Israel orders the army to stop the flotilla ship carrying aid to Gaza.

BarcelonaBenjamin Netanyahu's government has ordered the army to stop the ship. Madleen of theon the Freedom Flotilla, which is traveling to Gaza and is expected to arrive in the coming hours. A dozen activists, including the young Swede Greta Thunberg, are traveling aboard the ship transporting food and humanitarian aid to the Gaza Strip, where the population is starving after two and a half months of blockade. The ship is located this Sunday off the Egyptian coast, about 150 nautical miles from Gaza (about 277 kilometers), according to the Flotilla itself reported through social media.

"All this intimidation will not make us return; we are determined to reach Gaza," said one of the activists, Yasemin Acar, this Sunday during a Telegram connection from the ship. "There have been drones flying over us for five days, but if they want to monitor us, there's no problem. We're only carrying food and aid. The only ones carrying weapons are the Israeli regime agents," the young woman said, asking all those who support them to "make sure they don't intercept us" by putting pressure on their respective communities. "We're fine and we'll keep going," she insisted. During the same video chat, one of the activists, Spaniard Sergio Toribio, also insisted that the threat won't stop them: "It doesn't matter if they send their entire army."

Another activist on board the ship and French member of the European Parliament, Rima Hassan, also warned on her X account that they would soon be intercepted by the Israeli army and that during that time communications would be blocked.

Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz announced on Sunday that he had given the order to the army to "act so that the Madleen "I am not going to reach Gaza," Katz said in a statement. "To the anti-Semitic Greta and her friends, who are apologists for Hamas propaganda, I say clearly: you better go back, because you will not reach Gaza," Katz said. "We are preparing for the possibility of dialogue with the Shah," he admitted on Sunday. Madleen carries a symbolic amount of aid, including rice and baby formula.

An obstacle course

The ship is operated by the pro-Palestinian Freedom Flotilla Coalition (FFC) and is intended to circumvent the blockade imposed on Gaza and deliver aid to the Gazans. The mission had to be delayed when The first boat the activists intended to travel on was attacked with missiles by the Israeli army. when it was in international waters near Malta. Afterwards, the activists boarded the Madleen and set sail from Sicily on June 6th.

Just this weekend, the ship briefly interrupted its journey to attend to a boat they had encountered carrying migrants trying to reach Europe. Greta Thunberg and Yasemin Acar have also made another connection to the networks to explain that agents from the Libyan coast guard had taken the migrants "posing as Egyptian guards" to, in reality, take them to Libya, "something that is illegal, because they are not from Libya."

In addition to Thunberg, there are 11 other crew members on board. Israeli media have reported that the army plans to intercept the yacht before it reaches Gaza and escort it to the Israeli port of Ashdod. The crew would be deported. In 2010, Israeli commandos killed ten people when they attacked a Turkish boat, the MV Mavi Marmara, who was leading a small flotilla.