Israel Defense Forces (IDF)

‘We Refuse to Remain Silent’: 1,000 North African Volunteers Make Their Way to Gaza to Break Israeli Siege

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Original article by Julia Conley republished from Common Dreams under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0).

Pro-Palestinian activists wave Palestinian flags and keffiyehs from open bus windows as they, along with around 1,000 other participants in the Sumud or “Resilience” Convoy, depart from Tunis, Tunisia, on June 9, 2025. (Photo: Chedly Ben Ibrahim/NurPhoto via Getty Images)

“A tsunami of humanity is rising for Gaza.”

As Israeli forces unlawfully boarded the Madleen, a boat carrying humanitarian aid to Gaza, and detained the volunteers on the vessel on Monday, approximately 1,000 pro-Palestinian advocates from across Northwest Africa were boarding a convoy of buses and cars in Tunisia—planning to travel for days to the Rafah crossing, where they aim to break Israel’s blockade that’s starving people across the war-torn enclave.

The Sumud Convoy, whose name means “steadfastness” or “resilience” in Arabic, is carrying aid and being led by the Coordination of Joint Action for Palestine in Tunisia, and has ties to the Global March for Gaza, which includes rights advocates from about 50 countries across the world who were en route to Cairo on Wednesday.

“This is a civil and popular initiative in response to the ongoing genocide in Gaza,” Wael Naouar, a member of the organizing team, told The New Arab. “We refuse to remain silent.”

The convoy crossed into Libya on Tuesday and has been resting after a full day of travel as organizers wait for permission to cross the eastern part of the divided country.

In Tripoli in the western region, the volunteers have been welcomed by hundreds of locals, and fuel station owners have reportedly said they will provide free gas to all cars, buses, and trucks that join the convoy.

“This visit brings us joy,” architect Alaa Abdel Razzaq told Agence France-Presse.

Along with the current delay in receiving approval from eastern Libyan authorities to cross the region, the convoy and the Global March for Gaza could face resistance from the Egyptian government as organizers plan to march for three days from El Arish in the Sinai Peninsula to the Rafah crossing.

Egypt classifies the area between El Arish and Rafah as a military zone and has not released a statement on whether it will allow the march.

If the volunteers make it to the Rafah crossing, they will have to contend with the Israel Defense Forces. In addition to abducting international activists including Swedish climate leader Greta Thunberg and Palestinian-French member of European Parliament Rima Hassan this week, Israeli forces killed 10 activists carrying humanitarian aid to Gaza on a Turkish flotilla in 2010.

Ghaya Ben Mbarek, an independent journalist from Tunis, told Al Jazeera that people in the convoy “are feeling courage and anger” as they head toward the Gaza border.

“The message people here want to send to the world is that even if you stop us by sea, or air, then we will come, by the thousands, by land,” Ben Mbarek told Al Jazeera. “We will literally cross deserts… to stop people from dying from hunger.”

Fadi Quran of the U.S.-based advocacy group Avaaz said the journey of the convoy—which has been growing as more people have joined since leaving Tunisia—is “one of the most beautiful things humanity has to offer in 2025.”

“A tsunami of humanity is rising for Gaza,” said Quran. “Amplify it.”

The Sumud Convoy is supported by the Tunisian General Labor Union, the National Bar Association, the Tunisian League for Human Rights, and the Tunisian Forum for Economic and Social Rights, while groups including the Palestinian Youth Movement and CodePink are affiliated with the Global March for Gaza.

Advocates from countries including the Netherlands, Canada, and Ireland plan to arrive in Cairo on Thursday, when they hope to begin the three-day march to Rafah.

Canadian Sen. Yuen Pau Woo wrote to the Egyptian government on Tuesday, asking for support for the march.

“I believe that Egypt’s support for this humanitarian action would send a powerful message to the international community,” said Woo.

Kellie McConnell, a member of Irish Healthcare Workers for Palestine, also expressed hope that the international action will force governments around the world, including those that have backed Israel’s bombardment and blockade of Gaza, to “pay attention and do everything in their power” to end the attacks that have killed more than 55,000 Palestinians.

https://twitter.com/IrishhcwforPal/statuses/1932675184437178587

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“We can turn the tables in this genocide,” said McConnell. “We can stop the absolutely appalling brutalization and desperate treatment of people in Palestine.”

If the advocates are blocked at the border like the Madleen was intercepted on Monday, one activist in the Sumud Convoy told The New Arab, “even that will send a message.”

“People over power,” they said. “If they stop dozens, thousands will rise.”

Original article by Julia Conley republished from Common Dreams under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0).

Experiencing issues with this image not appearing. I suspect because it's so critical of Zionist Keir Starmer's support of and complicity in Israel's genocides.
Genocide denier and Current UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer is quoted that he supports Zionism without qualification. He also confirms that UK air force support has been essential in Israel’s mass-murdering genocide. Includes URLs https://www.declassifieduk.org/keir-starmers-100-spy-flights-over-gaza-in-support-of-israel/ and https://youtu.be/O74hZCKKdpA
UK Labour Party government ministers Keir Starmer, Angela Rayner and Rachel Reeves explain that they are partners complicit in Israel's Gaza genocide. The UK has provided Israel with arms, military and air force support. They explain that they don't do gas chambers but do do forced marches, starvation, destroy hospitals, mass-murders of journalists and healthcare workers.
UK Labour Party government ministers Keir Starmer, Angela Rayner and Rachel Reeves explain that they are partners complicit in Israel’s Gaza genocide. The UK has provided Israel with arms, military and air force support. They explain that they don’t do gas chambers but do do forced marches, starvation, destroy hospitals, mass-murders of journalists and healthcare workers.
Vote Labour for Genocide.
Vote Labour for Genocide.
Continue Reading‘We Refuse to Remain Silent’: 1,000 North African Volunteers Make Their Way to Gaza to Break Israeli Siege

At Least 14 More Palestinians Killed at Aid Points as Israel Detains Humanitarian Volunteers

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Original article by Julia Conley republished from Common Dreams under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0).

Palestinians go to an aid distribution point in the Netzarim Corridor in the central Gaza Strip on June 8, 2025. (Photo: Moiz Salhi/Anadolu via Getty Images)

“The almost daily massacres of starving Palestinian families desperately seeking food denied to them by the Israeli-imposed campaign of intentional starvation are crimes against humanity,” said one advocate.

As activists who had been headed for Gaza with humanitarian aid remained in Israeli custody Monday, Palestinian rights advocates condemned reports that the death toll at aid distribution points set up by a private Israel-backed company continued to grow.

The Associated Pressreported that “Israeli forces and allied local gunmen” were behind gunfire that killed at least 14 Palestinians who were taken to local hospitals on Monday, and roughly 100 people were injured.

The people killed were the latest among a total of at least 127 Palestinians who have been killed as they’ve approached distribution points set up by the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, a private group staffed by U.S. defense contractors and supported by the Israeli and U.S. governments—but rejected by the United Nations and groups that have long provided aid in Gaza, who say the GHF is not a neutral party and is endangering Palestinians by forcing them to walk several miles through their war-torn enclave to retrieve food boxes weighing 44 pounds each.

At Al Jazeera, Hind Khoudary reported that as Palestinians have approached the aid points in recent days, “the Israeli army starts opening fire, Israeli quadcopters hover above their heads, and Israeli tanks proceed to bear down on the aid seekers.”

Among the people killed at a distribution point in Rafah near al-Mawasi was “a woman named Hanan who was solely responsible for feeding her kids and family,” reported Khoudary.

“These distribution sites are in the middle of nowhere, where Israeli bulldozers destroyed residential homes,” Khoudary added. “It’s totally chaotic. Israeli forces have been firing live ammunition as well as tear gas canisters to disperse starving Palestinians.”

The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) have previously admitted to opening fire on Palestinians at GHF sites, but have claimed “shots were directed near individual suspects who advanced toward the troops.”

The APreported that men from a local militia called the Popular Forces, led by Yasser Abu Shabab, opened fire at a distribution site in Khan Younis after the men tried to organize the crowd and people “pushed forward.”

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said last week that his government has armed Abu Shabab’s militia as part of an effort to undermine Hamas. Abu Shabab denied the claim. Aid workers have said the Popular Forces have long looted trucks carrying humanitarian relief—something Israel has repeatedly accused Hamas of doing as it has entirely cut off aid to Gaza since March.

An eyewitness named Hussein Shamimi told the AP that his 14-year-old cousin was killed in the attack on Monday.

“There was an ambush,” said Shamimi, “the Israelis from one side and Abu Shabab from another.”

At least four people were shot in the neck, another witness told the outlet.

Nihad Awad, national executive director of the Council on American Islamic Relations in the U.S., called for an “immediate end” to the U.S. government’s “complicity” in Israel’s assault on Gaza, which has killed more than 54,000 Palestinians since October 2023, and in the attacks on people at GHF aid points.

“The almost daily massacres of starving Palestinian families desperately seeking food denied to them by the Israeli-imposed campaign of intentional starvation are crimes against humanity carried out with the complicity of our own government,” said Awad. “Food and other humanitarian supplies must enter Gaza unimpeded, without Israel being allowed to use starvation as a weapon of war and a tool for ethnic cleansing.”

Also in Khan Younis on Monday, a Palestinian child became the latest to die of malnutrition at the Children’s and Maternity Hospital.

At least 58 children in Gaza have died of malnutrition since Israel began its total blockade of aid in early March.

Meanwhile, organizers with the Freedom Flotilla Coalition reported Monday they had been unable to contact 12 international activists and volunteers who were aboard the Madleen, bound for Gaza, for 19 hours.

The activists, including Swedish climate leader Greta Thunberg, had been sailing to Gaza to deliver humanitarian aid.

“These citizens were sailing peacefully under international law, in international waters, and Israel went and forcibly abducted them,” Huwaida Arraf toldAl Jazeera. “This was done, as Israel puts it, to ‘maintain a maritime closure of Gaza’—which it has no authority to do.”

Original article by Julia Conley republished from Common Dreams under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0).

Experiencing issues with this image not appearing. I suspect because it's so critical of Zionist Keir Starmer's support of and complicity in Israel's genocides.
Genocide denier and Current UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer is quoted that he supports Zionism without qualification. He also confirms that UK air force support has been essential in Israel’s mass-murdering genocide. Includes URLs https://www.declassifieduk.org/keir-starmers-100-spy-flights-over-gaza-in-support-of-israel/ and https://youtu.be/O74hZCKKdpA
UK Labour Party government ministers Keir Starmer, Angela Rayner and Rachel Reeves explain that they are partners complicit in Israel's Gaza genocide. The UK has provided Israel with arms, military and air force support. They explain that they don't do gas chambers but do do forced marches, starvation, destroy hospitals, mass-murders of journalists and healthcare workers.
UK Labour Party government ministers Keir Starmer, Angela Rayner and Rachel Reeves explain that they are partners complicit in Israel’s Gaza genocide. The UK has provided Israel with arms, military and air force support. They explain that they don’t do gas chambers but do do forced marches, starvation, destroy hospitals, mass-murders of journalists and healthcare workers.
Continue ReadingAt Least 14 More Palestinians Killed at Aid Points as Israel Detains Humanitarian Volunteers

As Israeli defence forces “wreak carnage” it’s time for UK government to act, say Greens 

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Ellie Chowns, Green Party MP for North Herefordshire. CC image Wikipedia.
Ellie Chowns, Green Party MP for North Herefordshire. CC image Wikipedia.

Reacting to the third consecutive day in which Palestinians in Gaza have been gunned down by Israeli defence forces as they tried to access food aid, Ellie Chowns MP, Green Party Foreign Affairs spokesperson, said

“Having bombed people in their homes or tents as they sleep; shelled hospitals where people are being treated or schools where they seek shelter, the Israeli defence forces are now wreaking untold carnage, gunning hungry Palestinians down as they try to collect food aid they’ve been denied for weeks.  

“Two weeks ago, we heard lots of bluster from the Labour government about how awful and unacceptable the situation in Gaza was, but the concrete action pledged by Keir Starmer hasn’t materialised. It’s time for action, not more words – Israel has crossed too many red lines.  

“The government must call for an immediate ceasefire and denounce Israel’s atrocities for what they are – genocide. They must now end all arms sales to the country, impose a wide range of sanctions and call for the arrest and trial of all those guilty of war crimes – including prime minister Netanyahu.”  

Experiencing issues with this image not appearing. I suspect because it's so critical of Zionist Keir Starmer's support of and complicity in Israel's genocides.
Genocide denier and Current UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer is quoted that he supports Zionism without qualification. He also confirms that UK air force support has been essential in Israel’s mass-murdering genocide. Includes URLs https://www.declassifieduk.org/keir-starmers-100-spy-flights-over-gaza-in-support-of-israel/ and https://youtu.be/O74hZCKKdpA
UK Labour Party government ministers Keir Starmer, Angela Rayner and Rachel Reeves explain that they are partners complicit in Israel's Gaza genocide. The UK has provided Israel with arms, military and air force support. They explain that they don't do gas chambers but do do forced marches, starvation, destroy hospitals, mass-murders of journalists and healthcare workers.
UK Labour Party government ministers Keir Starmer, Angela Rayner and Rachel Reeves explain that they are partners complicit in Israel’s Gaza genocide. The UK has provided Israel with arms, military and air force support. They explain that they don’t do gas chambers but do do forced marches, starvation, destroy hospitals, mass-murders of journalists and healthcare workers.

Continue ReadingAs Israeli defence forces “wreak carnage” it’s time for UK government to act, say Greens 

‘They Are Now Planning on Annihilating Khan Younis’: New IDF Displacement Order Sparks Alarm

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Original article by Jake Johnson republished from Common Dreams under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0). 

Victims of the Israeli attack are taken from the morgue of al-Nasser Hospital to be buried after funeral procedures, on May 19, 2025 in Khan Younis.
 (Photo: Abed Rahim Khatib/Anadolu via Getty Images)

The United Nations human rights chief called Israel’s intensifying assault on Gaza “tantamount to ethnic cleansing.”

The Israeli military on Monday designated Gaza’s second-largest city a combat zone and ordered all residents to evacuate ahead of an “unprecedented attack,” the latest escalation of Israel’s U.S.-backed genocidal assault on the enclave’s besieged and starving population.

The forced displacement order came as Israeli tanks and troops pushed further into the Gaza Strip as part of a renewed ground assault on the territory, which has been decimated by relentless bombings that began in the aftermath of the Hamas-led October 7, 2023 attack.

The Euro-Mediterranean Human Rights Monitor said Monday that the rate of Israeli killings in Gaza has intensified significantly in recent days, crushing any lingering hope of an imminent cease-fire and heightening alarm over the rapidly deteriorating humanitarian emergency on the ground.

The group estimated that more than 300,000 Palestinians were forcibly displaced between May 12 and 18, with that number set to grow with the evacuation of Khan Younis.

“This surge in lethal attacks is part of a broader escalation by the Israeli military, marked by a scorched-earth policy and the systematic destruction of Gaza’s remaining residential areas and infrastructure,” said Euro-Med. “The ongoing campaign—now in its 19th month—has been characterised by mass killings, enforced starvation, and the deliberate dismantling of life-sustaining systems, with the explicit aim of eradicating the Palestinian population in Gaza and eliminating any possibility of return or reconstruction.”

Avichay Adraee, a spokesperson for the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF), wrote in a social media post early Monday that “from this moment, Khan Younis governorate will be considered a dangerous combat zone.”

“The IDF will launch an unprecedented attack to destroy the capabilities of terrorist organizations in this area,” Adraee continued. “For your safety, evacuate immediately.”

Video footage posted to social media showed Israeli airstrikes pounding the area and residents scrambling to evacuate their families, many of whom have already been displaced multiple times since late 2023.

“They are literally forcing all of Gazans into a concentration camp in what used to be Rafah in southern Gaza, after destroying it. They are now planning on annihilating Khan Younis,” Elia Ayoub, a researcher based in the United Kingdom, wrote Monday. “There’s never been a genocide so thoroughly documented as it was live-streamed straight to our phones.”

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who is facing an International Criminal Court arrest warrant for war crimes in Gaza, said Monday that the IDF is moving to seize “full control” of the “entire strip” while allowing in “minimal” humanitarian aid—remarks that deepened concerns about Israeli plans to starve out Gaza’s population and annex the territory.

“If this means annexation, it violates international law,” Swedish Foreign Minister Maria Malmer Stenergard said in response to Netanyahu’s comments. “Sweden maintains that the territory of Gaza must not be changed or reduced.”

“There needs to be a cease-fire and end to the fighting, and the hostages must be released,” she added. “No more statements or plans from the Israeli government that exacerbate the situation for civilians in Gaza.”

Over the past 24 hours, Israeli airstrikes have killed more than 130 people, bringing the official death toll since October 2023 to 53,486, according to Gaza’s Ministry of Health.

In a statement late last week, United Nations human rights chief Volker Türk warned that Israel’s “latest barrage of bombs” and “methodical destruction of entire neighborhoods”—as well as the cut-off of humanitarian assistance—signals “a push for a permanent demographic shift in Gaza that is in defiance of international law and is tantamount to ethnic cleansing.”

“We must stop the clock on this madness,” said Türk.

Original article by Jake Johnson republished from Common Dreams under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0). 

Experiencing issues with this image not appearing. I suspect because it's so critical of Zionist Keir Starmer's support of and complicity in Israel's genocides.
Genocide denier and Current UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer is quoted that he supports Zionism without qualification. He also confirms that UK air force support has been essential in Israel’s mass-murdering genocide. Includes URLs https://www.declassifieduk.org/keir-starmers-100-spy-flights-over-gaza-in-support-of-israel/ and https://youtu.be/O74hZCKKdpA
UK Labour Party government ministers Keir Starmer, Angela Rayner and Rachel Reeves explain that they are partners complicit in Israel's Gaza genocide. The UK has provided Israel with arms, military and air force support. They explain that they don't do gas chambers but do do forced marches, starvation, destroy hospitals, mass-murders of journalists and healthcare workers.
UK Labour Party government ministers Keir Starmer, Angela Rayner and Rachel Reeves explain that they are partners complicit in Israel’s Gaza genocide. The UK has provided Israel with arms, military and air force support. They explain that they don’t do gas chambers but do do forced marches, starvation, destroy hospitals, mass-murders of journalists and healthcare workers.
Vote For Genocide Vote Labour.
Vote For Genocide Vote Labour.
Continue Reading‘They Are Now Planning on Annihilating Khan Younis’: New IDF Displacement Order Sparks Alarm

‘Massacre After Massacre’: Israel Mounts ‘Extensive’ Ground Operation in Gaza

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Original article by Eloise Goldsmith republished from Common Dreams under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0). 

Palestinian rescuers remove the body of a victim from the site of an Israeli strike in al-Saftawi area west of Jabalia in the northern Gaza Strip on May 18, 2025. 
(Photo: Bashar Taleb/AFP via Getty Images)

On Sunday, Israel’s prime minister said that Israel will permit a “basic” amount of food aid to enter the Gaza Strip. Israel has imposed a total blockade on humanitarian aid since early March.

Over 140 Palestinians in Gaza have been killed by Israeli strikes since early Sunday as part of a new ground operation launched by Israel, according to Al Jazeera, which cited medical sources.

The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said Sunday it had begun “extensive ground operations throughout northern and southern Gaza as part of Operation ‘Gideon’s Chariots.'”

According to The Associated Press, the offensive is the largest since Israel shattered an eight-week cease-fire in mid-March.

Local health officials report that over 3,000 Palestinians have been killed since that cease-fire ended, and 53,000 people have been killed in Gaza since October 7, 2023, when Hamas attacked Israel, prompting Israel to launch a fierce military campaign on the enclave.

Amid reported Israeli attacks on the Indonesian Hospital in northern Gaza, the Gaza Health Ministry on Sunday said that all public hospitals in northern Gaza are “out of service.”

Israel has also imposed a complete blockade of humanitarian aid into Gaza in early March, but according to the AP Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Sunday his cabinet approved a move to permit a “basic” amount of food into the enclave.

On Sunday morning, the journalist Mehdi Hasan wrote on Bluesky: “135 Palestinians killed in Gaza so far today. Massacre after massacre, day after day. The world does nothing.”

Original article by Eloise Goldsmith republished from Common Dreams under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0). 

UK Labour Party government ministers Keir Starmer, Angela Rayner and Rachel Reeves explain that they are partners complicit in Israel's Gaza genocide. The UK has provided Israel with arms, military and air force support. They explain that they don't do gas chambers but do do forced marches, starvation, destroy hospitals, mass-murders of journalists and healthcare workers.
UK Labour Party government ministers Keir Starmer, Angela Rayner and Rachel Reeves explain that they are partners complicit in Israel’s Gaza genocide. The UK has provided Israel with arms, military and air force support. They explain that they don’t do gas chambers but do do forced marches, starvation, destroy hospitals, mass-murders of journalists and healthcare workers.
Vote For Genocide Vote Labour.
Vote For Genocide Vote Labour.
Experiencing issues with this image not appearing. I suspect because it's so critical of Zionist Keir Starmer's support of and complicity in Israel's genocides.
Genocide denier and Current UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer is quoted that he supports Zionism without qualification. He also confirms that UK air force support has been essential in Israel’s mass-murdering genocide. Includes URLs https://www.declassifieduk.org/keir-starmers-100-spy-flights-over-gaza-in-support-of-israel/ and https://youtu.be/O74hZCKKdpA
Continue Reading‘Massacre After Massacre’: Israel Mounts ‘Extensive’ Ground Operation in Gaza