London: A pair of activists from the UK have said they were hospitalized after being assaulted by Israeli forces last week.
Alice Chapman and Zak Khan were detained by Israel in international waters aboard the Global Sumud flotilla along with 178 other people last Wednesday.
Chapman told The Guardian that she had been punched by an Israeli soldier, while Khan said he was shot in the leg with a rubber bullet and nearly had his jaw broken.
“I was beaten by four people, repeatedly punched, kicked, spat on and accused of being a terrorist,” he told the newspaper.
Khan, a Green Party councilor in the UK, said he developed a chest infection while detained aboard an Israeli ship.
Chapman said half the detainees were made to sleep inside shipping containers while the others had to sleep on deck, and Israeli soldiers denied them water and used stun grenades to prevent them from sleeping.
Khan said detainees were also beaten aboard the ship, with one, called Richard, “beaten very badly inside a container” so loudly that the other prisoners could hear it.
“He was abducted due to essentially speaking loudly and, explicitly, for saying ‘free Palestine,’” Khan said.
Chapman and Khan are now in Crete, saying they and 32 others were hospitalized upon their release from Israeli custody.
Two flotilla members were taken to Israel and have appeared before a court in Ashkelon without charge: Spanish-Swedish national Saif Abukeshek, who has Palestinian ancestry, and Brazilian Thiago Avila.
Spain and Brazil issued a joint statement on Friday denouncing the “abduction of two of their citizens in international waters by the government of Israel.”
The flotilla’s organizers called Israel’s boarding of at least 22 boats on Wednesday piracy, adding that members had been unlawfully seized and that the flotilla was around 600 miles from Gaza when they were boarded.
It said about 20 flotilla members are UK citizens and eight were detained. Two have since returned to the UK, with the rest in Crete and Turkiye.
The flotilla has tried multiple times to break Israel’s blockade of Gaza and deliver humanitarian aid to the embattled Palestinian enclave.
A UK Foreign Office spokesperson said on Thursday: “Efforts to deliver aid by sea highlight the dire humanitarian situation in Gaza. Israel must do more to allow sufficient aid into Gaza, in line with agreed minimum targets.”
