CrossFireArabia
Mahmoud Basal, a spokesman for the Palestinian Civil Defense, says nearly 200,000 Palestinians currently under Israeli siege in Jabalia are facing imminent death from Israeli airstrikes or from hunger and thirst due to the ongoing land blockade imposed by the Israeli army.
CrossFireArabia
Italians who took part in a humanitarian aid flotilla for Gaza said Wednesday that when the Israeli army attacked them last month in the Mediterranean in violation of international law, they abducted some activists, and subjected them to ill-treatment amounting to torture.
“This time, the Israeli army responded to the flotilla much more violently” than in past humanitarian efforts, Antonio La Piccirella, who took part in the Global Sumud Flotilla’s 2026 Spring Mission, told a press conference in Rome.
“There were two attacks, one of them off the coast of Europe. In the attack between Italy and Greece, they abducted two of our members, further violating international law. The other intervention was carried out in broad daylight and lasted for one-and-a-half days.”
La Piccirella said Israel last year allocated $180 million to anti-flotilla propaganda in order to fight them and build up a sense of “impunity,” and that this year they spent far more, some $760 million.
This propaganda was carried out through disinformation and aimed to create communities sympathetic to Israel in Europe and the US, he said.
Emphasizing that they would continue to take action in the future, La Piccirella said: “We are concerned with actions against the naval blockade of Palestine (and promoting) humanitarian aid, and international law.
“The international situation is constantly changing, and so is our strategy. So we repeat that we will definitely continue to do something,” he said.
Italian journalist Alessandro Mantovani, who also took part in the spring mission, stressed that after being detained he was not even allowed to say that he was a journalist.
“From the very beginning, we were beaten and forced into humiliating positions. When we were taken to their military ships, we were pushed down face-first onto the deck, tied up, then forced to kneel and kept in the same extremely uncomfortable position for hours. When we were brought to the ship that we all called the prison ship, we were systematically beaten,” he said.
The face-down positions he described fit video footage posted online by Israeli National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir, in which the activists were forced to kneel and were subjected to abusive language, mistreatment which drew fierce criticism from numerous countries.
Mantovani said he still has problems with his jaw because of the blows he received and that his jaw may have been dislocated.
The Italian journalist said the Israeli army treated Turkish activists especially badly.
“I think I can say that the Turks were treated even worse than the others; torture also has a geopolitical dimension,” he said.
Turkish leaders have been at the international forefront of condemning Israel’s genocide in Gaza as well as the famine and near-starvation of its populace due to a long-standing blockade of food, medicine, and other humanitarian supplies. The blockade was due to be relaxed in recent months, but many rights groups and international observers say the situation has improved little if at all.
Mantovani pointed out that the Global Sumud Flotilla was detained at night during its first voyage last year, while during this latest voyage it was detained in broad daylight.
He stressed that the Israeli army was not ashamed to show that it attacked unarmed people with weapons. Anadolu
CrossFireArabia
Nine Palestinians were killed and dozens wounded, including women and children, in simultaneous Israeli airstrikes early Thursday targeting four residential apartments across Gaza City, according to medical sources.
The latest strikes come as Israel continues to violate the ceasefire agreement in force in the Gaza Strip since Oct. 10, 2025.
Nine bodies and dozens of wounded were received at Al-Shifa Hospital, an Anadolu correspondent at the scene reported citing medical sources.
Some of the bodies arrived dismembered, while others were severely burned, the sources added.
Israel’s two-year genocide in Gaza since October 2023 has killed nearly 73,000 Palestinians and injured more than 173,000, most of them women and children, according to Palestinian figures.
Despite a ceasefire that took effect on Oct. 10, 2025, the Israeli army has killed 936 Palestinians and injured 2,903 in near-daily attacks, according to the Gaza Health Ministry.
