Ann Wright reports on Gaza Flotilla survivors’ accounts of horrifying abuse by Israeli forces — of the same sort suffered by Palestinians without any international official protest.
Entrance to the Israeli Knesset, 2022. (Clema12 / Wikimedia Commons/ CC BY-SA 4.0)
By Ann Wright
It has been only four days since members of the Gaza flotilla arrived in Istanbul and told of the rape, assaults and abuse they endured from the Israeli military on their sailboats, from security personnel on the prison ship, from civilian police at the Ashdod processing center and from guards at the notoriously abusive Ktzi’ot prison where Palestinian prisoners have given testimony about torture, abuse and humiliation.
Those few days feel like weeks as stories were told by each of the 428 unarmed civilians from 45 countries who were on 50 small sailboats, kidnapped in international waters and taken against their will to a place they did not want to go — Israel — and then subjected to criminal abuse from personnel from a multitude of Israeli security institutions.
This criminal abuse was orchestrated and ordered at the highest level of the Israeli government as evidenced by the statement and actions of Minister of National Security Itamar Ben-Gvir.
Gvir himself posted footage on a social media platform showing himself gloating as activists from the flotilla were forced to kneel on the floor, blindfolded, roughed up with their hands bound tightly in zipties at the port of Ashdod.
HOLY SHIT BRO ?
Israeli minister Ben-Gvir parades kidnapped flotilla activists like captured animals in his sick propaganda circus.
No regard for international law. pic.twitter.com/6VmuwlVlFb
— Parody Jeff (@Parodyjeffx) May 20, 2026
The videos include a clip of Ben-Gvir waving an Israeli flag over the detainees who are hunched-over on the ground with their hands bound and a clip of him smiling and chanting “Am Yisrael Chai” — Hebrew for “The nation of Israel lives” — at a detainee.
Other clips showed detainees being pushed down to the ground, some with their foreheads pressed against the floor, surrounded by armed guards as the Israeli national anthem plays.
Double-Standard in Banning Ben-Gvir
Several countries have condemned, in the case of the international Flotilla participants, the same kind of abuse that goes ignored when Israeli security forces commit it against Palestinians.
France has banned Ben-Gvir from entering French territory because of his “unspeakable behavior of taunting Gaza flotilla activists who had been arrested and abused by Israeli police forces.” French Foreign Minister Jean-Noel Barrot wrote on X on Saturday:
“As of today, Itamar Ben-Gvir is banned from entering French territory. This decision follows his unspeakable actions towards French and European citizens who were passengers on the Global Sumud Flotilla. We cannot tolerate that French nationals can be threatened, intimidated or brutalized in this way—all the more so by a public official.”
Barrot also called for the European Union to sanction Ben-Gvir.
Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni condemned the treatment seen in the footage in a post on X, calling the images “unacceptable” and saying it was “inadmissible” that demonstrators, including Italian citizens, were subjected to treatment that “violates human dignity.”
“Italy further demands an apology for the treatment of these demonstrators and for the utter contempt shown toward the explicit requests of the Italian government,” she said, adding that Israel’s ambassador in Rome would also be summoned.
A Global Sumud Flotilla participant just testified from the depths of an Israeli detention center
“I was illegally kidnapped by Israel – like 425 other people.”
“Handcuffs on my hands and feet. Dragged me. When I couldn’t walk, they dragged me on the ground.”
“They hit us.… pic.twitter.com/voewedwuy5
— Ounka (@OunkaOnX) May 22, 2026
President Lee Jae Myung of South Korea on May 20 called Israel’s actions “way out of line.”
Spain and Ireland also issued statements against Ben Gvir’s “monstrous” and “appalling” behavior.
Even U.S. President Donald Trump’s administration issued a rare criticism of an Israeli official. U.S. Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee called Ben-Gvir’s actions “despicable.” Huckabee said the Flotilla was a “stupid stunt,” but that Ben-Gvir had “betrayed the dignity of his nation.”
Genocide, Ethnic Cleansing & Theft of Lands
Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu’s disclaimer about Ben-Givr’s incitement of violence against Flotilla participants not reflecting the “values” of the state of Israel has been ridiculed around the world as those values are clearly reflected in the genocide and ethnic cleansing of Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank. It is seen in 80 years of Israeli abuse of Palestinians beginning in 1948 with Israeli militia massacres of Palestinians and the theft of land and homes of over 800,000 people in the Nakba or “Catastrophe.”
?Footage reveals a mass grave at Nasser Hospital in Gaza containing victims killed by the Israeli army after the hospital was devastated during Israel’s assault.
https://t.co/5XIBzUkEF2— Ramy Abdu| ???? ???? (@RamAbdu) May 23, 2026
No one has to look far for the “values” of the state of Israel. The values of the state of Israel are the criminal actions documented in excruciating detail in cases brought to the International Court of Justice and the International Criminal Court.
The Israeli army kidnapped 3 Palestinian children from Almghayer village near Ramallah pic.twitter.com/0PHpCiZTZs
— Mustafa Barghouti @Mustafa_Barghouti (@MustafaBarghou1) May 23, 2026
Succession of Criminal Actions
Gaza flotilla participants, both men and women, young and old, endured an endless succession of criminal actions by Israeli state security officials.
Three were shot by Israeli officials.
They were beaten, kicked in all parts of the body, dragged on the floor by the hair, forced to remain kneeling and bent over for hours at a time, beaten when one moved slightly, stripped naked numerous times, sexually assaulted.
Intimidation and humiliation were suffered in various degrees by virtually all of the 428 persons who were kidnapped from their Flotilla boats.
Australian Gaza Flottila aid worker’s first message to her mother after being released from an israeli concentration camp. pic.twitter.com/662OfZpib4
— Israel Exposed (@xIsraelExposedx) May 24, 2026
Within hours of their arrival in Istanbul, Flotilla participants were telling Turkish police investigators and civilian lawyers — one-by-one, boat by boat — what the Israeli security personnel did to them.
These are official statements from participants that will be used in judicial proceedings against the State of Israel.
[A spokesperson of the Israeli prison service told The Guardian in a statement: “The allegations raised are false and entirely without factual basis. All prisoners and detainees are held in accordance with the law, with full regard for their basic rights and under the supervision of professional and trained prison staff. Medical care is provided according to professional medical judgment and in accordance with ministry of health guidelines.”]
The first of many reports describing the treatment of numerous participants was issued on Sunday. Titled “Global Sumud Flotilla Released Horrific, Newly Emerging Testimonies as Survivors Return Home,” it contains descriptions by members of several delegations of Israeli brutality toward flotilla participants:
New Testimonies: Terror Inside the Shipping Containers
As survivors begin speaking to the press upon arrival in their home nations, a shared experience of calculated barbarism — and profound solidarity — is emerging:
— The French Delegation: In a chilling personal testimony, French delegate Meriem Hadjal described being dragged toward a dark shipping container by soldiers multiple times her size.
“I take the first blow. Slaps that knock you out… Everything happens at the level of the head.”
Terrified of being raped, she resisted as a soldier repeatedly touched her, while a second soldier pulled at her chest and pants.
Inside the container, she witnessed a third soldier torturing another volunteer on the ground with a taser.
Another soldier grabbed her by the hair, beating her head while demanding she show her face.
When the container door briefly opened, she recounted,
“what I mainly see on the ground, because I don’t look up, are bloodstains.”
Meriem noted she, along with other detainees, were stripped naked, removing any warm clothes and crammed into splintered containers where they could hear their “comrades, one by one, screaming, because they were being beaten to a pulp.”
— The Polish Delegation: Karim Awad, a medic holding dual Polish and U.K. citizenship, recounted being choked with a torn Palestinian flag by an Israeli soldier.
Awad was subsequently subjected to continuous stompings to the head by six soldiers.
Because he had written “Free Palestine” on his body, he was singled out for multiple strip searches, severe beatings with a hand-held metal detector and having his hair ripped out.
He further revealed that the Israeli forces systematically flooded the floors of the dark shipping containers with cold water every few hours to prevent detainees from sleeping.
— The Greek Delegation: Delegates recounted the boarding of the Kiriakos X, where soldiers used electric shocks and brutal beatings on the crew to force them to identify their captain.
To halt the torture of her crew, the female captain courageously stepped forward to claim responsibility for the boat and volunteers; the Israeli forces responded by shooting her directly in the leg with a rubber bullet. She was wounded and denied proper medical care for days.
— The South African Delegation: Two South African delegates, Ebrahim Peters and Qutb Hendricks, provided powerful testimony detailing how Israeli soldiers explicitly used geopolitical retaliation as a pretext for torture.
Upon discovering the participants’ nationality, soldiers dragged them into an isolated room and launched a targeted physical assault. While beating the volunteers, soldiers explicitly referenced international accountability mechanisms, stating, “You guys want to take us to court? We’ll show you,” referencing South Africa’s genocide case against Israel at the International Court of Justice (ICJ).
— The Belgian & Australian Delegations: Seventy-seven-year-old Belgian delegate Olimpia Dìez Perlines expressed total shock at the sadism of the forces.
Julien Cabral, another Belgian participant noted that soldiers could be heard explicitly saying, “let’s have fun,” as they initiated the violent attacks.
Australian delegate Juliet Lamont provided further harrowing details, confirming she was sexually assaulted “in this kind of torture chamber as five men were bashing me and smashing my face.”
— The Canadian Delegation: Ehab Lotayef, sailing aboard the Canadian Boat to Gaza, was directly asked by Israeli military personnel to assist them with translation, only to be stabbed in the hand by soldiers the moment he attempted to provide that help.
Ko Tinmaung, a Toronto-based Rohingya activist, has been released after more than 96 hours in Israeli detention following Israel’s hijacking of the Global Sumud Flotilla and the abduction of its civilian participants.
His testimony is horrifying.
He says he was beaten in a dark… pic.twitter.com/AA1daq22R2
— Shafiur Rahman (@shafiur) May 25, 2026
— The Brazilian Delegation: A delegate returning to Brazil, Ariadne Telles, detailed suffering physical and psychological torture. The delegate was subjected to severe sleep deprivation and targeted physical assaults:
“They kicked me on the face, they kicked me on the legs, they zip-tied my hands; I don’t feel my fingers until now.”
Detainees were forced to sit on their knees with their heads pressed to the floor for hours, while captors laughed.
Ann Wright served in the U.S. Army/Army Reserves for 29 years and retired as a colonel. She was also a U.S. diplomat for 16 years and served in U.S. embassies in Nicaragua, Grenada, Somalia, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, Sierra Leone, Micronesia, Afghanistan and Mongolia. She is the co-author of Dissent: Voices of Conscience. She has been with the Gaza Freedom Flotilla Coalition since 2010, has been put in Israeli prison twice for attempting to break the illegal Israeli naval blockade on Gaza and has been on segments of flotillas in 2011, 2013, 2015, 2016, 2018 and 2024.
The views expressed are solely those of the author and may or may not reflect those of Consortium News.
Please Donate to the
Spring Fund Drive!
…”Several countries have condemned, in the case of the international Flotilla participants, the same kind of abuse that goes ignored when Israeli security forces commit it against Palestinians.”…
Which shows us the true character of the western “elites”.
Actually welcoming mass murder of almost numberless innocent people.
In Palestine, Lebanon, Syria, Iraq, Iran, Russia, and so on.
And non of those monsters is being held accountable.
This is really depressing and sickening!
Who would have guessed the country founded on the idea that they can take someone else’s land because they want it would have a problem with rape and assault.
The people America invites to come and train our police.
ICE monkeys are trained by Israeli goons, as well. And it shows. Extrajudicial killings are a feature of Israeli civilization.
Horrible as it may seem to say this:
Thank you to the Samud activists who suffered such despicable treatment at the hands of Israeli monsters for providing evidence to individuals in the collective West who should have known for years, but apparently have not, what depraved, sadistic, perverted monsters the vast majority of Zionist Israelis are.
The atrocities suffered by these activivists will not have been in vain if die-hard Israel supporters see the light as a result of these reports and demand that Western politicians stop supporting the Zionist colony politically, materially, and militarily.
I personally would like to see Israel dissolved, every Israeli who has committed crimes against humanity prosecuted and jailed, and all Palestinian land appropriated and torn from the fabric of the region’s civilization by the British returned to the Palestinian people to manage and develop as they see fit.
I too want to see Israel dissolved and every Israeli who has committed crimes against humanity prosecuted and jailed. I would go further than that, but that’s my personal opinion. The fact that international governments go along with this, defend it, fund it, and lie about it is sickening. Where there is no law, there is no civilization. Israelis are freaks of nature.
What a bad stste!
if this country had any decency, it would have ended aid to Israel long ago.
After the midterms the US Congress will REMAIN infested with supporters of Israel’s genocide operations. Trump has no real opposition in US politics.
The fat rich who are the ultimate ones behind this brutality (executed by Israeli zombies called charitably- humans) – just like the fat rich white supremacist zionists placed as University “trustees” who smash freedom of speech/assembly – reveal their hollow core. Such actions betray their membership in the human race. Can it be any clearer that their designation of Palestinians as “human animals” is nothing but an acute projection (loaded perjorative) of the Zionists’ own inner core. Sadly, the Zionists choice of “animal” denigrates animals whose behaviors don’t come even close to those obscene ones of these Zionists. A sane world would banish them as unworthy to the human race, and close all doors to them. Leaving them to wander alone.
I agree 100%.
allow me to rephrase the title into one that is actually true and much more honest:
Rape, Assault & Abuse Reflect Israeli SOCIETY Values
if there is any country in which the government actually represents the people; it is Israel
it has been proven over and over again, and well before “october 7th” (although it’s much clearer since then) it is this:
90% or more of all Israeli’s are psychopathic, genocidal, racist and sadictic monsters.
this is very easy to prove; put a mike in front of an israeli, any israeli; women, children, old people and ask how they view Palestinians; and their true nature surfaces again and again.
on this issue they are very honest and open.
there are a million video clips floating around the diverse social media sites that prove this.
they want them all dead, gone; but preferably dead, including the children.
this has been so since day 1; almost 80 years ago.
‘Beyond One Man: Why Israel’s Wars Will Not End With Netanyahu,’
Ramzy Baroud Palestine Chronicle, April 23, 2026
hxxps://www.palestinechronicle.com/beyond-one-man-why-israels-wars-will-not-end-with-netanyahu/
An Israel Democracy Institute survey conducted on March 2–3 found that 93% of Jewish Israelis supported the joint US-Israeli attack on Iran. Support cut across all political camps.
The same enthusiasm for war accompanied the Gaza genocide and the various wars and escalations in Lebanon.
Indeed. There is no partner for peace within Israel these days.
There used to be a Peace Party, but it has long since died. Today the “opposition” is either Gen. Gantz, who led a genocidal attack on Gaza under Obama, or Bennett who was always from the far right. The same situation exists in America, where the Peace Movement has also died, and politically there is no partner for peace anywhere. You can vote for War with Iran, or for War with Russia, but the only dispute is over whom America should kill first. And I say ‘first’ because everyone agrees that eventually we will need to kill them all.
The rest of the world appears to see that there is no partner for peace in US-Israel.
For confirmation, look at a prediction market for who has a chance to be the next PM of Israel. The top names are Bennett, Netanyahu, Eisenkot and Lieberman. No other names are given higher than a 1% chance. If you don’t know these names, go and look them up. Learn about each of them. Learn about Israel, and what is politically popular.
Bennett is a former Chief of Staff to Netanyahu who now leads a party called “Jewish Home” that is far right.
Eisenkot is a former General and former member of the Golani Brigade who split from Gen. Gantz’s party. In recent years, the Golani Bgd was deeply involved in Gaza.
Lieberman is from “Israel Our Home” party and is considered a hardliner on Palestinian-Israel conflict. He was quoted as “there are no innocents in Gaza.”
No other names get more than a 1% chance of becoming PM. There is no partner for peace.
We’re witnessing history being written right before our eyes.
Of course we understand what the cowardly, racist, genocidal israelis are telling us with this brutality. But as Ko Tinmaung tells us, we will not be beaten by these detestable acts. The Sumud will come back stronger until the blockade collapses, as israel must surely collapse under their own hatred and venom which will poison them.
BDS israel.
So it takes their own people being tortured by Israel before these countries’ leadership speak up. I guess they’re finally feeling a little twinge of embarrassment. Or they’re just trying to save face after decades of complicity in genocide. It’s not enough. Not nearly. Israel needs to be completely isolated from the world and those countries that have assisted in and lied about the genocide, must pay reparations to the Palestinian people as well as forcing Israel to give back all stolen land. Nothing else is sufficient.
You’re right, of course. Therefore, we must thank the Sumud Flotilla personnel for enduring this barbaric violence to bring to the minds of the white supremacists that even they are not immune from the criminal actions of Israel. The collective west, the traditional invaders and occupiers of the global south, have no problem with violence as long as the victims are brown people from countries whose sovereignty they do not acknowledge or respect. But when they see it done to people like themselves, it suddenly become real to them. I salute the Flotilla members and wish them well so that more people will do what they have done until Israel is wiped off the face of the earth.