Turkish activists have stormed a German-flagged ship at a port in the city of Istanbul following the vessel’s arrival there from the Egyptian coastline, where it had offloaded weapons intended for the Israeli military.
The activists staged a sit-in on the vessel, dubbed MV Kathrin, at Istanbul’s Haydarpasa port after forcing their way onboard, various reports pointed out on Monday.
They chanted slogans while on board the vessel that had reached Haydarpasa after leaving its military cargo that featured eight shipping containers holding 150,000 kilograms of RDX (Research Department Explosive) devices at the Egyptian port of Alexandria.
Earlier this week, thousands of protesters stormed Istanbul’s Ambarli Port after an Israeli-linked ship docked there, preventing the vessel from carrying its cargo towards the port of Haifa in the occupied territories, and chanting, “No Zionism in our ports.”
MV Kathrin’s cargo was intended for Israeli Military Industries, the munitions production arm of the Israeli regime’s largest military company Elbit Systems, which uses the explosives to make such weapons as aerial bombs, mortars, and rockets.
According to the European Legal Support Center, a German rights group, the weapons are used by the regime towards perpetration of war crimes, crimes against humanity, and genocide in the Gaza Strip.
The regime has killed more than 43,300 Palestinians, mostly women and children, since last October, when it began bringing the coastal sliver under a genocidal war.
MV Kathrin was forced to dock at Alexandria after being turned away by several countries, including Malta, Angola, and Namibia. Portugal had also refused to let the vessel fly its flag, prompting it to sail under a German ensign.
Egypt has been allowing Israeli ships or the vessels that are headed towards or away from the ports of the occupied Palestinian territories to dock at its ports amid ongoing pro-Palestinian operations by Yemen’s Armed Forces that have been targeting the vessels in protest at the genocide.