Israel has deported hundreds of foreign activists abducted by Israeli forces who stormed a Gaza aid flotilla earlier this week, following global outcry over their treatment in custody.
In Turkiye, dozens of flotilla participants arrived at the Istanbul airport throughout Thursday, some wearing keffiyehs and holding up their fingers in a peace sign. Crowds of supporters brandishing Palestinian flags welcomed them.
Ankara has evacuated 422 people on chartered flights, including 85 of its own citizens, and deployed doctors and ambulances to treat participants.
The French Foreign Ministry said the group included 37 French nationals. Some Spanish activists arrived in Madrid early evening on Thursday from Turkiye, while Jordan confirmed that two of its nationals had returned home via the southern crossing with Israel.
Israel’s Foreign Ministry spokesman Oren Marmorstein said earlier that all “foreign activists from the PR flotilla have been deported”.
“Israel will not permit any breach of the lawful naval blockade on Gaza,” he added.
The legal centre for Palestinian rights in Israel, Adalah, told Al Jazeera that most of the roughly 430 abducted activists were deported from Ramon airport in southern Israel, and the rest from Ben Gurion airport in Tel Aviv.
Julien Cabral, a 57-year-old Belgian who participated in his first flotilla voyage, arrived in Istanbul with a black eye and wound on his left temple – the result of a punch from an Israeli marine raiding his seven-person boat, he told AFP news agency.
“I heard them say in English, ‘Let’s have some fun’,” he said, adding that activists were slapped, verbally abused and forced to beg for food, water and sanitary products at every step of the detainment process. Israeli authorities also refused to let the injured see doctors, he said.
Alessandro Mantovani, an Italian journalist detained with the activists and deported before the others, told reporters in Rome that he and others were “taken to Ben Gurion airport in handcuffs and with chains on our feet” before being put on a flight to Athens.
Israeli forces “beat us up”, he said. “They kicked us and punched us and shouted ‘Welcome to Israel’.”
Widespread criticism
The latest round of abductions took place on Tuesday evening, when Israeli forces finished intercepting the last of the more than 50 boats of the Global Sumud Flotilla as they were sailing towards Gaza in international waters.
Israel’s raids were widely condemned, with the foreign ministers of 10 countries, including Spain, Brazil and India, slamming Israeli forces’ actions as “blatant violations of international law and international humanitarian law”.
Israel’s treatment of the activists has since been condemned by more countries, including several key allies.
The criticism comes after far-right National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir posted a video on X on Wednesday of himself taunting activists who were kneeling on the floor with their hands tied behind their backs.
In response, several nations, including France, Canada, Spain, Portugal and the Netherlands, summoned the Israeli ambassadors to their capitals to express their outrage. Meanwhile, European Council President Antonio Costa said he was “appalled” by Ben-Gvir’s behaviour, calling it “completely unacceptable”.
Italy has demanded an apology from Israel. Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani contacted European Union foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas, requesting that sanctions against Ben-Gvir be discussed at the bloc’s next meeting of foreign ministers.
Ben-Gvir’s behaviour prompted a rare rebuke from Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
“Israel has every right to prevent provocative flotillas of Hamas terrorist supporters from entering our territorial waters and reaching Gaza. However, the way that Minister Ben-Gvir dealt with the flotilla activists is not in line with Israel’s values and norms,” said Netanyahu.
“It really goes to show how much Israeli authorities wanted to make a show out of [this] and how it’s very much an extension of the Israeli treatment towards Palestinians, which obviously gets a lot less of a public outcry,” Miriam Azem, the international advocacy coordinator at Adalah, told Al Jazeera.
Reporting from Ramallah in the occupied West Bank, Al Jazeera’s Nida Ibrahim said the ongoing deportations were the fastest Israel has ever carried out, as it scrambles to contain the public relations damage caused by Ben-Gvir’s video. Ibrahim added that many Palestinians believe the incident has gained more international attention because those mistreated were from foreign countries.
Among those detained was an Israeli citizen, Zohar Regev, who attended a court hearing in Ashkelon on Thursday after she was accused of illegally entering Israel.
“This shows you the level of Israeli anger, the level of Israeli frustration at these continued flotillas that will disrupt Israel’s image,” Ibrahim reported.
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