Machinist Rob Volker left Rockhampton to join the Global Sumud Flotilla to sail to Gaza. He will join about 1000 people from around the globe trying to deliver 500 tonnes of aid to Palestinians living under occupation.
“The conditions on the ground in Palestine, that Palestinian people are living through, are worse than hell,” Volker said. “To call it anything but a genocide is not acknowledging reality.”
The 35 year-old veteran flew out of Magan-djin/Brisbane in late March to help prepare about 100 boats to break Israel’s 19-year naval blockade on Gaza. It will be the biggest humanitarian maritime mission to ever sail for Palestine.
“I was starting to get bit of a hero complex,” he said. “I walked into the pub one day and one fellow offered to buy me dinner, and then people bought me beers and it sort of made me a little bit embarrassed.
“There’s nothing holding regional Queenslanders back from voicing whatever social issues or opinions we want to voice. The support I got was incredible. It touches your heart. It’s great to see that people care. A lot have gone and looked into the cause and come back and told me about it.”
In 2021 and 2022, leading human rights organisations Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International released damning reports saying Israel’s decades-long system of oppression against Palestinians amounts to Apartheid.
In September last year, a United Nations commission found that “Israel is responsible for the commission of genocide in Gaza”.
Since the shaky ceasefire in Gaza on October 10 last year, Israel has violated the agreement more than 2000 times with almost daily attacks, killing at least 713 people. On March 30, the Knesset adopted exclusive death penalty laws aimed at Palestinians.
Last September’s Sumud flotilla sailed with 462 people on 42 boats; they carried baby formula, food and medical supplies. After taking shifts monitoring their boats from his bedroom in Rockhampton, Volker said he “committed this year to taking that step and going over”.
Volker was given a surprise send-off at the train station, late last month. “One of my mates from the pub is an old fellow called Tim. He met me at the train station this morning. My mate’s missus, she’s a carer and she was coming home from an overnighter, so she pulled in at the train station and I waited with them for the train to come.”
Volker pulled a folded envelope from his pocket and showed us its contents. “Tim gave me this little package here, he didn’t say much but wished me luck. There’s some US dollars in here, some Euro, he gave me a bit of Aussie money and he gave me this pendant.
“But this is from the House of the Virgin Mary, in Türkiye. I’ll wear that and maybe it’ll give me some luck.”
Volker is one of 17 Australians to join the flotilla. He said his experience in the army, including his deployment to Afghanistan, prepared him for a journey like this. He joined as a 17 year old, after getting kicked out of school. He served for seven years. His dad would not sign the paperwork unless he took on a trade, so he decided to be a fitter.
“I was the youngest soldier in my corp for nearly a full year.” After completing his apprenticeship, his was sent to infantry battalions “to work on weapons and some small generators and chainsaws”. In his sixth year, he was sent to Townsville to work on boats, landing craft and zodiacs.
“I heard about the flotilla forming again and my friend said my mechanical background and my experiences might be quite useful. I hope that we can get things as smooth as possible for running maintenance-wise.”
Volker said he feels “like a small piece in the big cog of humanity”, and is honoured to be able to participate.
“As a veteran, I’ve seen warfare. I’ve experienced being part of warfare and I can say with confidence that what the Israelis are doing to the Palestinian people is not warfare.
“The conditions that Palestinian people are living through are worse than hell. They’re being starved. They’re losing their medical facilities and schools, and to call it anything but a genocide is not acknowledging reality.”
Volker is “definitely nervous” about the being attacked and detained by the IDF. “To say I’m not nervous or anything would be a lie. You’d be silly not to be nervous to sail into a naval blockade.
“The most important thing to remember as civilians is that we are entering a conflict zone and that being detained by a military force is a little different from being detained by a policing force. There’ll be guns pointed at us. We need to ensure that they know that we’re compliant.
“From my limited personal experience as the person on the other end of the gun, you don’t know what’s going on. There are a lot of scenarios you can run through your mind about what might happen.”
Flotilla participants in the September 2025 mission were detained in Israel’s Ketziot Prison for a week. They reported that they were sexually assaulted, beaten, threats were made to themselves and their families and they were denied food, water and critical medication.
Even with these risks, Volker said it is important to participate. “I think it’s really important for those with the ability to look more towards helping raise everyone else up. Australia has become complicit in the genocide in Palestine through its support for the Israeli government.
“Human rights are everyone’s rights and if we’re going to allow this tumbleweed of human destruction to start in one area of the world, in a globalised world then what’s to stop that tumbleweed rolling back around to us? We can’t build a good future society on the ashes of horrible crimes.”
Volker said he would miss his dogs, with which he is a “little inseparable”. “I’ve got three mongrels. They’ll be quite happy to see me when I come home.”