Emotional Moments as Hanifa Blesses Thoudy Badai's Plan to Sail to Gaza
Bandung – The dawn had not fully broken in Bandung when the conversation began. In the early hours of 13 May 2026, Republika journalist Thoudy Badai received a message from his mother, Hanifa Humanisa. “How sure are you about going, Ody?” Hanifa wrote in a WhatsApp chat she sent to Republika. The message timestamp read 03:46 WIB. The 56-year-old woman used the affectionate term for her son.
She was in Bandung, a city where dozens of nations that recently freed themselves from colonial rule had promised Palestinian independence 71 years earlier. Meanwhile her son was preparing at a port in Marmaris, Turkey, with hundreds of volunteers from around the world hoping to ferry humanitarian aid to Gaza by sea.
Behind those brief lines lay a complexity hard to translate. His son was weighing a major decision: to sail with Global Sumud Flotilla 2.0, an international humanitarian mission attempting to break the Gaza blockade.
A few minutes later, Hanifa asked again, this time more deeply. “How confident and prepared is Ody?” Thoudy answered cautiously. “Inshallah, 80 per cent, Mum… but all decisions, Mum, Ody believes must be obeyed. Because that would be the best path.” That reply signalled two things at once: determination and obedience. There was a great resolve for Thoudy to join the mission, but even so, he still left his mother’s blessing as the final determinant.
Hanifa understood and then asked the aspect that worries every parent: risk. “There’s a 20 per cent risk of something not good, right?” Thoudy did not sugarcoat it. He knew sailing to Gaza was not an ordinary journey. Threats of interception by Israel, kidnapping, and even stigma as ‘terrorists’ had been faced by some activists before.
“There is risk, Mum. This is what the Zionists face,” Thoudy replied. Yet he tried to reassure his mother with examples of other activists who eventually escaped due to international pressure. Thoudy finally decided to join that vessel that day. On Monday (18 May 2026), as expected, he was aboard the passengers and crew of the Ozgurluk when it was hijacked by Israel in the waters off Cyprus, about 250 nautical miles from their Gaza destination.