The Spanish journalist Alicia Armesto landed in Madrid last Wednesday, June 24, after having stayed for a month, whom human rights organizations such as Amnesty International have accused on several occasions of war crimes. Armesto, who only a few months earlier had been illegally detained by Israel in international waters while traveling aboard the Global Sumud Flotilla, signed up for the land convoy that was intended to bring humanitarian aid to Gaza.
Although she had not long been deported from Israel, where she suffered mistreatment and humiliation, Armesto spoke with the Madrid Journalists’ Union (SPM), of which she is technical secretary, and told them that, if they supported her, she would try to reach Palestine. “No matter how much there is a peace agreement, we all know that it is a lie,” says Alicia, who denounces that Israel continues to prevent international journalists from documenting what is happening in Gaza. “The best way to report was this,” he says, then with the certainty that “really on this occasion everything would be shorter, much shorter.” It wasn’t like that. Alicia and ten other companions from the land convoy were detained by Haftar’s military forces on May 24, sent to a detention center that the Libyans themselves defined as a “black hole, a place where human rights do not exist.” His release, a month later.
- You were detained on May 24 when you approached a checkpoint in Sirte (Libyan city) to negotiate safe passage for the land convoy. You do so after having crossed the “5+5” security zone, the Libyan territory controlled by a committee in which the different opposing factions in the country participate. What happened?
Actually, they kidnapped us. We were going to negotiate. Before that we had already gone to the checkpoint twice. The first time the Red Cross was there and we spoke with them to leave them humanitarian aid. On the second occasion, the Red Cross was no longer there and the colonel told us to leave, not to return. When we tried to go a third time as a negotiating team, we encountered 50 military cars and they took our passports. Before, two doctors and a translator used to talk to the soldiers, but that day they did not allow it. They put us in cars and took us to a migrant detention center. At that time, we thought they were going to deport us. We were surprised when they took our blood and we didn’t really know why…
- Have you been able to discover it?
No, we still don’t know why they did it. We stayed in the detention center for a day and a half, until they told us that they would send us back home, each one of us to our own country. They took us to an airport and there a soldier apologizes and tells us that we will go to Tripoli, but they put us on the plane and the commander says no, we will go to Benghazi. We thought that maybe there was the airport from which they would send us back…
No, when we arrive in Benghazi, at night, they put us in some cars that drive without lights, completely in the dark, and they put us in a place. Upon arrival, they tell us that it is a “black hole”, a place where human rights do not exist. They put each of us in cells measuring 1.5 x 1.5 meters, in the dark, rooms from where we listened to how they were torturing other people. At that moment I couldn’t know if it was my colleagues or not, and if I would be next. After two or three days they took us to another module, which seemed like the place where people were treated better, with a lot of quotes… Screams continued to be heard and sometimes trails of blood could be seen when they moved some people from one place to another. At least they left us, they never touched us.
- They didn’t hit you, but upon your return to the Madrid airport you said that it was the place where you had the worst time psychologically.
Very badly. When we were in the individual cells, until they took us to the other module, where we were three women per cell and the boys all together, we went on a hunger strike. We kept it later because no one told us anything. We couldn’t even talk to our families. I was at 32 glucose, my Argentine companion had seizures… We were like this for several days, until seven or eight days later the American and Italian consuls appeared.
The Spaniard showed up the next day, after the American and the Italian told them where we were. Manuel, the Spanish consul, burst into tears when he saw me. We had been missing for several days and he told me that they didn’t know if we were dead. From that day on, both Manuel and Marc, his second, stayed in Benghazi. They wouldn’t leave until we were free. I can say that I am the person who has seen his consular representation the most times.
- I understand, then, that the relationship with the Spanish Government, its predisposition, was good.
They were both incredible. In fact, they were the ones who gave us some hope. They told us that they didn’t know when, but that they would free us, and that they would try to achieve it in the shortest time possible.
- Did you know what they accused you of?
They accused us of illegal immigration and gathering in a prohibited place. At first they made us testify before the military, who gave us some papers to sign in Arabic. I wrote “I don’t understand” in Spanish and signed. Afterwards, everyone did the same. At the same time, they took us before a prosecutor and we declared without the presence of a lawyer.
- Do you think Israel was also behind this?
It’s very clear. Israel puts a lot of pressure on Egypt and Libya borders Egypt, you cannot get on bad terms with them. Furthermore, Khalifa Haftar [el mariscal que comanda el Ejército Nacional Libio] He is a protégé of Benjamin Netanyahu.
- Months before, you were already illegally detained in Israel for participating in the maritime flotilla. Was it different?
In Israel, as we arrived at the port, Adalah’s lawyers were already waiting for us, and that at least gives you a little more security. In Israel I got my due, but the blows are easier to dissociate, thinking that you are recording them behind a camera, for example, but how do you dissociate fear? In Libya I had to make a lot of efforts to get through one day and get to the next. We were terrified. When we went in the maritime flotilla we knew what could happen, but not here. We were not prepared for something like this. It’s like when the people from the flotilla were beaten at the Bilbao airport. It was harder for them to assimilate that than what Israel did, because mentally you are not prepared for something like that. This, Libya, has been terrifying. I didn’t know when I would see my children again. Furthermore, every time the flotilla put something about our case on social media, the soldiers came to the cells and told us that if this was not deleted we would go to punishment cells. You don’t know the fear that happens, to the point that we thought that, please, things should be deleted, that nothing should be done, I’m not exaggerating. There came a time when the consuls, in addition, when they extended our kidnapping for another 30 days, told us that there was only the diplomatic route left, that there was no other solution.
- How did you manage to endure day after day, so as not to give up?
This made the military very angry. After twelve or thirteen days they left the cells open and the ten of us could see each other both in the space between cells and the times we could access a small patio. It was very hard, but when one couldn’t take it anymore, he had the other nine to support him. It is true that we were very different people, but we were all there for the same cause, and we became the main support. If one day you couldn’t get up, one of your colleagues always came to get you to do it.
- After 30 days they release you. How did you find out? How was it achieved?
Two days before the liberation, the Polish companion, who was very depressed and very afraid because she had also converted to Islam, had to undergo appendicitis surgery. I think they must have been afraid that one of us would die. The consul told us that things were speeding up and two days later some jailers appeared and took some of them away. They said they would go free. We were scared, because we didn’t know if they would really be released or not, but at night they showed us photos of them arriving at the airport. They told us to be prepared, that those of us who were left would leave in the morning. We couldn’t believe it, but in the morning they took us to the airport and there was Marc, the consul’s second. He hugged me and told me: “You are now free.”
- What feeling did the news give you and, above all, that moment when you are already on the plane returning home?
We went crazy. With the first meal they gave us, tears came to our eyes, we were like hyperactive. When I arrived in Madrid I was still in shock, in fact, I don’t remember many of the people who came to welcome me.
- It hasn’t even been a week since you returned… How are you?
I have a strange feeling of normality. Suddenly and for no reason I get angry, I feel like crying, angry… But I can’t even say why it happens to me. Psychologically I am paying a very high price. Also, I’m still a little angry because I think we were not well prepared in this convoy. At no time did we foresee the scenario of such an arrest. We really thought that this time, and not like in the maritime flotilla, everything would be shorter, much shorter. The possibility of arrest was never raised. Honestly, it was never considered, at any point.
During all these days detained in Libya, I kept remembering something that one of my children had told me, that they loved my solidarity but that I should also have it with them. They’re getting over it, but they’re angry. In the end, in eight months his mother has had to be released from prison on two occasions. Now I am going to dedicate myself to those closest to me. The latest levels of violence have been so brutal, too, with both the convoy and the flotilla, that perhaps we have to change the formula. I don’t know if it still makes sense to keep hitting that wall, to keep putting people’s lives at risk, although I don’t know if there is another way to do it.
