A ship traveling on international waters is subject to the jurisdiction of its own state – that is, the state whose flag it is registered with.
Therefore, Israel had no right to stop the activist organization Freedom Flotilla on the ship Mavi Marmara, where, among other things, Swedish Greta Thunberg traveled with eleven other activists with supplies on their way to Gaza.
What Israel has done, and it is not the first time but has happened several times before, violates both customary law rules that all states have accepted and follow, and also the rules of the Convention on the Law of the Sea, which are very clear in this regard, says Mahmoudi, professor of international law at Stockholm University.
Illegal according to The Hague
Israel is, however, not a party to the Convention on the Law of the Sea. Therefore, there is no possibility of taking the case to the International Court of Justice in Hamburg, Germany.
The country whose flag the ship is registered in, which according to several other media is the United Kingdom, has reason to react to the breach of the country's integrity, emphasizes Mahmoudi.
According to customary law rules, other states only have the right to act against ships on international waters if, for example, the ship is suspected of engaging in piracy or drug trafficking.
“War crime after war crime”
What Israel is doing is illegal from several angles, says Mahmoudi.
Last year, the International Court of Justice in The Hague decided that Israel's continued occupation of Palestinian areas violates international law, which means that they also do not have the right to block supplies from reaching Gaza.
–But Israel is quite used to doing whatever they want being illegal these days. It's just war crime after war crime. It seems like they don't care that there are rules.
