Following major victories, activists in Spain, Morocco and Gibraltar mobilize together to block energy transport to Israel as part of the No Harbour for Genocide Campaign.
The Overseas Santorini, which is slated to reach the Strait of Gibraltar on Tuesday, July 30, is one of two tanker vessels that have shipped millions of barrels of military grade jet fuel from Valero Energy, through a U.S. government contract to Israel, from 2014 to the present. It departed from Valero’s Corpus Christi refinery in Texas on July 15, following its standard route for transporting JP-8 fuel from there to Israel’s port of Ashkelon, generally docking in Algeciras, Spain on the way there, and Limassol, Cyprus, on the way back, and sometimes calling at other Atlantic and Mediterranean ports. Independent researchers have been tracking these shipments, which have been leaving approximately every two months. Each shipment carries around 300,000 barrels of fuel—capable of refueling an F-16 fighter jet (military warplane) 12,000 times, according to rough calculations.
Valero Energy is a crucial partner in the United States-Israel Military Stronghold that continues to ensure that Israel doesn’t run out of military jet fuel to utilize in its aerial bombardment of Gaza. In 2020, the US Defense Logistics Agency Energy (DLA Energy) issued a $3 billion contract for 1 billion liters of JP-8 jet fuel, diesel fuel, and Unleaded Gasoline covering many years of supply to the Israeli Armed Forces. The Overseas Santorini itself is also affiliated with the US military, as one of ten ships enrolled in the U.S. Department of Transportation’s Maritime Administration’s Tanker Security Program, which provides these “militarily useful” vessels with a $6 million annual stipend for “allow[ing] for committed, reliable and loyal fuel transportation to the US military during a time of national crisis.”
Activists from Morocco, Gibraltar and Spain are collaborating as a united front at the Strait of Gibraltar, in coordination with a broad international coalition including Disrupt Power, Global Energy Embargo for Palestine, the Palestinian Assembly for Liberation, the Palestinian NGO Network, the International Coalition to Stop Genocide in Palestine, Progressive International, La Vía Campesina, and numerous other groups, to prevent the Overseas Santorini from delivering its deadly cargo. The campaign, called “No Harbour for Genocide,” has already succeeded in forcing the tanker to reroute, and aims to create a people’s blockade throughout the Mediterranean.
The Spanish government has positioned itself as being in opposition to the genocide, publicly declaring in May a policy of prohibiting the docking of ships carrying weapons to Israel, and intervening on behalf of South Africa in its Genocide Convention case against Israel at the International Court of Justice. Nonetheless, internal divisions and lack of political will to enforce the administration’s own policies have angered Spanish activists opposing the genocide. For instance, despite its promise not to allow the docking of ships loaded with weapons bound for Israel and the April 5, 2024 UN Resolution A/HRC/55/L.3 expressing deep concern about the use of jet fuel in war crimes and human rights violations and calling on all States to “cease the sale, transfer and diversion of arms, munitions and other military equipment to Israel,” Spain permitted the docking of the Overseas Santorini at Algeciras on May 28, 2024.
A study published on July 9, 2024 by the Centre d’Estudis per la Pau J.M. Delàs titled Bu$in€ss as Usual confirms that in fact Spain’s military and defense ties with Israel are currently stronger than ever, with the Spanish military continuing to contract with Israeli security companies, and extensive intelligence and security cooperation between the two governments. The revelations in the report provide important context for for the fact that the Spanish government has turned a blind eye to the docking of ships supplying the genocide, and for the fact last Thursday, activists traveling to Algeciras to participate in a planned protest against the docking of the Overseas Santorini on Saturday were targeted, stopped and violently harassed by plain-clothed paisano police.
In addition to organizing public protests, Spanish activists, led by RESCOP/The Solidarity Network Against the Occupation in Palestine sent letters to port worker unions UGT and CCOO which responded by endorsing the campaign, to the Algeciras Port Authority, and to Spanish politicians, a number of whom—including Ione Belarra and Pablo Iglesias—publicly denounced the planned docking of the Overseas Santorini. The leftist Sumar party formally registered a parliamentary question challenging the government’s authorization of the Overseas Santorini’s docking request. The combined actions of Spanish activists and parliamentarians resulted in a wave of coverage in Spanish press.
On Friday, Spanish activists got word from inside sources that as a result of their pressure campaign, the ship had rescinded its request to dock in the Port of Algeciras; moments later, the ship changed its AIS destination to Gibraltar—a mere 4 1/2 miles across the Bay of Gibraltar.
Ana Sánchez, spokesperson for the Spanish group RESCOP, states: “Once again we have shown that people power works: we blocked the Borkum, we blocked the Marianne Danica, and now we have blocked the Overseas Santorini. We will not stop until we have put an end to our government’s complicity with the genocide in Palestine, and this includes the imposition of a total military blockade against the illegal occupying regime of genocidal apartheid Israel.”
Despite their success, protest organizers in Spain did not cancel their planned rally and march in Algeciras Saturday, and reframed their message to maintain pressure on their government, and to express solidarity with social movements, unions and politicians in Gibraltar and other Mediterranean nations also fighting to ensure there will be No Harbour for Genocide.
For its part, despite its size, Gibraltar—a British Overseas Territory—has nonetheless been a key strategic ally of Israel, and has played a quiet but important role in furthering the UK’s complicity with the genocide in Palestine. For example, in October, Gibraltar provided harbour for two British Royal Navy vessels transporting P8 aircraft, surveillance assets, three Merlin helicopters and a company of Royal Marines. The deeply Zionist Government of Gibraltar has continually sought to reinforce ties with Israel, supporting the strengthening of commercial exchange through the Gibraltar-Israel “Gibrael” Chamber of Commerce; and with symbolic measures like the issuance of a joint Gibraltar-Israel “friendship stamp” (the original design for which was nixed by the UK Foreign Office as inappropriate for choosing an image of the Citadel, in occupied Jerusalem, to represent Israel). The deputy mayor of Jerusalem hails from Gibraltar.
In collaboration with their comrades in Spain, activists with the group Gibraltar for Palestine publicly denounced the Overseas Santorini’s announced arrival in the Bay of Gibraltar. They have additionally sent letters to Gibraltar’s only trade union and its Port Authority outlining the illegality of servicing a ship carrying supplied destined for use in genocide, and calling upon them to prohibit its docking. Gibraltarian activists are additionally supported by UK-based activists demanding that the UK parliament prevent its tiny Mediterranean colonial outpost (and thus the UK itself) from actively enabling the genocide in Palestine by allowing the docking of ships supplying the Israeli military. They have sent formal letters to the Gibraltar Port Authority and Unite, the UK-based headquarters of Gibraltar’s union, to demand that the Gibraltar and the UK governments cease their complicity with genocide and seek port worker solidarity. On Monday, a group of eighteen cross-party British MPs sent a letter to UK foreign secretary David Lammy, exhorting the government to “prohibit and prevent Gibraltar being used as a haven for the transport of military fuel used in Israel’s assault on Gaza.”
Following the announcement that the Overseas Santorini would not dock in Algeciras, the Government of Gibraltar, responding to pressure from activists from throughout the region and the UK, issued a formal announcement Saturday stating that the Overseas Santorini had not, in fact, taken the required step of requesting permission to dock in their port.
Rahma Safouan, with Gibraltar for Palestine, states: “Gibraltar For Palestine is committed to raising awareness to the injustices that are happening in Palestine, including the complicity of our government in its staunch support for Israel. We are honoured to join the network of organisations working under the #NoHarbourForGenocide, with hopes of pressuring HM Govt of Gibraltar into refusing harbour for the US oil tanker Overseas Santorini, and any other ship supplying the genocide in Israel.”
Meanwhile, the Moroccan Front to Support Palestine and Oppose Normalisation has been forcefully denouncing its government’s normalization of relations with Israel since Morocco signed the 2020 U.S.-mediated Abraham Accords. Since October 7, 2023 the Front—a coalition of 19 Moroccan political parties, trade unions and associations—has protested Morocco’s support to Israel in this intensified phase of its ongoing genocide against Palestinians. Morocco’s complicity in the past 10 months has included harbouring Israeli war ships and a $1 billion deal announced on July 9, 2024 to purchase spy satellites from Israel Aerospace Industries (IAI). On July 7, the Moroccan Front to Support Palestine and Oppose Normalisation organized nationwide actions in protest of the docking in Tangier of the U.S.-made Israeli warship the INS Komemiyut, en route from Pascagoula, MI (USA) to the Haifa naval base.
Sion Assidon, co-founder of BDS Morocco, an organizational member of the Moroccan Front to Support Palestine and Oppose Normalization, states:
“Let’s salute our first victory: the Overseas Santorini will not dock at Algeciras or any other Spanish port. The Moroccan Front to Support Palestine and Oppose Normalization is proud to be part of this wide international movement aiming to prevent the Overseas Santorini from reaching Israel by closing all Mediterranean ports to this cargo ship carrying fuel for the criminal F16 and F35 Israel army jets used in the genocidal bombing of Gaza. This broad international movement is an important contribution to confront the war of extermination planned since October 2023 by the State of occupation of Palestine—a continuation of the ethnic cleansing of Palestine ongoing since the Nakba in 1948.
The call to prevent any ship complicit in crimes against the Palestinian people to dock in Moroccan ports began successfully in June with the Vertom Odette, which was also forced out of the Spanish port of Cartagena by popular mobilization. The docking of the INS Komemiyut at the Port of Tangier—in line with the military alliance Moroccan army signed in 2022 with the Occupying State—met with a huge reaction by Moroccan people opposed to any relationship with the Occupying State. On July 7th, hundreds of thousands of people organized by the Moroccan Front, participated in a national demonstration in Tangier, as the answer of the Moroccan people to this violation of Moroccan sovereignty. Today, the question is: will Moroccan authorities dare to yet again commit the crime of complicity with the genocide in Palestine by welcoming the Overseas Santorini?”