Canadian organizations to participate in “largest civilian mission to Gaza”
Posted March 18, 2026 3:14 pm.
Canadian organizations intend to participate in what they plan to be the largest civilian mission to Gaza.
For the past 20 years, civil society organizations have participated in maritime convoys to deliver humanitarian aid to the Palestinian territory. But the mission planned for April will be different.
Global Sumud Canada and Canadian Boat to Gaza, with the support of more than 80 civil society organizations across Canada, plan to organize “the largest coordinated maritime mission with land convoys and led by civilians in support of Palestine to date,” according to a press release issued Wednesday.
“There will be approximately 3,000 international participants and also 100 boats, coming from 100 countries” to “break the illegal blockade imposed by Israel for 19 years,” explained Safa Chebbi of Global Sumud Canada, in an interview with The Canadian Press on Wednesday.
This flotilla also differs from previous ones, explained Safa Chebbi, because it carries “a reconstruction plan by the Palestinians” and “the people who will participate commit to staying for several months, so it is not just a mission for a few days, the participants must free themselves completely to contribute to the reconstruction of Gaza, moreover, it is done in collaboration with the municipality of Gaza.”
The participating organizations plan to announce in the coming weeks the identity of the aid workers who will take part in this dangerous mission.
Amnesty International reports that the military offensive launched by Israel following the attacks of October 7, 2023, has killed tens of thousands of people, razed residential neighborhoods, destroyed essential infrastructure and forced the displacement of almost two million Palestinians, more than 90 per cent of the population of the Gaza Strip, causing an unprecedented humanitarian catastrophe.
“The situation in Gaza is worse than it ever was,” said Ehab Lotayef of the Canadian Boat to Gaza. “The plans for Gaza by Donald Trump and his shady peace council are more dangerous than ever. The people in Gaza, about 90 percent of them have been displaced at this point, are in need of our support more than ever. The plans that are woven for the Middle East as a whole are calling on us as a civil society to act, to move. Because the politicians are not moving. At best some of them are flip-flopping, but they’re not taking any strong action to stop this huge injustice and these crimes that are happening against the human population in Gaza and in Palestine as a whole.”
“At a time when some proposals, particularly those associated with Donald Trump, envision the future of Gaza through logics of control or imposed restructuring,” the flotilla in support of Palestine puts forward “a reconstruction based on the rights of the Palestinians, their self-determination and active international solidarity, rejecting any political or colonial instrumentalization,” reads the statement from Global Sumud Canada.
The Middle East is ablaze
The aid workers plan to travel to a region that is subject to a very high-tension geopolitical context.
Two weeks after the start of the American and Israeli attacks against Iran and Tehran’s retaliatory strikes against its neighbors, the armed conflict is engulfing the Middle East.
In Lebanon alone, Israeli strikes have reportedly displaced more than one million people — about 20 per cent of the population — according to the Lebanese government, which reported 912 deaths and 2,221 injuries.
In Israel, 14 people were killed by Iranian missile strikes. At least 13 American service members were killed.
More than 1,300 people have been killed in Iran since the start of the conflict, according to the Iranian Red Crescent.
“This flotilla is not just a humanitarian mission. It is a political response to a war that stretches from Gaza to Lebanon to Iran, and to imperialist and colonial projects that seek to decide the future of the region without its people,” said Safa Chebbi of Global Sumud Canada.
The Montreal activist added that the participants who will take part in this mission, “obviously, they are leaving fully aware of the conditions and the current political context in the region” with “very informed consent” and they are taking this risk because “as long as governments do not move, people must organize themselves.”
–This report by La Presse Canadienne was translated by CityNews
