Barcelona, Spain – Volunteers from all over the world have gathered in the main room of one of the oldest unions in Spain, UGT – formerly a registration center for international volunteers who came to Spain to fight fascism during the Spanish civil war.
Now he has trained non -violent international volunteers – supporters of Palestine, activists, journalists and politicians – who will sail on Flatilla Global Sumud on Sunday.
“We are not heroes. We are not history. History is the inhabitants of Gaza,” said organizer Thiago Avila, a permanent activist in Palestine and environmental justice, told the crowd for a press conference before ships set sail.
Their objective is to provide humanitarian aid, which is the only cargo in the flotilla, and to open a humanitarian corridor for the Palestinians to be hungry and killed by Israel.
In less than two years of war, Israel has killed more than 63,000 Palestinians with tens of thousands of people more injured and disappeared.
Navigate uncertainty
About 26,000 requests from people around the world have entered and have been reduced to the hundreds who will be on the around 100 flotilla boats.
Flotilla will start in Barcelona and go to Tunisia, where it will be joined by more ships on Thursday.
Once again on the Mediterranean Sea, he will converge with more boats leaving Italy and other non -disclosed ports, and together, they will sail in formation to the Gaza Strip.
The organizers know that time is against them, because Israel kills the Palestinians daily, not only using air strikes and land forces, but also an artificial famine it has imposed.
Since 2010, all the Freedom Flotillas in Gaza have been intercepted or attacked by Israeli forces.
In June, the Madleen ship was illegally intercepted by Israeli forces in international waters about 185 km (115 miles) west of Gaza, where Israel has no authority. His crew, which included climate activist Greta Thunberg, was detained or expelled.
In 2010, Gaza Liberté Flotilla, made up of six ships with humanitarian aid and more than 600 passengers, was attacked by Israeli commandos in Mediterranean waters.
The commandos killed 10 activists and injured dozens.
Other attempts were blocked by Israel in 2011, 2015, 2018 and several attempts in 2025, including conscience, which was struck twice by 25 km (14 naval miles) drones off Malta.
An earlier attempt on earth, called the world march in Gaza, participated in June to provide aid to Gaza by crossing Rafah with Egypt.
Many of these volunteers have gathered in Tunisia to collect ships to join the Global Sumud Flatilla.
Determined volunteers
The rally of Barcelona reflected a large international presence, in particular delegations of Argentina, Brazil, Germany, Malaysia, Mexico, Poland and the United States.
Volunteers, some veterans of several flotters, are focused on their collective objective: to break the headquarters of Israel from Gaza and provide help to its people.
The training sessions in Barcelona were intense, designed to prepare participants for scenarios such as interception in international waters, arrest, imprisonment, expulsion, violent aggressions or bureaucratic strategies to stop the departure of boats.
But the basis of their preparation is to maintain non-violence in one of these scenarios, which the organizers have highlighted several times and warned that the rupture of this principle would not be accepted.
Each volunteer signed a strict code of conduct, committing to peaceful resistance and rejecting the oppression and operating systems throughout the mission.
Workshops have also revised the history of the non -violent struggle – of the management of Mahatma Gandhi in the independence movement of India at the challenge of Rosa Parks against racial segregation in the United States.
Among the participants, Luna Valentina, a 24 -year -old Colombian volunteer. She is married to a Palestinian refugee and lived herself after being targeted in Colombia for her activism during mass demonstrations against the former right president Ivan Duque.
The couple lives in Jordan after having faced racism in Europe while they were trying to find a place to settle down, she told Tel Aviv Tribune.
During the world march in Gaza, Valentina joined other Colombians on Rafah path. She recalled the solidarity, the strength and the care she found among the other Colombian activists, some of which will pass with her now, and others who will support the mission of the earth.
Prepare to go in a sail
Friday, a three -day celebration of volunteers and their mission began on Moll de la Fusta, a porterrel in Barcelona, while the countdown started for their departure.
It was a vague of warm support while the sounds of the battery filled the air, hundreds of Palestinian flags floated and crowds gathered for a festival of music, culture and art to show his support for the Palestinians in Gaza and for the volunteers of the flotilla.
What everyone hopes is that ships will arrive on the siege coast of Gaza and will provide humanitarian aid that Israel has prevented from entering.
For Avila, the father of a newborn baby, this flotilla continues a heritage: “I love my daughter so much, that mothers and fathers in Gaza, and because of this love, … We cannot leave a world like this. We must change the company that allows a genocide to perform, “he told Tel Aviv Tribune.
“I believe that anyone who died inside dies a little with each child from Gaza who dies,” he added.
This feeling was shared by an Australian mother of four children who also joined the flotilla. His voice broke by saying: “No one should live and die like that. Everyone deserves the same dignity and the same freedom.”