Letter to Viceroy Murray regarding the illegal seizure of the Madleen and the kidnapping of its passengers
Dear Ian,
I am writing to ask you what the UK government intends to do about today’s illegal seizure by Israel of the UK registered and flagged vessel, the Madleen, while it was sailing in international waters. At no point was the Madleen heading for Israeli waters but for Gazan waters off the ravaged territory of Gaza which Israel has been illegally occupying since 1967.
As I’m sure you are aware, the Madleen was unarmed and on a humanitarian mission to provide aid to the two million Palestinians in Gaza that Israel is deliberately starving and murdering. It was loaded with desperately needed supplies including baby formula, flour, rice, nappies, women’s sanitary products, water desalination kits, medical supplies, crutches and children’s prosthetics. Among the 12 passengers were a doctor, a French MEP and activist Greta Thunberg.
Before being stormed by ZOF commandos, Israeli drones sprayed the vessel with a white chemical substance that burned the passengers’ eyes and obstructed their vision. Israel then kidnapped all 12 and is illegally holding them and forcing them to watch violent footage from October 7th.
I refer you to the UK government legal justification for bombing the Houthis who were attacking British flagged ships in the Red Sea. (Of course, the Houthis were doing this because the UK, along with other western powers, are materially supporting Israel’s genocide of the Palestinians.) Please explain to me why the same UK government protection should not be given to the Madleen, something the crew had repeatedly requested.
Can you also please explain to me why the UK sent a spy plane from the Akrotiri air base on Cyprus to fly over Gaza while Israel was threatening the Madleen? Was the UK plane monitoring the Israeli attack on the vessel and if so, why? And if not, then why didn’t the UK intervene since it had plenty of notice about Israel’s intention to prevent the Madleen from reaching Palestine?
This was an act of international piracy and state terrorism by the Zionist entity that is continuing to mass murder and starve two million Palestinians. I suppose you could say it’s par for the course for this terrorist state.
As my MP, I demand to know what the UK government is going to do about the kidnapping of the Madleen passengers and the ongoing genocide in Gaza.
Doing nothing means the UK is complicit in Israel’s criminal and evil acts.
I look forward to your timely response.
On the nail again Leah.
The UK ratified the Rome Statute and therefore is under the jurisdiction of the International Criminal Court, (unlike Israel and the United States.) Therefore, those members of the UK government responsible for being complicit in genocide can be prosecuted. This would include Sunak, Starmer and their foreign secretaries.
The First Minister of Scotland, John Swinney, should, as the representative of Scotland, write to the Office of the Prosecutor of the ICC requesting that they initiate an investigation of these people.
He won’t of course. He is a manager who lacks leadership skills. He does not see this as an opportunity to both take the moral high ground and to create a powerful and popular split between Westminster and Holyrood.