In Naples, two little girls leaned out of their apartment window as the chants below reached their street. They had no flag, no banner, only their voices. “Freedom for Palestine!” they cried, joining the tide of demonstrators who poured through the southern Italian city on Saturday. For a moment, the children’s voices carried over the crowd, a reminder of the young lives being lost in Gaza as tens of thousands marched for justice.
Across Italy, more than 1.5 million people filled the streets — 300,000 in Rome, 100,000 each in Milan and Bologna, tens of thousands more in Florence, Genoa, Naples and Palermo. Workers and students led the charge, their voices and banners echoing from city to city, part of one of the largest demonstrations in Europe since Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza began two years ago.
The Italian mini-uprising comes amid growing European and international movement demanding an end to the ongoing Israeli genocide in the Gaza Strip and calling on Western governments to stop supplying Israel with the weapons used to kill Palestinians.
It also comes a day after US President Donald Trump said Israel must stop the bombing of Gaza immediately, following Hamas's agreement to release Israeli captives in response to his 20-point plan to end the war.
In Barcelona, chanting protesters were joined by the horns of taxi drivers, who rolled down their windows to shout along, weaving through the crowd as if the city itself was rising with them.
Bangkok staged its own act of defiance: protesters laid a portrait of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, wanted by the ICC for crimes against humanity in the Gaza war, and an Israeli flag across the street. Cheers erupted as passing cars crushed them under their wheels. Citizen journalists called it the biggest pro-Palestine demonstration in Thailand since the start of the war in October 2023.
Left-wing Parisian MEP Manon Aubry joined thousands demanding an end to what she called Israel’s “genocide in Gaza” and the release of the GSF crew and activists “illegally detained” by Israeli forces.
“The impunity must stop. France and the European Union (EU) must act. Their silence is complicity,” she wrote on social media.
Berlin and Stuttgart also saw marches denouncing Israel’s blockade and the seizure of the GSF vessels. In Lisbon, demonstrators carried Palestinian flags and banners reading “Freedom for Gaza, freedom for the flotilla detainees”.
The ripple of protest stretched further still.
In Tunis, marchers chanted “Free, free Palestine” and “7 October is the pride of the resistance.”
In Seoul, thousands carried the cry: “From Seoul to Gaza, from the river to the sea, Palestine will be free.”
In Dublin, the streets overflowed with one of the largest pro-Palestine rallies in Ireland.
In London, Trafalgar Square became a sea of demonstrators for a massive silent vigil. Hours earlier, activists from Palestine Action had climbed Westminster Bridge to hang a banner that read: “I oppose genocide… I support Palestine Action.”
Melbourne
On Friday, Scottish activists blocked Waverley Bridge in Edinburgh under the slogan: “No business as usual during a genocide.” Earlier that day in Melbourne, thousands shut down the road to Webb Dock in protest against Israel’s seizure of six Australians aboard the GSF.
Amid the protests, flotilla detainees began returning home.
A Turkish Airlines flight carrying 137 activists, including 36 Turkish nationals, landed in Istanbul on Saturday. Families, journalists, and supporters welcomed them after days of uncertainty at sea.
The activists, part of a humanitarian mission to deliver aid to Gaza and break the blockade, had been intercepted by Israeli forces in international waters, detained, and subjected to what participants described as shocking abuse.
Turkish activist Ersin Celik told Anadolu Agency that climate campaigner Greta Thunberg had been mistreated during the raid. “They dragged little Greta by her hair before our eyes, beat her, and forced her to kiss the Israeli flag. They did everything imaginable to her, as a warning to others,” he said.
The flotilla, comprising around 45 vessels and including volunteers from more than 50 countries, had set sail from several European ports in September.
After a 10-day stop in Tunisia, during which organizers reported two drone attacks, the convoy resumed its journey on 15 September.
Israeli naval forces intercepted the ships from Wednesday onwards, detaining over 470 activists.
However, the international grassroots organization, Freedom Flotilla Coalition (FFC), announced on Thursday that 11 more ships are sailing toward the Gaza Strip to challenge the years-long Israeli blockade.
Two boats, flying Italian and French flags, departed from Otranto, Italy, on 25 September, and were joined by the vessel Conscience on 30 September.
The Conscience has a long history of targeted attacks: in May 2024, it was struck by Israeli drones off Malta, sustaining extensive damage from aerial strikes, with no internal explosions or weapons aboard, and carrying only humanitarian aid. All 12 crew members stranded at the time were later safely returned home. Though the FFC criticized European authorities for failing to permit an independent forensic investigation.
The three vessels have now rendezvoused with another eight-boat convoy, Thousand Madleens to Gaza, forming an 11-ship flotilla carrying about 100 people - including journalists and doctors - off the coast of Crete.
The boats are currently hours away from northern Alexandria and are expected to reach Gaza’s shores in 3–4 days. Additionally, on Thursday, tens of Turkish civilians from Black Sea provinces boarded 45 small vessels and set sail toward Gaza, joining the growing flotilla movement.
The flotilla is part of the FFC’s broader mission, which dates back to 2007, to deliver aid to Gaza and draw attention to Israel’s 19-year-long naval blockade, significantly tightened since the outbreak of Tel Aviv's genocidal war on the strip in October 2023.
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