A small group of protesters stepped away from the larger group and gathered at the pier railing, looking out at the large U.S. military ship docked at the Port of Tacoma in the early hours of Monday, Nov. 6, that some people was thought to be headed to Israel.

This article was originally published by McClatchy News in the News Tribune.

A U.S. Coast Guard boat and a Tacoma Police Department boat could be seen near the MV Cape Orlando at all times, but off in the distance, a traditional Native American canoe carrying seven Indigenous water warriors floated in solidarity with the protesters on the pier.

Members of the Puyallup, Nisqually, Muckleshoot, Yakama , Suquamish and Cowlitz tribes joined hundreds of other protesters during the Block the Boat protest that occurred on the traditional homelands of the Puyallup Tribe. The News Tribune previously reported that the protesters believed the MV Cape Orlando was going to be loaded with weapons and equipment that would be delivered to Israel. While some protesters used their cars to block the entrance to a pier at the port in an effort to prevent workers from loading the ship, Indigenous water warriors took to the waters in an attempt to physically block the ship from leaving the port.

Indigenous Paddlers Protest Military Ship

Hundreds of protesters arrived at the port before dawn with signs that read “Free Palestine Now” and “Ceasefire Now.” Protesters were spread out in three different sections along 11th Street and marched in circles for 12 hours until about 4:30 p.m. Organizers announced that the ship had been partially loaded but said their protest was successful in delaying the ship for eight hours. With a day’s notice, tribal members and water warriors came together and organized in solidarity with the Arab Resource and Organizing Center (AROC), International League of Peoples Seattle-Tacoma, Samidoun Seattle, Falastiniyat. The water warriors rode in a traditional canoe that belongs to the Nisqually Tribe. Patricia Gonzalez, a member of the Puyallup Tribe and organizer of the Water Warriors Council in Puyallup, said they were only able to use one Nisqually canoe because all other tribes in the area had put their canoes away for the winter.

“At this time in the winter, we usually put our canoes away, and this is about the time we do that ceremony which is why a lot of other canoes couldn’t come out because they were already past that ceremony point,” Gonzalez said. “But Nisqually, they had a loss in their community, and they weren’t able to do that [ceremony] and postponed it out of respect, so they still had their canoes awake. it was just a beautiful blessing from the Creator that that happened the way that it did and everything fell into place the way it did.” Gonzalez said that some warriors from the Nisqually Tribe heard about the protest and offered their canoe to join the effort. “They knew that the canoe was awake, so they had the perfect opportunity to just get up and bring that canoe up, so it was a joint effort for a lot of the canoe work,” Gonzalez said. “For Nisqually, it was just something that sits on their heart to bring that fight here to be with the Palestinian people.”

Gonzalez said they chose to join the fight by canoe because of the strong connection the Puyallup people have with the water. “The waters are very, very spiritual for us. We’re connected to them. They ground us in a very humbling way. They teach us how to be patient. They teach us how to suffer up for our prayers, for good causes. When we’re out there, it’s a full prayer ceremony in itself, and each time you dip your paddle into the water, it’s a new prayer,” Gonzalez said. Gonzalez explained that the prayers that were done before and during the protest were very powerful and emotional, especially since her ancestors were victims of genocide.

“It’s very simple, we oppose genocide. There is no form, no desensitization that can happen that will make us ever be OK with that, because that is a wound for us that is still not yet healed and is still open and we are trying our best,” Gonzalez said. “When we saw that that’s what was going on, we knew we had to do the most powerful thing in our culture that we know how to do and for us that was warrior up. Get on the water and stand your ground and that’s exactly what we went out there to do.” Several demonstrations with thousands of people in attendance have occurred all over Washington, including in Olympia and in Tri-Cities, since the block-the-boat protest that happened earlier this month, all with the same message of calling for a ceasefire in Gaza. The war started on Oct. 7 after Hamas, a Palestinian militant group governing the Gaza Strip, attacked southern Israel. About 1,200 Israelis and more than 12,700 Palestinians have been killed and about 240 others were taken captive by Hamas since the start of the war, according to the Associated Press. According to a United Nation press release, Francesca Albanese, a UN expert on human rights in the occupied Palestinian territories, said “that Palestinians are in grave danger of mass ethnic cleansing and called on the international community to urgently mediate a ceasefire between warring Hamas and Israeli occupation forces.”

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