Medea Benjamin reports on the attack on Conscience, a ship in the Freedom Flotilla Coalition, which has been challenging Israel’s maritime blockade of Gaza since 2008.
A tug vessel sprays water to extinguish a fire aboard The Conscience, a ship from the Gaza Freedom Flotilla, during a nighttime emergency on Friday. (Wikimedia Commons /Public Domain)
In the early hours of May 2, the quiet of night was shattered aboard the Conscience, a civilian vessel anchored in international waters, 17 kilometers off the coast of Malta. Aboard were 18 crew members and passengers, jolted from sleep by the sound of two explosions. Flames and smoke filled the air. The ship had just been struck — by what the crew members say were drone attacks.
The very day of the attack, more passengers from 21 countries were waiting in Malta to be ferried out to join the Conscience. Among those slated to join the ship were world-renowned environmentalist Greta Thunberg, retired U.S. Army Colonel Ann Wright and longtime CODEPINK activist Tighe Barry.
The Conscience is part of the Freedom Flotilla Coalition, a network of international activists that has been challenging Israel’s maritime blockade of Gaza since 2008.
The group alleges that the attack came from Israel — an allegation bolstered by a CNN investigation. According to CNN, flight-tracking data from ADS-B Exchange showed that an Israeli Air Force C-130 Hercules aircraft departed from Israel early Thursday afternoon and flew at low altitude over eastern Malta for an extended period.
While the Hercules did not land, its path brought it in proximity to the area where the Conscience was later attacked. The plane returned to Israel approximately seven hours later. The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) declined to comment on the flight data.
The ship suffered significant damage, but fortunately, no one was hurt.
?BREAKING: The Gaza Freedom Flotilla was attacked by drones in international waters before it could deliver humanitarian aid to Gaza.
This unarmed civilian ship that was going to carry passengers from 21 countries including CODEPINK’s Tighe Barry, Ann Wright, and Greta… pic.twitter.com/BIb5rnTRTH
— CODEPINK (@codepink) May 2, 2025
That was not the case when the Freedom Flotilla was attacked in 2010. This May 2 attack comes just weeks before the 15th anniversary of the infamous raid on the Mavi Marmara, the Turkish ship that led a previous flotilla to Gaza in 2010. On May 31 of that year, Israeli naval commandos stormed the ship in international waters, killing 10 people and injuring dozens.
The Mavi Marmara had been carrying over 500 activists and humanitarian supplies. That attack drew condemnation from around the world and calls for an international investigation — calls that Israel dismissed.
One of this year’s flotilla organizers, Ismail Behesti, is the son of a man killed in the 2010 raid. In videos circulating after the recent strike, Behesti is seen walking through the damaged interior of the Conscience, his voice resolute as he condemns what he believes was another Israeli act of aggression against civilians on a humanitarian mission.
“People are asking how Israel can get away with attacking a civilian ship in international waters,” said Tighe Barry, speaking from the port in Malta.
“But since October 8, 2024, Israel has shown complete disregard for international law — from bombing civilian neighborhoods to using starvation as a weapon by blocking food from entering Gaza. This is just one more example of its impunity.”
“Where is the outrage?” Barry continued. “The U.S. condemns the Houthis for stopping ships carrying weapons to Israel — and bombs Yemen mercilessly for it. But will they condemn Israel for attacking a peaceful ship on a humanitarian mission to Gaza?”
The Freedom Flotilla Coalition and activist groups such as CODEPINK are calling on governments and international bodies to speak out and take action.
The Conscience was carrying no weapons. It posed no threat. Its only crime was daring to challenge a brutal siege and slaughter that the U.N. itself has condemned as illegal and inhumane. That’s the real threat Israel fears — not the ship itself, but the global solidarity it represents.
So, will the world speak up about Israel’s latest outrage? Or will this, too, be quietly buried beneath the waves?
Medea Benjamin is the co-founder of CODEPINK: Women for Peace and the author of numerous books including Kingdom of the Unjust: Behind the US-Saudi Connection and Inside Iran: the Real History and Politics of the Islamic Republic of Iran.
This article is from CODEPINK.
Views expressed in this article and may or may not reflect those of Consortium News.
God bless the brave
If one will pardon the pun, this operation appears like a malformed and unholy combination of “Operation Wooden Leg,” in which the Israeli Air Force bombed Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) headquarters in Hammam Chott, Tunisia (only around 230 miles from Malta), resulting in multiple needless civilian casualties, which even the United States under the Reagan administration condemned, and “Opération Satanique,” the sinking of Greenpeace’s “Rainbow Warrior” civilian activist vessel in New Zealand by agents of France’s Direction Générale de la Sécurité Extérieure (DGSE) intelligence service, leading to the fatal drowning of photojournalist Fernando Pereira, both of which took place far from the territory of the perpetrators around forty years ago in 1985.
It is unfortunate that, in today’s geopolitical environment, many of the same institutions that rightfully deplored these wanton acts of state terrorism, committed with negligible national security justification, are far less likely to greet the Maltese incident with the degree of opprobrium it deserves.
Israel “attacking a civilian ship in international waters!”
Why that’s nothing Tighe, just look at what the Zionist
state did to the USS Liberty (1967), also in international
waters.
Just looked over today’s New York Times website, and couldn’t find anything about this attack. Which must mean it didn’t happen.
That’s TERRORISM, pure and simple!
Malta is a neutral small country so of course has no rights. A good interview recently on Neutrality Studies gives an excellent explanation.
When/how will the zio-criminal entity be stopped? It needs to be shut down. ASAP.
Are you talking about Israel or the United States? The two countries have operated as a single entity for some time now.
Today, Israel is conducting a large number of air strikes targeting Damascus and Idlib among the list. No word yet on Turkey’s response since the area up near the Turkish border has been a protected region from air strikes for most of the last decade. This means American High Explosives have been exploding from Gaza to the Turkey border. Possibly from Malta to Damascus, but I can’t tell the manufacturer of the civilian-targeting drone yet from reports.
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Is there any chance that the EU mistook this boat for those evil migrants who try to invade their garden and must therefore die in the Med? They don’t normally openly shoot at the boats though, Just let the quietly go under with a slow response? Or manage to “accidentally” capsize the boat with a tow rope and suddenly bad seapersonship? Drownings is the EU modus operandi, not usually drones.
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Notice that this happened in the waters of the UK Commonwealth state of Malta. The UK of course does “intelligence sharing” with Israel, including reports of spy planes flying over Gaza taking pictures for ….. uh ….. looking for the 1970’s IRA? I’d guess the Press Office says that, or anything besides collecting intelligence to share with Israel.
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Why does this group always stage their boats from NATO? IIRC, last time they got stuck in a port in Turkey when the long-time Israel trade-partner and NATO nation refused to let them sail? Here’s a hint …. Stay away from NATO. NATO is not your friend. NATO is Israel’s friend.