This story originally appeared in Common Dreams on May 19, 2026. It is shared here under a Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0) license.
Palestine defenders decried Tuesday’s announcement by the Trump administration of US sanctions targeting four nonviolent campaigners involved in the recent humanitarian flotillas that tried to break Israel’s illegal siege of Gaza.
The US Department of the Treasury said in a statement that its Office of Foreign Assets Control “is taking action against four individuals associated with the pro-Hamas flotilla organized by the US-designated Popular Conference for Palestinians Abroad (PCPA) that is attempting to access Gaza in support of Hamas.”
The sanctioned individuals are Saif Abu Keshek, a Palestinian with Spanish and Swedish citizenship and PCPA leader who helped organize and lead Global Sumud Flotilla (GSF) missions; Jordan-based PCPA president Hisham Abdallah Sulayman Abu Mahfuz; Mohammed Khatib, who is based in Belgium and is the European coordinator for Samidoun, the Palestinian Prisoner Solidarity Network; and Jaldia Abubakra Aueda, Samidoun’s coordinator in Madrid.
“The pro-terror flotilla attempting to reach Gaza is a ludicrous attempt to undermine President [Donald] Trump’s successful progress toward lasting peace in the region,” Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said in a statement Tuesday. “Treasury will continue to sever Hamas’ global financial support networks, no matter where in the world they are.”
There is no substantiated evidence that the Gaza flotillas are linked to Hamas. Meanwhile, United Nations experts, numerous national governments, human rights groups, and experts say Israel is perpetrating genocide, apartheid, colonization, occupation, and ethnic cleansing against Palestinians.
Samidoun called the sanctions—which freeze any of the targets’ US assets and ban Americans from doing business with them—“the latest manifestation of the ongoing US genocidal war on the Palestinian people” and pointed to Israel’s ongoing violent interception and seizure of GSF vessels on the high seas off the coast of Gaza.
“Today’s sanctions by the US come hand-in-hand with today’s Israeli piracy of the Global Sumud Flotilla and the Freedom Flotilla, and the abduction of hundreds of international activists at sea,” the group said in a statement. “All of these sanctions targeting Palestinian organizations, not only those targeting us, are aiding and abetting genocide.”
Since the Hamas-led attack of October 7, 2023, the Biden and Trump administrations have supported Israel with tens of billions of dollars worth of armed aid and diplomatic cover, including vetoes of numerous United Nations Security Council Gaza ceasefire resolutions. Total US financial support for Israel since it was founded in 1948—largely via the ethnic cleansing of Palestinian Arabs—is approaching $300 billion in inflation-adjusted dollars.
Since returning to office, Trump has cracked down on pro-Palestinian activists, students, organizations, and foreign nationals. Critics—including advocacy groups, academics, and some judges—have condemned what they have called attacks on free speech, association, and academic freedom.
The Trump administration has sanctioned International Criminal Court Prosecutor Karim Khan and other numerous other ICC jurists after the Hague-based tribunal issued warrants for the arrest of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former Defense Minister Yoav Gallant for alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity in Gaza. The ICC also issued arrest warrants for three Hamas leaders who were killed by Israeli attacks.
On Tuesday, far-right Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich said that the ICC is also seeking his arrest, and that he would “fight back” by ordering the ethnic cleansing of hundreds of Palestinians from their homes in the illegally occupied West Bank.
The US administration has also sanctioned independent UN Palestine expert Francesca Albanese and her family—a move that was temporarily blocked earlier this month by a federal judge who asserted that the Italian humanitarian “has done nothing more than speak.”
“Every time Palestinians and their supporters organize internationally, Washington reaches for the terrorism label to shut them down,” Isabelle Hayslip, advocacy manager at Democracy for the Arab World Now, told Al Jazeera on Tuesday. “The net keeps widening. Palestinian diaspora communities now live under constant threat of designation for demanding their rights.”
This content originally appeared on The Real News Network and was authored by Brett Wilkins.