Turkey’s humanitarian ships refused entry to Gaza

Humanitarian supply ships headed from Turkey to Gaza have been denied the right to sail by an international shipping body.

The organization Freedom Flotilla Coalition said in a press statement Saturday afternoon the group organizing for support to Gaza was contacted by the Guinea Bissau International Ships Registry for an inspection of their lead ship.

The inspector for GBISR conducted the inspection on Friday, and the organization withdrew consent for the legal registration and flag use for the two FFC ships, citing the organization’s planned mission to Gaza amid the war between Hamas and Israel.

“Without a flag, we cannot sail. But this is not the end,” wrote the FFC.

FFC highlights this as “a blatantly political move,” noting the GBISR’s requests for a complete manifest of the ships and a letter explicitly approving the transportation of humanitarian aid.

“Normally, national flagging authorities concern themselves only with safety and related standards on vessels bearing their flag, and are not concerned with the destination, route, cargo manifests or the nature of a specific voyage,” wrote the FFC in its press statement. “Just like when you register your car, the authorities don’t require you to detail to them every place you are going to go with the car.”

FFC was created in 2010, consisting of a partnership between 14 pro-Palestinian organizations worldwide with the mission of acting against the Israeli blockade of the religion with “principles of non-violence and non-violent resistance.”

The organization decried the GBISR as having “allowed itself to become complicit in Israel’s deliberate starvation, illegal siege and genocide of Palestinians in Gaza.”

“Israel is only allowed to get away with this because we have an international order where law does not apply equally, where people are not valued the same, and where might equals right,” wrote the group.

The USAID published a memo in March saying that famine is “imminent” in northern Gaza by May and that there are “catastrophic levels of hunger and malnutrition” in the region.

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The U.S. agency last week confirmed to reporters they are working with the United Nations’s World Food Program to get humanitarian aid through the Israeli blockade to Gaza.

“This is a complex operation that requires coordination between many partners, and our conversations are ongoing,” said the USAID spokesperson. “Throughout Gaza, the safety and security of humanitarian actors is critical to the delivery of assistance, and we continue to advocate for measures that will give humanitarians greater assurances.”