On Wednesday 20 May, Itamar Ben-Gvir, Israel’s fascist National Security Minister, posted videos on X showing him taunting activists from the Global Sumud Flotilla, forced to kneel in rows with their hands zip-tied behind their backs. Waving an Israeli flag, he shouted: “Welcome to Israel, we are the landlords.”
The spectacle took place at the Israeli port of Ashdod after around 430 activists were seized by Israeli forces from more than fifty small boats sailing in international waters off Cyprus, carrying aid for besieged Gaza. The Flotilla organisers said on X that ‘our activists are being subjected to violent abuse after being illegally abducted at sea while attempting to break the siege on Gaza’. The prisoners have been denied access to lawyers, and will not be granted it until they are transferred to Ketziot prison in the Negev desert.
If a serving cabinet minister will boast to the world’s cameras about abusing international activists, the treatment routinely meted out to Palestinian prisoners—held without cameras, lawyers or witnesses—scarcely needs imagining.
The flotilla departed from Turkey on 14 May in a renewed attempt to get humanitarian aid into Gaza. Despite the so-called ceasefire announced last October, the territory remains under a tight Israeli siege and endures regular bombardment. According to Gaza’s Health Ministry, 881 Palestinians have been killed since the ceasefire took effect on 10 October. Since Israel’s genocidal assault on Gaza began in October 2023, more than 72,700 Palestinians have been killed.
In April, Israeli forces attacked 22 boats from the first phase of the Sumud Flotilla, kidnapping 181 activists. All but two were released on Crete the following day. Spanish citizen Saif Abu Keshek and Brazilian citizen Thiago Ávila, two of the key organisers, were taken to Israel and subjected to brutal interrogation, only being deported after ten days as the result of international protests.
This week’s atrocity is part of a coordinated campaign of repression. Even as the maritime flotilla was being boarded, the parallel North African Sumud Land Convoy was halted by Libyan forces near Sirte, with its communications jammed and its participants stranded. On Tuesday the United States imposed sanctions on four key organisers of the flotilla missions.
The pro-Palestinian movement around the world must demand that governments condemn this Israeli piracy in the Mediterranean and the blockade of the Land Convoy, and demand that Israel open the land and sea borders of Gaza to relieve the inhuman conditions of a population whose homes, hospitals and schools have been demolished, and which is suffering from malnutrition and rampant waterborne disease.
We must step up the pressure on Western governments to halt their military and diplomatic support for Israel, and to end the media slander and legal repression of the protests in solidarity with the Palestinian people.
- Free the Sumud Flotilla prisoners!
- Break the siege of Gaza — end the attacks on the towns and villages of the West Bank!
- Break with the states that arm and shield the Zionist project!
- From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free!
