Israel says intercepted 175 Gaza flotilla activists on 20 boats

Israel’s foreign ministry said on Thursday that Israeli forces had arrested about 175 activists aboard 20 ships from an aid-laden flotilla bound for Gaza.

“Approximately 175 activists from more than 20 boats… are now making their way peacefully to Israel,” the ministry said in a statement, including a video of the activists aboard an Israeli navy ship.

Israel controls all entry points to Gaza, and has been accused by the United Nations and foreign NGOs of strangling the flow of goods into the territory, causing shortages since the start of the war in October 2023.

The statement came after the organisers of a flotilla carrying pro-Palestinian activists aiming to break through an Israeli blockade in Gaza said their boats were surrounded by Israeli “military boats”.

The flotilla, made up of more than 50 boats, set sail in recent weeks from Marseille in France, Barcelona in Spain and Syracuse in Italy.

In a post to X overnight, the Global Sumud Flotilla said that Israeli military boats had “illegally surrounded the flotilla in international waters and threatened kidnapping and violence”.

“Communications with 11 vessels have been lost,” the organisation added. The flotilla is currently off the coast of Greece, near Crete, according to the organisation’s live tracking on its website.

“Our boats were approached by military speedboats, self-identified as ‘Israel’, pointing lasers and semi-automatic assault weapons ordering participants to the front of the boats and to get on their hands and knees,” the organisation added.

“Boat communications are being jammed and a SOS was issued.”

In late 2025, an initial flotilla of about 50 boats, composed of political figures and activists such as Sweden’s Greta Thunberg, was boarded by the Israeli navy — illegally, according to the organisers and Amnesty International. The crew members were arrested and expelled by Israel.

Israel weaponsing access to water in Gaza: MSF

Meanwhile, according to a report by Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF), Israeli authorities have used access to water as a “weapon against Palestinians, systematically depriving people in Gaza, Palestine, of water in a campaign of collective punishment”.

MSF, in a statement, said that the “deliberate denial of water from Palestinians is an integral part of Israel’s genocide”.

“After the local authorities, MSF is the largest producer and a main distributor of drinking water in Gaza, yet between May and November 2025, one in every five of our water distributions ran dry as our trucks were unable to carry sufficient water for all the people who required it,” the organisation said.

Due to the Israeli military’s displacement orders, MSF teams were unable to reach areas where it previously provided water, the statement said.

It added that around “one-third” of MSF’s requests to “bring in critical water and sanitation supplies have been rejected or left unanswered”.

“These supplies include water desalination units, pumps, chlorine and other chemicals to treat water, water tanks, insect repellent, and latrines,” it said.

MSF warned that the consequences of the deprivation could be “far-reaching on people’s health, hygiene, and dignity”.