“Clearly, I see a pamphleteering initiative, which I consider irresponsible, towards a territory occupied by a terrorist organization responsible for an attack that claimed over 1,200 lives in Israel,” said the CDS-PP president to journalists during a local election campaign event at the municipal market in Mondim de Basto, Vila Real, as reported by Now.
The president of CDS-PP stated that the Islamist movement Hamas “oppresses minorities, whether they are religious or people based on their sexual orientation.”
“Is it in support of such an organization, considered terrorist by the European Union, that these people [three Portuguese citizens, including the BE coordinator, Mariana Mortágua] mobilize towards a territory that is at war?” lamented Melo, referring to the terrorist group responsible for the attack in southern Israel in October 2023, which resulted in 1,200 deaths and 251 hostages.
The executive member led by social-democrat Luís Montenegro expressed trust in the “authorities representing a democratic state,” hoping that Israel “now behaves as such, returning the Portuguese citizens and others to their countries of origin, and treating them with respect for their rights.”
The spokesperson of the Italian activist group participating in the humanitarian action “Global Sumud” (Global Resistance, in Arabic), Maria Elena Delia, stated today that 39 ships of the flotilla intercepted by the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) are still heading towards the Gaza Strip, with some smaller ships expected to reach the same destination.
According to the Italian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the crews were taken to the port of Ashdod and held in specific detention centers, where they can either accept immediate voluntary expulsion or reject it and await a judicial decision.
Among the detained are the deputy and Bloquista leader, actress Sofia Aparício, and activist Miguel Duarte.
On September 16, Israel launched a major ground offensive against the city of Gaza, justified as an effort to eliminate the last ‘stronghold’ of the Palestinian extremist group.
The military invasion led to the forced displacement of over one million people to the south of the Gaza Strip and resulted in dozens of daily deaths in the city, many of them civilians, in a conflict that has already killed over 66,000 Palestinians, including women and children, according to Hamas figures.
