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A US tanker carrying aviation fuel for Israel that was intended to dock at Gibraltar has reportedly entered the Strait.
The Santorini was due to arrive in Algeciras at 3pm on Tuesday, but a series of diplomatic pressures appear to have affected its plans.
Although the ship has now re-listed its destination as “Mediterranean”, there are concerns it may dock directly in Gibraltar.
The ship made a request yesterday to dock at the British Overseas Territory, but a response is not yet known.
However, pressure is growing to deny them entry.
More than a dozen cross-party British MPs wrote to Gibraltar Chief Minister Fabian Picardo, British Foreign Secretary David Lammy and British Gibraltar Governor Sir Ben Bathurst.
They called on the three countries to “make every effort to prevent and prohibit Gibraltar from being used as a safe haven for the transportation of military fuel used in Israel’s attacks on Gaza.”
The tanker was reportedly carrying more than 300,000 barrels of fuel from a refinery in Texas, enough “to refuel approximately 12,000 F-16 (fighter jets).”
The letter claimed that the plane flew across the Atlantic every two months as part of a U.S. government contract to provide military-grade jet fuel to Israel.
“The standard route for transporting JP-8 fuel from Valero’s Corpus Christi refinery in Texas to the Israeli port of Ashkelon includes stops in Algeciras, Spain, and Limassol, Cyprus,” the report states.
The MPs claimed that pressure from Spanish civil society, trade unions and political leaders had paid off, with Algeciras being removed from the stopover itinerary.
The latest tanker movements provided by MarineTraffic indicate that the tanker has passed Gibraltar, which means it will not stop there.
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