Israel 'beat, tied up and tortured' Gaza flotilla activists in prison

A Jewish American activist deported from Israel after participating in the Global Sumud Flotilla has told Middle East Eye that he and his fellow detainees were regularly beaten, tied up, psychologically tortured and denied food and medicine over a period of five days in prison.

David Adler, the co-general coordinator of the left-wing organisation Progressive International, was one of about 470 activists intercepted by Israeli naval forces in international waters and taken first to the port of Ashdod and then to Ketziot, a prison in the Negev desert notorious for rampant sexual abuse and violence.

He said the naval interception had been violent, that an Israeli barge had fired water cannons at the flotilla, tried to ram them and that in the end Israel had stolen all the ships. Taken in international waters, the activists were abducted and brought to the Israeli port of Ashdod.

"From the first moment we stepped onto that tarmac after interception, we were violently forced onto our knees into positions of submission," Adler said, speaking from Amman, the capital of Jordan, on Tuesday.

He said that once in positions of submission in the detention centre at Ashdod, he and the other Jewish member of the flotilla "were taken by the ear and ripped from the group for a photo op with Ben Gvir staring at the flag of the state of Israel".

Itamar Ben Gvir, a settler and Israel's far-right minister of national security, visited the site and derided the captured members of the flotilla as "terrorists". Adler said he and the other activists were "taunted by his goons".

"I went to visit Ketziot prison and I was proud that we are treating the 'flotilla activists' as terror supporters. Whoever supports terrorism is a terrorist, and deserves the conditions of terrorists," Ben Gvir said.

Israel's foreign ministry has denied mistreating members of the Global Sumud Flotilla. Middle East Eye wrote to the Israeli Prison Service asking for a response to the allegations.

'Psychologically tortured'

Speaking from Amman after his release, Adler said that "our belongings and boats were stolen from us". 

Before they left Ashdod, he said that the activists were "stripped, zip-tied, blindfolded and sent to an internment camp in a police van without any access to food, to water or to legal support".

'In short, we were treated as terrorists, which is what Ben Gvir promised'

- David Adler, Progressive International

Over the next five days, he said the group was "psychologically tortured" at Keziot Prison in the Negev desert.

If a detainee made a request for necessities such as insulin for the treatment of diabetes, they were "taken individually out of their cells and regularly beaten, handcuffed and ankle cuffed and left in solitary confinement".

"This happened so many times," Adler said. "In short, we were treated as terrorists, which is what Ben Gvir promised."

The flotilla activist said that in the prison, which is close to the border with Egypt, detainees could hear Israeli F-16s and F-35s travelling overhead every night "going to bomb Gaza, with the sound of German Shepherd dogs around us".

"Riot groups would come to our cells with tear gas, and riot gear and German Shepherds that would come and seek to terrify and terrorise us," Adler told MEE.

Adler and other detainees have said they had their belongings stolen by Israel. 

'Rogue state'

Clare Azzougarh, the daughter of Malcolm Ducker, a 72-year-old British air force veteran who captained a boat on the flotilla and was also detained in Ketziot, told MEE that she had spoken to her father since his release.

"He was very emotional," Azzougarh said. "Through tears he told us it had been a tough week, but not as bad as some."

Ducker's daughter said the Israelis had stolen all her father's belongings and he was in the process of trying to find some clothes while in Jordan.

US and UK 'immensely let down' families of detained Gaza flotilla activists

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Adler referred in his testimony to a "serial and systematic violation of our rights". He said he and his fellow detainees had been denied food and water, "denied medicine based on the whims of individual officers", and given no access to lawyers.

"I am shocked that more of this information hasn't come to light," Adler said.

"These were not at all normal prison conditions. I'm obviously very aware that all this pales in comparison to what Palestinian prisoners endure every single day - 11,000 of them in indefinite detention," he said. "But it is a marker of how rogue the state of Israel has become in its basic disregard for international humanitarian law."

The families of Adler and Ducker told MEE on Monday that they had felt let down by the British and American governments.

Adler said on Tuesday that the detained Americans had had "absolutely zero consular service".

When they were met by the US consul general at the border with Jordan, the activists were told: "We are not your babysitters. You will have no food, no water, no money, no phones, no planes, no visa. We will be taking you to the airport then you're on your own. We are not your babysitters."

Adler said US officials repeated the line about babysitters "four or five times, as if we needed to be told".

In the end, Adler described it as a "Ben Gvir-Trumpian nightmare we've been living for the last few days".

"This is how Ben Gvir got his way with a group of activists, teachers, nurses and medics, and people from around the world who were just trying to deliver aid."