Striking dockworkers blocked access roads to ports in Italy and violence flared at a pro-Palestinian protest in the centre of Milan as unions staged a day of protest against Israel's Gaza offensive.
Protesting Italian dock workers say they are seeking to prevent Italy from being used as a staging post for the transfer of arms and other supplies to Israel that is at war with Hamas in Gaza.
Police in riot gear and using tear gas clashed with protesters around the central station in Milan, a Reuters witness reported, while Italian media said that demonstrators were trying to halt traffic on the motorway close to the city of Bologna.
In the southern city of Naples, there were skirmishes with police as protesters forced their way into the main railway station. Some of them briefly got on to the tracks, causing delays to services.
Thousands demonstrated in other Italian cities, schools were closed and some public transport was affected by stoppages called by unions.
In Genoa, in northwest Italy, protesters among a crowd of several hundred people waved the Palestinian flag during early morning gatherings around the port.
Further down the coast in the Tuscan city of Livorno, an entrance to the port was blocked by protesting workers. A similar protest also took place in Trieste, in the northeast.
The right-wing Italian government of Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni is a traditional supporter of Israel within Europe, and has ruled out following other Western nations by recognising a Palestinian state.
Regional train services to Rome faced delays and cancellations because of the strikes but the underground railway ran as normal. Most of the metro lines in Milan, Italy's financial capital, were also operating.
Transport Minister Matteo Salvini played down the impact of the protests on the rail network, praising those who had gone to work.
"Today's strike is causing the cancellation of only a limited number of trains. The political mobilisation of far-left trade unionists cannot harm millions of workers," he said.
Airlines were not affected.
Spain faces uphill battle to cut Israel military ties - experts
Spain's drive to cut military ties with Israel over the devastating war in Gaza will face formidable hurdles as cutting-edge Israeli technology is embedded in the armed forces, experts say.
Socialist Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez announced earlier this month a package of measures aimed at stopping what he called "the genocide in Gaza", including an arms embargo.
The leftist government said it had already stopped buying weapons from or selling them to Israel since the outbreak of the war, sparked by an unprecedented Hamas attack on Israeli soil on 7 October 2023.
But Mr Sanchez, one of the most virulent critics of Israel's offensive, said the new measure would "consolidate in law" the embargo.
A decree detailing the terms of the embargo is due to be approved by cabinet tomorrow.
The leftist government has already terminated a contract worth nearly €700m for Israeli-designed rocket launchers.
The cancellation of a deal valued at €287m for 168 anti-tank missile launchers, which were to be manufactured under licence from an Israeli company, has also been formalised.
But severing all ties with Israeli military equipment is easier said than done.
Spanish media have recently uncovered a vast range of military equipment dependent on Israeli technology, including ammunition, combat tank radios, armoured vehicles and missile launchers.
El Pais daily reported that the air force's ageing fleet of US-designed F-5 fighter jets, used to train pilots, were "modernised" - notably in their electronics systems - and maintained by Israel Aerospace Industries.
David Khalfa, a researcher at the Paris-based Jean Jaures Foundation, identified "a dilemma between military needs linked to the Russian threat... and a more political approach, linked to the situation in Gaza".
"The Israelis' advantage is that these technologies are tested in the field," notably the latest generation of anti-missile defences, added Khalfa, who is also co-president of the Atlantic Middle East Forum think tank.
"There are few countries capable of securing their airspace," he told AFP, pointing to European "restlessness" after recent Russian breaches of NATO airspace in Poland and Estonia.
Another pitfall facing the new law is the timeframe for replacing equipment yet to be delivered but whose contracts have already been scrapped.
"There are no Spanish technologies available to replace them. We will have to develop, invest in research and development to make up the gap," said Felix Arteaga, a defence specialist at Madrid's Elcano Royal Institute.
Mr Arteaga warned that if the replacement technology were American, Spain would be merely exchanging one dependence for another without achieving "strategic autonomy".
Defence Minister Margarita Robles has told parliament that Spanish industry was filling the gap left by the jettisoned Israeli technology.
She conceded "a few loose ends remained from a technological point of view", but that the gaps were resolved "at the end of July".
A Spanish military source told AFP "the topic is sensitive", saying "the radical intention to cut off (the defence trade) is one thing, reality is another".
"These decisions have repercussions," the source added while acknowledging the military was "in the middle of a revolution".
Global hunger monitor IPC determined this month that an entirely man-made famine is currently taking place in Gaza, while UN human rights chief Volker Turk said the famine was the direct result of Israeli government policies.
The world's biggest academic association of genocide scholars passed a resolution saying the legal criteria have been met to establish Israel is committing genocide in Gaza.
Israeli attacks on Gaza have killed 65,062 Palestinians, mostly civilians, according to health officials in the territory, figures the UN considers reliable.
The current stage of the war in Gaza began when Hamas-led militants stormed into southern Israel on 7 October 2023, abducting 251 people and killing 1,200, mostly civilians, according to Israeli tallies.
