LET'S BREAK THE SIEGE OF GAZA with the Global Sumud Flotilla
The United Nations General Assembly, with Resolution 60/1 of September 16, 2005, established that
each individual State has the responsibility to protect its populations from genocide, war crimes, ethnic cleansing and crimes against humanity.
It also ruled that if a state is unable to do so or clearly fails to assume responsibility for protecting its population from genocide, war crimes, ethnic cleansing, and crimes against humanity, but deliberately commits them,
the international community, in accordance with the United Nations Charter, international human rights law, and international humanitarian law, has a responsibility to use appropriate diplomatic, humanitarian, and other peaceful means to protect the population from such crimes.
The Security Council may also
take prompt and decisive collective action if peaceful means prove inadequate and the national authorities manifestly fail to protect their populations from genocide, war crimes, ethnic cleansing, and crimes against humanity.
Faced with the criminal behavior of the State of Israel in the Gaza Strip and the inertia, which amounts to complicity, of the member states of the European Union, the European civil society has the right and duty to interfere in the internal affairs of the State of Israel in order to provide food, medicine, and basic services to the Palestinian population.
The “Responsibility to Protect” does not provide for or tolerate the double standards that characterize the behavior of most European governments in office. The law is the same for everyone, as written in courtrooms and taught in schools.
The action of the Global Sumud Flotilla aimed at breaking the siege of Gaza, as the Beati costruttori di pace (Blessed Peacemakers) did with their mission to Sarajevo in December 1992 to end one of the bloodiest conflicts of the late 20th century, is therefore necessary and legitimate under the Charter of the United Nations and international human rights law.
The Global Sumud Flotilla is doing what European states should be doing under the authority of the United Nations: saving the Palestinian people and calling for the arrest of criminals for whom an international arrest warrant has been issued by the International Criminal Court.
Asking the Global Sumud Flotilla to abandon its peaceful, nonviolent, and unarmed mission, without even naming the criminals, as some European governments are doing, is a further act of unbearable hypocrisy and serious complicity with the crimes being perpetrated in the Gaza Strip.
By virtue of the principle of “Responsibility to Protect,” the Global Sumud Flotilla is carrying out a major “Rescue Operation” for the children and all the survivors of Gaza. With every hour that passes, some of them will be killed, wounded, or tortured! And the blame also lies with those governments that are doing nothing to save them. Those who do not act are accomplices!
The Italian government must immediately dispatch the three Italian aircraft carriers “Cavour,” “Garibaldi,” and “Trieste” loaded with aid. The Prime Minister and the Minister of Foreign Affairs must board those ships, direct the rescue operations, and ask all European and other world leaders to do the same. The genocide and siege of Gaza must be stopped!
N.B. The sea off the Gaza Strip is not Israeli sea. That sea is part of the “Palestinian Territories” illegally occupied by the State of Israel. Israel's armed blockade of that strip of sea is an illegal act that cannot be tolerated.
Flavio Lotti, President of the PerugiAssisi Foundation for the Culture of Peace
Marco Mascia, President of the “Antonio Papisca” Human Rights Center – University of Padua
Perugia, Padua, September 29, 2025