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The Israeli military forces have bought and blocked all 47 boats of the humanitarian mission Global Sumud Flotilla while they were in international waters directed towards the Gaza Strip. According to international law, the blocking of boats and the arrest of the activists on board can be configured as aillegal action In violation of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea. Let’s examine the individual reasons.
The sinking took place in international waters
The first question is related to the fact that the interception of the Flotilla took place in international waters. Article 87 of United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) sanctions as a fundamental principle of‘high sea that of the freedom of navigationaccording to which the ships of all states enjoy the right to navigate without restrictions. Furthermore, art.97 of the same agreement sanctions that:
In the event of ABONDO or any other navigation accident in the Upper Sea, which implies the criminal or disciplinary liability of the ship’s commander or any other crew member, criminal or disciplinary actions cannot be taken against such people, if not by the jurisdictional or administrative authorities of the flag or state of which such people have citizenship.
The Global Sumud Flotilla was a mission for humanitarian purposes
Israel justified his action on the basis of the – declared – of the Global Sumud Flotilla di violate the naval block imposed by the Jewish state on the waters in front of the Gaza Strip. The Sanremo Manual In fact, it establishes that a ship suspected of violating the block can be stopped, inspected and captured, but the la Fourth Geneva Convention On the protection of the civilian population, in armed conflicts it requires the obligation for the conflict parties they have to guarantee adequate supply of food and basic necessities to the civilian population. In other words, the passage of essential humanitarian aid must always be guaranteed, such as those transported by the flotilla which has always been declared as one peaceful and non -violent mission with humanitarian purposes In a context like that of the invasion of the strip in which Israel has been repeatedly accused of not guaranteeing an adequate influx of aid to the civilian population.
In addition, the naval blockage imposed by Israel would be upstream illegitimate according to international law since it does not comply with the specific rules established by Sanremo Manual: preventive notification, proportionality and the arrival of essential goods for the survival of the civilian population of the occupied territories. In any case, the block cannot extend beyond territorial waters.
The use of force
As for theuse of force used by the Israeli Armed Forces – including the use of water cannons, interception And Interruption of communications Both video and radio, arrest of unarmed civilians by military forces during a humanitarian mission – is considered an offense from the point of view of international law, since non -violent civil disobedience is not qualified as hostile act towards a state. By hostile act, in fact, we mean those actions that require qualified hostility, concrete and operationalin which non -armed civil initiatives are not included and with humanitarian purposes.
The flag law
The international law of the sea sanctions in the Montego Bay Convention also the Flag law principlei.e. the international ship regime, both public and private, according to which each ship is subjected exclusively to power of the state of which it has nationality – the so -called Flag. The ship is therefore considered the territory of the state whose flag beats, a principle that was defined in the past Territire Flottant.
For this reason, Israel could not exercise coercive actions against civil boats and foreign flag, effectively violating the freedom of navigation guaranteed by UNCLOS and in addition with the use of force against foreign ships, also violating article 2 of the United Nations Charterwhich prohibits the threat and use of force against territorial integrity or political independence of states.
A derogation To these principles, according to the Montego Bay convention is the‘art. 105, according to which any military ship or in the state service (provided that it is recognizable as such) can proceed on the high seas for the seizure of the ship and the goods contained in it, as well as the arrest of the people on board, in the hypothesis of exercising the piracy. In that case, the state can exercise its full criminal jurisdiction on the ship and responsible for the piracy documents, as if the fact had occurred in its territorial waters. This hypothesis does not correspond to the actions carried out by the Global Sumud Flotilla, since unlike the documents of piracy, the end from the peaceful mission And not violent is a end of humanitariannot justifying the use of strength.
Would he have been legal if he did it in the territorial waters of Gaza?
From the legal point of view the Gaza water in front They are not formally Israeli territorial waters, but on the contrary belonging to Palestine: in this regard, both in 2004 that in 2024 there International Court of Justice He had expressed himself in this sense by stating that the Palestinian people are entitled to self -determination and that the annexation of the Palestinian territories by Israel, including Gaza, was illegitimate. Since the‘territorial annexation from the Gaza Strip The extension of the Israeli territorial sovereignty on the sea in front of Gaza cannot be considered legitimate.
Even if Israel wanted to claim his territorial power over the waters in front of Gaza, according to the International sea law There is a limit to the power of the coastal state government: the right of harmless passage by the foreign shipsaccording to which each foreign ship has the right to the harmless passage in the territorial sea of a state, both to cross it and to enter the internal waters both to take the wide coming from these as long as the passage is quick and continuous. There is no parking faculty or anchoring unless there are ordinary events – as fuel supply – or force majeure, such as dangerous situations or need to help people or other ships. It is considered harmless as long as it does not give damage to peace, good order or safety of the coastal state.
Is Israel’s action configured as an act of piracy?
According to art. 100-110 from the Montego Bay Convention For piracy we mean illegal acts committed for private purposes or others non -political purposes from private ships or aircraft. However, this clause of “private ends” and non -political or of public interest, called “private ends“It is still a lot today debate On a legal level, since part of the doctrine does not agree on the assumption that an act of depictions or violence does not rest for the cases of piracy if motivated by a political purpose.
Even today the theme is widely debated but to configure a pirate act, but from a purely legal point of view, rather than piracy that of Israel is more assimilable to an attack on the flag state, therefore an act of aggression.
