PIRAEUS, Greece — Riot police at Greece’s largest port cordoned off an area around an Israeli cruise ship that arrived early Thursday to prevent several hundred union-backed protesters from approaching the vessel.
Protests have been held on Greek islands and at mainland ports along the route of the Crown Iris and several of them have led to clashes with police.
Unions in Greece and other European Union countries have become increasingly outspoken in their condemnation of Israel over widespread destruction and severe food shortages in Gaza.
At the port of Piraeus, near Athens, demonstrators held flares and waved Palestinian flags behind a cordon formed with riot police buses.
Protest organizers, citing online posts from travelers, said off-duty Israeli soldiers were among the passengers.
“They are unwanted here and have no business being here,” protest organizer Markos Bekris said. “The blood of innocent people is on their hands, and we should not welcome them.” Many European governments have become more critical of Israel in recent weeks, and several unions have gone even further by expressing support for punitive measures.
Last month, the European Trade Union Confederation called on the EU to suspend its trade-focused association agreement with Israel – a move that would hurt the country’s exports to Europe that were worth 15.9 billion euros ($18.5 billion) last year. Belgium’s largest trade union is encouraging members employed at Brussels airport to refuse to work on recently reopened flights to Tel Aviv. “Members and workers who refuse to participate in normalizing our relations with the State of Israel will be fully supported by our organization,” the CSC umbrella union said in a statement this week. “We call on everyone to refuse to handle these flights.” In a separate development, French officials have refused to comment on reports that the government has halted renewing work visas for some staff at Israeli airline El Al in France in an apparent spat over security checks. Greece is a popular holiday destination for Israelis. But the ongoing war in Gaza has triggered hundreds of anti-Israel protests in Athens and other Greek cities, as well as a political confrontation.
Left-wing opposition parties are calling on the conservative government to halt commercial and broad military cooperation with Israel. Addressing the growing criticism, Israeli government officials have insisted it will not change their military objectives in Gaza. These include a comprehensive defeat of the Hamas militant group.
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McNeil reported from Brussels. Derek Gatopoulos in Athens and John Leicester in Paris contributed.
