid supplies—an amount authorities said underscored the flotilla’s real aim: generating global headlines.
“Hamas worked to finance the flotilla, to synchronize the various international organizations, and to purchase ships, all while attempting to conceal its involvement in the flotilla,” according to the petition.
