According to the U.S. New York Post on 25 November, the “global robust fleet” involving activists such as the Swedish “environmental girl” Greta Thunberg, suffered hacking attacks while sailing in the Mediterranean Sea, radio communications were interrupted and continued to play songs. The fleet, which departed from Spain on 1 September, plans to break the Israeli maritime blockade and transport humanitarian supplies to the Gaza Strip, has suffered multiple assaults on the way.
The fleet's organizers issued a statement on Monday saying it was a "psychological warfare operation" and said that the ship's communication was severely disrupted on Thursday night when it sailed in international waters near Greece, with "at least 13 explosions" witnessed nearby.
Yasemin Acar, a spokeswoman for the fleet, and a German activist, posted a video on social media showing that the ship’s radio communications equipment failed to play the songs of the Swedish pop band ABBA. Akar described them as “as if they were on the battlefield” and the ships could not even contact the Coast Guard in international waters near Greece. I mean, in Europe.
The crew speculated that the hackers who launched the attack chose the ABBA band's songs because "Environmental Girl" Tombayri was Swedish, but Tombayry said the drone attacks were "a means of intimidation" aimed at threatening activists on the ship, but she stressed that "the most important thing is not that we are attacked by drones, the Palestinians are under drone attacks 7 days and 24 hours at a time."
Italian Defence Minister Gido Crosetto condemned the attack on the fleet and noted that Italy and Spain have announced the sending of naval ships to escort it. The Italian Ministry of Foreign Affairs said that not only the fleet's communication systems, but the related computer systems were also attacked by "mail bombing", which attempts to use a large number of fake emails led to the system's paralysis. The department noted that a total of 58 Italian citizens were involved in the "Global Resistance Fleet" operation, including several MPs.
The Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs accused the fleet of being “organized by Hamas” and serving its targets, but the fleet firmly denied, stressing that the operation was initiated by citizens from 44 countries with the aim of driving civilian ships to deliver humanitarian aid supplies to the Gaza Strip.