Goodness, Greta, what on earth’s the point of your Gaza flotillas?

In common with many, I suspect, I have been tracking the progress of the 40-ship Global Sumud Flotilla since it left Barcelona a month ago, with campaigner-for-everything Greta Thunberg as its standard-bearer.

This latest attempt to deliver food and medical aid direct to Gaza made sometimes fitful progress, thanks to inclement weather and a fire caused by a suspected drone attack, but has now reached what always seemed its inevitable finale. Israel said the ships had been stopped from entering “an active combat zone”; the charities and others organising the flotilla said the interception was illegal – and both statements can be true.

Not in dispute is that the lead ships were blocked a good distance from the shore, after the Israeli Navy jammed their communications. They were then boarded by Israeli commandos, who detained those on board in preparation prior to transferring them to Israel for deportation. “Greta and her friends”, an Israeli statement said, were safe and well. We have been here before. This is the third, though by far the biggest, aid convoy to have tried and failed to reach Gaza this summer. To do the same thing and expect a different outcome was quite simply unrealistic.

Time was when there were certainly different outcomes. In 1985, the Greenpeace flagship, the Rainbow Warrior, was blown up in New Zealand, in a clandestine sabotage operation conducted by the French secret service, which caused the death of a photographer. The Rainbow Warrior was en route to the South Pacific in an attempt to disrupt French nuclear weapons tests. I was based in Paris at the time and the incident caused a huge diplomatic furore – not least because someone was killed and the two saboteurs were caught.

France paid a high price in reputational and financial costs, and nothing of the sort has happened since. There was another incident, too, perhaps more pertinent to present circumstances, 15 years ago, when Israel tried to turn back a so-called Freedom Flotilla that was trying to break its recently declared blockade of Gaza ports.

The crew of a Turkish ship resisted, resulting in clashes that claimed the lives of 10 Turkish protesters and injured nearly 30 people, including some of the Israeli commandos. While what happened prompted widespread indignation, two points might be noted. The outcry was probably less than if the casualties had been, say, American, or French, or, say, Greta. There has also been no repetition.

It is hard to escape the sense that everyone concerned, the Israeli military included, regarded the Global Sumud Flotilla as a theatrical gesture of protest and acted accordingly. The contrast with Israel’s approach to Gaza could not be greater: here, war is war; the destruction and the killing are real.

All that said, the stated purpose of this enormous flotilla, as of its smaller predecessors, was to deliver a large quantity of desperately needed aid to Gaza, and that goal has not – yet – been achieved. Its leaders refused an Israeli proposal to divert to the port of Ashdod, next to the northwestern tip of Gaza, where the cargo could be offloaded, insisting that the aid should be supplied direct to Gaza, the express purpose being to bypass Israel, which is blamed for helping cause famine in Gaza.

The bottom line surely has to be: do the donors and the flotilla crews want their aid to reach Gaza or not? If so, they should surely be ready to deliver it to a port where it can be unloaded, while demanding assurances, and proof, from Israel that it is being taken to where it is needed.

Unless, that is, the aid delivery is less important than the protest against Israel’s refusal to provide direct access to Gaza. In which case, it is hard to dismiss Israel’s characterisation of the flotilla as a “selfie yacht”. When challenged on this point by the BBC, Thunberg said: “I don’t think anyone would risk their life for a publicity stunt.” But this is at least part of the point.

In recent days, however, it has become even more crucial than it was to make sure it stays in that box. This is because of the sudden glimmer of hope for a settlement, in and around Gaza, if not in the wider region, that has emerged from the multi-layered talks that have been held in Washington and Doha. An aid convoy that began and essentially remains a vanity distraction designed as a protest against Israel over its destruction of Gaza must not be allowed to derail the first prospects of peace there have been for a very long time, however tenuous they may be.