As 2.3 million Palestinians in Gaza endure and resist Israel’s forced starvation in the midst of its ongoing genocide, a ship flying the flag of Portugal and carrying humanitarian aid was reportedly bombed by military drones in Tunisian waters. Thankfully everyone on board has been confirmed safe. Logically, all fingers point to Israel, which is today among the world’s most dangerous rogue states.
The Palestinian-led BDS movement:
- Calls for escalating BDS pressure to isolate apartheid Israel, imposing targeted sanctions on it, starting with a comprehensive military and energy embargo, as legally required under international law.
- Denounces complicit governments that have enabled Israel’s genocide. They’ve allowed ships carrying military materiel, including fuel and other dual use items, to Israel to use their ports, services and flags and have even imported Israeli drones to militarize the Mediterranean, while refusing and delaying rescue operations for migrants and refugees.
- Calls for pressure on Tunisian authorities to investigate and seek proper accountability for this attack. If proven, this is an attack on Tunisia's sovereignty, and not the first attack of its kind.
- Calls for pressure on the flag state Portugal, and the European Union, to investigate and confront this attack. If proven, it is also an attack on their sovereignty, and not the first attack of its kind.
This criminal attack on a humanitarian convoy highlights two key points:
- Unless stopped, Israel will go further than ever to starve Palestinians in Gaza. Israel’s “total impunity” is truly unprecedented.
- Complicit states are fully responsible for emboldening Israel’s criminal behaviour. Because it got away with murder, literally, after massacring aid activists aboard the Mavi Marmara in 2010, Israel can now bomb a similar humanitarian mission off the European coast, and now the Tunisian coast, with utter impunity.
Armed, funded, and shielded from accountability mainly by the US and Europe, Israel is simultaneously destroying the foundations of international law, bringing about a might-makes-right era unseen in decades. This poses a serious threat to humanity at large.
Israel over the months has not only escalated genocide, apartheid and ethnic cleansing of the Palestinian people, it is continuing to increase its attacks of other sovereign states across North Africa and East Asia, and now repeatedly against European sovereignty.
As called for by dozens of UN human rights experts, all States must “impose a full arms embargo on Israel, halting all arms agreements, imports, exports and transfers, including of dual-use items,” as well as “cancel or suspend economic relationships, trade agreements and academic relations with Israel that may contribute to its unlawful presence and apartheid regime in the occupied Palestinian territory.”
Momentum for sanctions is greater than ever. Growing numbers of states and municipalities are reviewing or cutting ties with Israel. Never again is now.
You can take action wherever you are: Mobilize now towards the Global Weekend of Action to #DisruptComplicity, 18 – 21 September.
We must disrupt global complicity in Israel’s “final solution” for Indigenous Palestinians. Together, we can help dismantle Israeli apartheid — just as global movements helped dismantle apartheid in South Africa.