On Sunday, around 500 anti-Israel protesters formed a picket line at the port of Oakland, California, and temporarily prevented an incoming Israeli ship from being unloaded. The dock's day shift of longshoremen agreed to not cross the picket line. The action was in protest at Israel's recent raid on the Gaza-bound flotilla, in which nine people died. "Our objective was to boycott this ship for 24 hours, and we succeeded in doing that," said Richard Becker of the ANSWER Coalition, one of the groups that had organized the protest.
According to Becker, the ship's arrival was delayed from the morning until its eventual arrival around 6 p.m., by which time dockworkers agreed not to show up to unload the vessel, citing concern for their personal safety. A representative of the Israeli Consulate in San Francisco disputed Becker's account, saying the ship had always been scheduled to arrive at 6 p.m. In the afternoon, two Israel supporters arrived and waved Israeli and American flags across the street from the pro-Palestinian demonstrators.
"I want the Palestinian people to have peace and land. They have been suffering for 60 years, and it's time for them to have justice," one of the protestors was quoted by the ‘San Francisco Chronicle’ as saying.
