Italy, Spain deploy vessels to protect Gaza flotilla

Italy and Spain have deployed naval ships to assist an international aid flotilla that has come under drone attack while trying to deliver aid to Gaza, potentially ratcheting up tensions with Israel, which strongly opposes the initiative.

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The Global Sumud Flotilla is using about 50 civilian boats to try to break Israel's naval blockade of Gaza. Many lawyers, parliamentarians and activists, including Swedish climate campaigner Greta Thunberg, are on board.

The Italian defence ministry said a frigate that was dispatched on Wednesday, hours after the GSF was targeted on its way to Gaza, would be replaced by another vessel, adding that the aim was to protect people.

"It is not an act of war, it is not a provocation: it is an act of humanity, which is a duty of a state towards its citizens," Defence Minister Guido Crossetto told the upper house of parliament on the decision to send a ship.