Hundreds of pro-Palestinian Greeks staged a fresh protest Tuesday, rallying at Crete’s Agios Nicholaos Port against the arrival of the Israeli cruise ship Crown Iris — the third such demonstration on a Greek island in a week as calls to end Israel's genocide in Gaza grow louder.
Despite a heavy police presence at the port, protestors, carrying Palestinian flags and banners hailing Palestinian resistance and condemning Israel’s genocidal war on the Gaza Strip, chanted "Freedom to Palestine," "Victory to Intifada” and "Stop genocide in Gaza,” reported the Prin newspaper.
The newspaper noted that police used tear gas to disperse protestors, similar to methods used against demonstrators who rallied in Rhodes on Monday to protest the ship.
The rally in Agios Nicholaos on Tuesday was organized by the Solidarity Initiative for the Palestinian People, which emphasized local communities cannot remain silent in the face of war crimes and the "normalization of genocide" in Gaza.
"The ship symbolizes the continuation of the siege of the Palestinian people and its presence in Greek ports cannot be considered touristic activity,” it said.
Four people were detained, local media said. Video showed police leading one man away, his arms cuffed behind his back, as he shouted "Free, free Palestine."
Similar scenes unfolded the previous day when the Crown Iris docked in a port on the eastern Greek island of Rhodes, where clashes broke out between riot police and demonstrators calling for an end to the war in Gaza. There also, the cruise ship's passengers disembarked for tours of the island, and no violence was reported.
Anti-war protesters on Greece's Cycladic island of Syros were the first to hold a demonstration against the docking of the Crown Iris, on July 22. The crowd of about 150 people chanted slogans and carried banners that read "Stop the Genocide" and "No a/c in hell" - a reference to the conditions Palestinians face in the Gaza Strip.
On that occasion, the ship's roughly 1,700 passengers didn't disembark and the ship left the island earlier than planned, with the company operating the trip, Israel's Mano Cruise, saying it had "decided in light of the situation in the city of Syros to now sail to another tourist destination."
Israel has imposed a blockade on Gaza for 18 years, and since March 2, 2025, it has closed all crossings, blocking the entry of humanitarian aid and worsening conditions for the 2.4 million people who live in the enclave.
Gaza’s Health Ministry has indicated that at least 147 people have died of starvation since October 2023, including 88 children.
The Israeli army, rejecting international calls for a ceasefire, has killed more than 60,000 Palestinians, most of them women and children, in Gaza since late 2023. The relentless bombardment has destroyed the enclave and led to a severe hunger crisis.
Israeli rights groups B’Tselem and Physicians for Human Rights-Israel accused Israel on Monday of committing genocide in Gaza, citing the systematic destruction of Palestinian society and the deliberate dismantling of the territory’s health care system.
