COLUMN: 100 ships, 3,000 people, and a blockade that no one dares to name

A Man Who Has Already Paid the Price

Ehad Lotayef is no armchair activist. In 2011, this Montreal-based poet was detained for a week in Israel after attempting to reach Gaza by sea. He knows exactly what awaits him: the cell, the interrogation, the endless wait. He knows what captivity feels like when you’ve committed no crime.

And yet, he’s going back. Not in spite of what he knows, but precisely because he knows. “We’re not seeking to become martyrs,” he says, “but neither are we ignorant of the realities.” This statement is disarmingly lucid. No romanticism. No contrived heroism. Just the cold awareness of the price of human dignity when governments refuse to defend it.

The training no citizen should ever have to undergo

The flotilla participants receive specific training to prepare for possible violence during their detention. Read that sentence again. Civilians—doctors, poets, volunteers—must learn how to react if they are brutalized for transporting powdered milk. In what kind of world is this normal? In ours. In the one we have accepted.

When the History of First Nations Meets That of Gaza

Dr. Suzanne Shoush is a family physician in Toronto. She is Black and Indigenous, a member of the Leqʼá꞉mel First Nation. She participated in the flotilla last year and plans to return. And when she explains why, her words carry the weight of generations of dispossession.

“Indigenous peoples see themselves reflected in the plight of the Palestinians,” she says, “as peoples who have endured occupation and colonialism. ” This isn’t an intellectual analogy. It’s a visceral recognition. When you’ve grown up on land from which your ancestors were driven out, when your language was banned, when your very existence was denied by bureaucratic systems—you recognize the pattern when you see it elsewhere.

The sentence that sums it all up

Dr. Shoush said something I can’t forget: “At some point, you cross that line where standing there watching, knowing, and doing nothing is worse for you than anything that could happen.”

This sentence is not a slogan. It is a moral diagnosis. It describes the exact moment when individual conscience refuses to submit to collective inertia. The moment when inaction becomes more painful than the danger. Thousands of people have reached that moment. And they are boarding boats.

Sailing in accordance with international law, detained in violation of international law

Fida Alburini, a Palestinian-Canadian organizer, articulated the central paradox of this mission with surgical precision: “We are human, so of course we are afraid. But the risk shouldn’t exist, because we are sailing in accordance with international law in international waters. We are transporting humanitarian aid.”

Let’s pause for a moment to consider this legal absurdity. Civilians transporting powdered milk and medicine in international waters must fear being detained by the armed forces of a state that claims to respect the international order. Maritime law protects these convoys. Humanitarian law authorizes them. And yet, they are the ones being treated like criminals.

“The risk exists because Israel decides to attack us illegally”

This statement by Fida Alburini is devastatingly simple. It turns the tables. The danger does not come from the sea, nor from storms, nor from distance. The danger comes from a political decision: the decision to intercept, by military force, civilian ships carrying medical supplies. And this decision is made with complete impunity, year after year, before the eyes of the entire world.

What the Word “Blockade” Hides

The word “blockade” is a technical term. It evokes military files, UN resolutions, and debates among experts in maritime law. It is designed to numb the senses. What it hides is infinitely more brutal: for nearly twenty years, an entire population has been locked in. Not protected. Not safe. Locked in.

Israel claims that this naval blockade is necessary to prevent Hamas from importing weapons. Its critics—and there are many among international legal experts—see it as collective punishment. International law expressly prohibits collective punishment. Article 33 of the Fourth Geneva Convention is unambiguous. And yet, the blockade persists.

The figures we’d rather not read

In January 2026, according to the United Nations World Food Programme, an average of 225 trucks per day delivered food to the Gaza Strip. That figure seems impressive—until you compare it to the promise: 600 trucks per day, according to the October 2025 ceasefire agreement. The difference between 225 and 600 is famine. And the famine in Gaza is described as “acute” by humanitarian organizations.

Food prices have skyrocketed. Hospitals are operating with meager resources. Children are dying from preventable causes—malnutrition, infections, and a lack of basic medicines. And meanwhile, a naval blockade is preventing ships loaded with powdered milk from docking.

The end of “major operations” does not mean the end of deaths

The ceasefire agreement negotiated by the United States in October 2025 brought an end to major military operations. That is the official version. The reality is bleaker. Israel has continued to strike what it calls “militants,” often killing civilians. The word “often” in that sentence should be unbearable. It is no longer so. We’ve grown accustomed to it.

And it is precisely this complacency that the flotilla seeks to shatter. Not just the naval blockade. The mental blockade. The one that allows us to read “civilians killed” between sips of coffee and turn to the next page.

A maritime corridor as a response to congested land crossings

Ehad Lotayef made it clear: the flotilla’s goal is not to resolve the humanitarian crisis in Gaza. A hundred boats won’t feed two million people. The goal is to establish a maritime corridor to the region, to bypass the overburdened land crossings, to set a precedent. If a maritime corridor works once, it can work a hundred times.

It’s a long-term strategy in the midst of a short-term emergency. And that’s exactly what makes it both admirable and heartbreaking—because the children dying today don’t have the luxury of the long term.

2010: Ten Dead, and a World That Looked the Other Way

On May 31, 2010, Israeli commandos boarded the Mavi Marmara in international waters. Ten passengers were killed. Ten people carrying humanitarian aid, shot dead in the open sea. The international community expressed its “concern.” Then it moved on.

Sixteen years later, the same scenarios are repeating themselves. The same interceptions. The same detentions. The same expressions of diplomatic “concern.” And the same ships setting sail again, because the people on board refuse to accept that the Mavi Marmara was sacrificed for nothing.

Since 2008, not a single ship has reached Gaza

Eighteen years. For eighteen years, not a single humanitarian ship has managed to dock in Gaza. Every attempt has been intercepted. Every shipment confiscated. Every crew detained. And every year, new ships set sail. There is something deeply human about this determination—something that resembles the very definition of courage: doing what is right while knowing that failure is almost certain.

Six Citizens Arrested in International Waters, and Ottawa Looks the Other Way

When six Canadian citizens are arrested by a foreign power in international waters, what does the Canadian government do? The answer should be automatic: a diplomatic protest, summoning the ambassador, demanding an explanation. The actual response is a silence that speaks louder than any press release.

This silence comes at a moral cost. It tells Canadians boarding those ships: you’re on your own. It tells Israel: you can arrest our citizens with impunity. It tells the world: Canada chooses diplomatic expediency over the protection of its own citizens.

Variable-Geometry Sovereignty

Canada regularly invokes sovereignty and international law when it comes to defending its Arctic interests, its fishing zones, and its trade borders. But when its citizens are captured on the high seas for transporting medication, sovereignty suddenly becomes a vague, negotiable concept, subordinated to geopolitical considerations.

And yet, Canadians keep going back. Not because their government supports them. Despite the fact that their government does not support them.

What the Law Says

International maritime law is clear: freedom of navigation in international waters is a fundamental principle. International humanitarian law is clear: the delivery of aid to civilian populations must not be impeded. The Fourth Geneva Convention is clear: collective punishment is prohibited.

The legality of Israel’s naval blockade in international waters is a matter of debate among experts. But even those who recognize some legitimacy in the blockade admit that international law protects the delivery of humanitarian aid. Powdered milk is not a weapon. Medicines are not ammunition. Doctors are not combatants.

The Reality

The reality is that international law is only as strong as the will to enforce it. And that will is lacking. The International Court of Justice can issue advisory opinions. The Human Rights Council can adopt resolutions. Special rapporteurs can publish reports. None of this changes anything if the powers that have the ability to act choose not to act.

It is in this vacuum—between what the law says and what states do—that the flotillas operate. They occupy the space that governments have abandoned. They do the work that diplomacy refuses to do.

Who are these people boarding the ship?

The Sumud Global Flotilla and the Freedom Flotilla have merged this year for a joint expedition. This is no small matter. It means that two distinct movements, with different histories—Sumud since its recent creation, the Freedom Flotilla since 2010—have decided that the cause is greater than the organizations themselves.

On board are healthcare professionals ready to provide care. Construction workers ready to rebuild. Journalists ready to bear witness. And ordinary citizens who have decided that their physical presence was the only thing they could still offer when everything else had failed.

Sumud: A Word That Speaks Volumes

“Sumud” is an Arabic word meaning “resistance through perseverance,” “tenacity,” “rootedness.” It is the name Palestinians give to this form of resistance that consists simply of staying. Of existing. To refuse to disappear. Naming the flotilla “Sumud” is a way of saying: we will not come with weapons; we will come with our determination to be human.

The Mirror We Refuse to Look Into

The flotilla is not just a humanitarian operation. It is a moral test for each and every one of us. It poses a simple question: What do you do when you know? When you know that children are starving behind a blockade. When you know that aid exists but isn’t getting through. When you know that citizens of your own country are being arrested for trying to deliver medicine.

Most of us respond with the comfort of powerlessness. “It’s terrible, but what can we do?” Dr. Shoush, Ehad Lotayef, and Fida Alburini respond differently. They respond with their bodies on a boat.

The Difference Between Knowing and Acting

We all know. Information is circulating. The images are available. United Nations reports are public. 225 trucks instead of 600. Acute famine. Malnourished children. Destroyed hospitals. We know. And we go on with our lives. It is this distance—between knowing and acting—that every person who boards a ship in the flotilla refuses to accept.

What Will Happen, and What Should Happen

What will likely happen on April 12 is predictable. The ships will leave Spanish and Italian ports. They will sail toward Gaza. At some point, the Israeli navy will intercept them. The passengers will be arrested. The aid will be confiscated. A few headlines for 48 hours. Then it will be forgotten.

What should happen is quite different. Governments should demand safe passage for humanitarian aid. The international community should escort these ships. Maritime law should be enforced. But between what should be and what is, there is a chasm. And in that chasm, ordinary people are doing the work of governments.

A rendezvous with our own conscience

April 12, 2026, is not just the departure date of a flotilla. It is a rendezvous. Not for the 3,000 people boarding the ships—they have already made their decision. It is a rendezvous for us. For us who will watch the images on our screens. For us who will read the news reports. For us who will know, once again, and who will have to decide whether knowing is enough.

Dr. Shoush is right. There comes a point when standing by and watching becomes worse than anything that could happen. The question is: when will we reach that point? When will we cross that line?

Or have we already crossed it—and have we simply chosen not to look the other way?

Signed, Jacques PJ Provost