The twenty or so ships of the Global Sumud Flotilla or freedom flotilla that set sail this Sunday from the Port of Barcelona towards Gaza with humanitarian aid have returned this morning due to bad weather and their captains are meeting this Monday to decide when to set sail again. Among the participants, a woman from Lanzarote is traveling.
The storm that hit the Catalan coast caught the flotilla at sea and, for safety, the decision was made to return to the Port of Barcelona, specifically to the Marina dock, where they have spent the night and this morning they are holding a meeting to decide how and when to set sail again, sources close to the flotilla have explained.
The Global Sumud Flotilla boats set sail from the Catalan capital at 3:00 p.m. this past Sunday amidst shouts of "Free Palestine".
One of the ships is captained by the ERC councilor in the Barcelona City Council, Jordi Coronas, and this Monday the president of the party, Oriol Junqueras, explained that the tramuntana wind that was blowing in the Gulf of Lion and on the Catalan coast made navigation very difficult, so it was decided to return to port and wait for the weather conditions to improve.
The objective of the flotilla: citizen resistance
Among the 300 people who enlisted in this humanitarian mission is the Swedish activist Greta Thunberg, who appealed to the "resistance" of citizens in the face of the "failure" of governments with the "genocide" perpetrated by Israel in Gaza.
The former mayor of Barcelona, Ada Colau, is also participating in the expedition, who recalled that the Catalan capital was "the first European city to break relations with Israel". "We are going to demand that this be specified in all institutions, in all European governments," she pledged.
Thunberg herself announced the flotilla on August 10 as "the biggest attempt to break the illegal Israeli siege on Gaza", with "dozens" of boats that, on September 4, will converge with boats from other areas of the Mediterranean, such as Italy or Tunisia.
Since then, the Global Sumud Flotilla, which has the participation of 44 countries, has received expressions of support from social activism throughout Spain, as well as from actors and actresses of international renown, such as the American Susan Sarandon or the Irish Liam Cunningham, present in the Moll de la Fusta.
Together with the Spanish actor Eduard Fernàndez, Cunningham made public the posthumous message recorded by a five-year-old Palestinian girl who gave details of the music she wanted to be played at her funeral if she was killed.
