Hamas voices outrage over Israeli forces’ hijacking of Gaza-bound aid ship

The Gaza-based Palestinian resistance movement delivered the comments in a statement on Sunday after Israeli navy forces boarded the vessel, named Handala, pointing their weapons towards its 21-strong crewmembers.

The group called the seizure “a new form of terrorism and piracy” that had posed a clear challenge to humanity’s conscience and will.

By capturing the ship, Hamas added, the Israeli regime showed once again that it refused to commit to any humanitarian regulations or international laws.

The attack came “while Gaza is facing an all-out war, a policy of systematic starvation, and a brutal siege,” it noted.

The movement was referring to the regime’s ongoing war of genocide on Gaza, which began in October 2023.

As a means of, what experts have called, trying to maximize fatalities, the regime has further tightened its grip on the territory over the past months, reinforcing a blockade that has been in place since 2007.

Nearly all life-saving aid has been kept out as a result, despite the desperate need on the ground.

The combination of the relentless bombardment and suffocating restrictions that has been increasingly condemned as strategic use of starvation as a weapon, has taken a staggering human toll.

Hamas, meanwhile, felicitated Handala’s crew for their heading out on the brave journey, saying the move had further awakened the global public opinion to the extent of the regime’s atrocities.

The movement commended grassroots efforts to break the siege on Gaza, calling such actions a reflection of “humanity’s living conscience,” and a means of exposing the true nature of the Zionist regime and certain powers’ complicity in its crimes.