(Reuters)-Israel said that on Monday deported activist Greta Thunberg and 170 other international flotilla activists prevented by Israeli forces last week from delivering help to Gaza, sending them to Greece and Slovakia.
Previously, Swiss and Spanish activists of the Flotilha said they were subjected to inhuman conditions during their detention by Israeli forces. Monday’s expulsions raised to 341 the total number of deported from 479 detainees.
The Israeli Foreign Ministry issued a statement, accompanied by Thunberg photos at the airport, saying that the legal rights of all participants were respected and that the only violence involved an activist who bit a doctor in the Israeli prison of Ketziot.
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A spokesman for the Israeli Foreign Ministry said Thunberg, a Swedish activist who fights mainly against climate change, embarked on a plane at Ramon Air Base in the Negev Desert in Israel. Israel classified the flotilla as an advertising blow.
The deported are citizens of Greece, Italy, France, Ireland, Sweden, Poland, Germany, Bulgaria, Lithuania, Austria, Luxembourg, Finland, Denmark, Slovakia, Switzerland, Norway, United Kingdom, Serbia and the United States, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said.
Activists claim abuse
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Among the nine members of the Flotilla who arrived home in Switzerland, some claimed sleep deprivation, lack of water and food, and were beaten, kicked and locked in a cage, said the group that represents them in a statement.
A spokesman for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Israel rejected the allegations.
The Spanish activists also claimed abuse when they arrived in Spain at the end of Sunday after being deported.
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“They beat us, dragged us on the floor, sold our eyes, tied our hands and feet, set us into cages and insulted us,” said lawyer Rafael Borrego to reporters at Madrid airport.
Swedish activists said on Saturday that Thunberg was pushed and forced to use an Israeli flag during his arrest, while others said they had clean foods and retained water and had their drugs and confiscated belongings.
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Israel described as “complete lies” the widespread accounts that detainees were mistreated after the interception of the flotilla.
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A spokesman told Reuters over the weekend that all detainees had access to water, food and bathrooms, adding: “They were not denied access to a lawyer and all their legal rights were fully respected.”
On Sunday, the Switzerland embassy in Tel Aviv visited 10 Swiss citizens and said they were all “in relatively good health conditions given the circumstances.”
The former mayor of Barcelona Ada Colau, who was also in the flotilla, said there was “abuse, but this is nothing compared to what the Palestinian people suffer every day.”
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(Reportagem de Olivia Le Poidevin, David Latona, Alexander Cornwell and Howard Goller)
