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‘Gaza heroes’ welcomed home
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‘Gaza heroes’ welcomed home
KUWAIT: Eighteen Kuwaiti activists detained by Israel after a raid on a Gaza-bound aid flotilla returned home yesterday, accusing Israeli troops of having opened fire without warning. The activists, including Islamist MP Waleed Al-Tabtabaei and six women, were flown home aboard a government plane from Jordan after crossing by bus from Israel early yesterday, following hours of delay.
Tabtabaei, who was on the main vessel, the Turkish-flagged Mavi Marmara, told Kuwait Times that Israeli commandos fired live ammunition from the air killing two unarmed Turkish men instantly. This, he said, led to a firm unarmed stand by the civilians on the boats against fully armed soldiers that did not show any mercy.
“The resistance of the hostile takeover led to holding three Israeli soldiers captive that were freed later on when the flotilla surrendered,”
“We were assaulted, beaten and tied up for hours”.
Tabtabaei said the attack came in early hours of the morning,
“when we were getting ready for morning prayers without any warning of any kind. Later, we were forced to be interrogated but we refused to answer any questions.” Calling the Israelis “high seas pirates”,
Tabtabaei said he refused to answer any questions directed at him aboard the ship.
Israeli commandos started shooting from the air without warning,” lawyer Mubarak Al-Mutawa, who was also on the Mavi Marmara, told reporters. “They killed a number of volunteers even before landing aboard the ship,” he said. Young activist Ali Buhamd claimed he saw an
“Israeli soldier shooting and killing a wounded Turk in the head”
and that
“soldiers left another wounded Turk to bleed to death despite repeated appeals for help.”
Israel has blamed activists on board the Mavi Marmara for Monday’s confrontation in international waters, saying its troops were attacked as they boarded the ship and that nine passengers were killed in the fighting.
“I assure you that no one from the aid volunteers had any firearms. We had no other weapons, except kitchenware, and the volunteers did not start any resistance,”
Mutawa said.
Another Kuwaiti activist compared their subsequent detention by Israeli authorities to Guantanamo, the controversial US detention centre for terrorism suspects in Cuba.
“We experienced the Zionist crimes in the true meaning of the word. We lived two days as if we were in Guantanamo,”
Abdulrahman Al-Kharraz said.
Women activists Sundus Al-Abduljader and Senan Al-Ahmad said they were handcuffed, mistreated by Israelis and forced to go to the bathroom while still in handcuffs.
“They kept us confined inside the ship for 24 hours, handcuffed and with a number of the dead bodies with us. Five of the group were made to stay on top of the ship under the sun for hours,”
Tabtabaei said he was kicked by soldiers, who prevented him going to the toilet for 24 hours, while Mutawa, in his 60s, said his left hand was almost paralysed because of the tight cuffs. “With God’s will, we will not rest until Gaza and all of Palestine is free from the Zionist death grip” Mutawa added. The 18 men and women, some of whom looked exhausted, were received by Prime Minister HH Sheikh Nasser Mohammad Al-Ahmad Al-Sabah, senior officials and a large number of relatives, carrying Kuwaiti and Turk
ish flags.
The Kuwaitis arrived home on an Amiri plane sent by HH the Amir Sheikh Sabah Al-Ahmed Al-Sabah at 10:45 am at the ministerial protocol hall where they were welcomed by National Assembly Speaker Jassem Al-Khorafi at the moment and their families who preferred waiting in the hot sun rather than inside the hall. Tears of joy and cries of “Allah is Greatest” greeted the landing plane as families ran over rope barriers to hug their imprisoned relatives and welcome them back home while holding Kuwaiti and Turkish flags.
Abdul Rahman Failakawee, a Kuwaiti, said the Israelis had used an array of weaponry to subdue those on board the convoy. “The attack was totally barbaric,” he said by telephone from a bus taking the freed activists to Amman.
“They used legitimate and maybe illegitimate weapons: rubber bullets, live ammunition, sound bombs and tear gas bombs. They also used batons as they landed to beat those on board to control the ship.”
Kuwait News Agency (KUNA) reporter Muna Shashter, who was one of the women detainees, called on all Arabs and all Muslims to take similar actions, urging them to be a part of freeing Gaza and stopping all the inhumane actions against fellow Arabs and Muslims by the Israeli forces. Shashter added that one day in detention by the Israeli forces is more than enough to show how much the people of Palestine are suffering and how brutal and cruel their treatment of Palestinians is.
Shashter described the Israelis as
“terrorists, liars, and brutal animals” that don’t consider others who are not Israelis humans. Shashter said the attack on the aid flotilla took place in international waters with three boats and a helicopter ordering the captains to turn back, all of whom refused and continued ahead. “After that, each boat was surrounded by vessels and a helicopter deployed men in black, armed from head to toe, who asked no questions and killed two Turkish men immediately,”
She said things got worse when they were forced to stand for five hours under the sun with their hands tied without allowing them to make any phone calls. Shashter thanked the people of Kuwait for their support along with officials who helped them get back home safely by starting a major campaign, while thanking people around the world who stood against the Israeli actions and their vicious acts.
Four Bahraini activists from the aid flotilla were also arrived home yesterday. Sheikh Jalal Al-Sharqi, a Bahraini who was on the Mavi Marmara, said in a telephone call from Amman that activists were
“not allowed to go to the bathroom, nor to pray”.
Other activists expelled to Jordan early yesterday accused Israeli commandos who carried out the raid of killing passengers cold-bloodedly. “What happened was unbelievable. The way the criminal Israeli soldiers beat us and killed Turkish activists in cold blood was like a bloody movie. They could have arrested them,” Morrocan MP Abdelqader Amara, 47, told AFP in a hotel in Amman.
“The Israelis used live ammunition and showed us all the barbarism and cruelty in the world although all of us were unarmed. The Israelis beat some of them up with the butts of their rifles before they shot them dead.”
The Jewish state early Wednesday deported to Jordan 126 people it held after Monday’s raid, among them 30 Jordanians as well as nationals from Bahrain, Kuwait, Morocco, Syria, Algeria, Oman, Yemen, Mauritania, Indonesia, Pakistan, Malaysia and Azerbaijan. Turkish nationals made up the bulk of the more than 600 passengers on the fleet, and four were killed in the attack, diplomats in Ankara have said, dragging Israel’s relations with Turkey to a new low.
Amara said the attempt by the “Peace Flotilla” to breach the Israeli blockade of the Gaza Strip had served to highlight the “crimes” of the Jewish state. “What we did has exposed the Zionist entity to the world because its crimes took place in international waters. They did not warn us at all before storming the ship. It was a nightmare,” said Amara. He added that he and seven other Moroccans were to head home later yetserday. “We were beaten, humiliated, insulted and stripped of our clothes.
“An Algerian MP nearly lost his eyes after the Israelis beat him,”
said another passenger, Salha Nuweisreyh, 51, of Algeria.
Najwa Sultan, 48, also from Algeria, said Israel
“treated the activists as if they were terrorists”. “We were deprived of basic rights. They handcuffed us after the raid and kept us waiting under the sun for many hours. It was inhuman,”
“I think we have achieved our goal and broke the blockade despite all what happened. Israel has gone mad and it will not continue to exist forever.” Around 28 Algerian nationals are expected to head home today.
Jordan’s King Abdullah II on Monday instructed his government to facilitate the transfer to the kingdom of those wounded in the attack “and provide them with necessary treatment and care before sending them to their countries”. Jordan signed a peace treaty with Israel in 1994. The Israeli operation has sparked global outrage, with many countries calling for international probe, and on Wednesday Nicaragua became the first country to suspend diplomatic relations with Israel over the incident.
Greece said several of its citizens were badly treated, reports emerged of an Australian journalist being Tasered and volunteers described Israeli “crimes”. Top Swedish author Henning Mankell – who was on board the fleet of six boats towed to Israel after the offensive on Monday that left nine people dead and dozens injured – accused the Jewish state of “brutality”.
“What will happen next year when we come back with hundreds of boats? Will they fire a nuclear bomb?”
the author of the Wallander crime series
said when he returned to Gothenburg airport on Tuesday night.
In Australia, the Sydney Morning Herald said its photographer Kate Geraghty may have been hit with a stun gun by Israeli forces during the raid. On its website, the newspaper said Geraghty had told Australian Consular officials on Tuesday she had been hit in the upper arm with what she believed to be a Taser and had subsequently suffered a minor burn and felt nauseous. The photographer and Herald journalist Paul McGeough have been in Israeli detention since Monday.
“I did not see her being Tasered, but when we were all finally gathered into a room and they had subdued all of us and taken over the boat she did show us her wound on her arm and she said that she wasn’t feeling well and that she was hurt,”
said Palestinian activist Huwaida Arraf, who was on the same boat.
The Israelis just attacked us without warning after dawn prayer,” said Norazma Abdullah, a Malaysian who crossed into Jordan.
“They fired with some rubber bullets but after some time they used live ammunition. Five were dead on the spot and after that we surrendered,”
said Abdullah, who was on the Marmara where most of the violence took place. Abdullah, speaking to Reuters near a Jordan river bridge, said the Israeli commandos had then kept the activists tied up for 15 hours until they reached the Israeli port of Ashdod.
Abdullah said the Turkish-backed flotilla had been more than 68 miles off the Gaza coast when it was intercepted.
“Our original plan was to stop there and ask for Israeli permission before we entered and, if they refused, to stay at sea in protest … but they attacked us before we had a chance to do that,”
Archbishop Hilarian Capucci, a Greek Catholic prelate from Jerusalem who was imprisoned by Israel in 1974 and later deported, said the maritime attack was unwarranted.
“Our trip to Gaza was a trip of love and God was with us. Israel by its actions had rightly drawn world outrage over its brutality against unarmed people carrying a message of love to an innocent occupied people under siege,”
Capucci said. – Agencies
Detained flotilla activist: ‘I saw blood everywhere’
Wednesday, June 2, 2010
Ma’an – Lawyers were finally allowed to access some 680 activists….. testimony from the detainees on Wednesday, describing Israeli forces opening fire and the state of panic that followed.
After having stormed the vessels, the detained activists said Israeli forces confiscated all mobile phones, laptops, and cash. They told lawyers that Israeli commandos began firing live ammunition, rubber bullets, stun grenades and tear-gas canisters from helicopters without prior notice, which caused panic and confusion amongst those on board.
The overhead helicopters terrified the passengers, with many having assembled for the Muslim dawn prayer.
Syrian activist Shatha Barakat said that when she tried to go to the upper deck of one of the ships to help the injured, she saw blood stains everywhere and heard gunshots from all directions. Offering first aid to an elderly man who was struck, Barakat said all on board the vessel were unarmed. Israeli soldiers, she said, were hit by random fire from military helicopters overhead.
Indonesian doctor Muhammad Halim Ben Hassan, also on the Flotilla, told lawyers that he gave first aid to several people who sustained both gunshot and rubber-coated bullet wounds, confirming he saw four activists dead on board.
Early on Monday morning the six-vessel fleet was attacked by Israel commando forces, who shot dead at least 10 activists on board. The incident occurred in international waters, with Israel’s navy later diverting the aid boats to Ashdod, and detaining all those on board, which included members of parliaments from across the world.
The boats were carrying with them some 10,000 tons of humanitarian aid in an attempt to break Israel’s four-year-long blockade of the Gaza Strip, which UN organizations say three-quarters of which remain in disrepair following Israel’s assault 16-months prior as building material remains largely embargoed by Israel.
Archbishop Capucci: Israeli Aggression Uncovered Israel’s Racism and Fascism
Jun 04, 2010
Daraa, southern Syria (SANA) – The four Syrian supporters who have joined the Freedom Flotilla, which was attacked by the Israeli occupation forces, arrived on Wednesday in Nasib border center in Daraa, southern Syria, and were met by a massive popular and official reception.
The four supporters are Archbishop of Jerusalem in exile Hilarion Capucci, Shaza Barakat, Mohammad Satalah and Hassan Rifai.
Archbishop Capucci said in a statement that he was brutally attacked by the occupation forces who handcuffed him and that one of the soldiers tried to throw him to the ground, saying that the occupation soldiers are immoral.
He pointed out that the Israeli aggression uncovered Israel’s racism and fascism, and that the supporters headed to Gaza to show Israel’s racist reality and lift the siege.
Archbishop Capucci pointed out that this is second time he joined supporters on a ship to break the siege on Gaza, and that the Israeli occupation soldiers had also attacked them the first time, affirming that he and the participants will continue their attempts until the siege on Gaza is lifted.
He affirmed that the Palestinians will return to a free and independent Palestinian state with Jerusalem as its capital, saying that Israel’s strength is relative and not absolute.
He called for achieving Palestinian unity of ranks.
For her part, Shaza Barakat said the supporters participated in breaking the siege and were not afraid despite knowing that the Israeli occupation forces will attack the peace flotilla, adding that the Israelis treated her with brutality and violence.
“This blood on the shawl I’m wearing is the blood of a Turkish martyr… there were Turkish martyrs that were thrown into the sea immediately after they were killed by israeli soldiers,”
she said, affirming solidarity with the people of Gaza.
Barakat said negotiations for releasing them were very quick, adding “an Israeli guard said that we caused a major problem for Israel… they showed fear from this.”
She concluded by affirming her strong confidence and hope in the people and in the stances of President Bashar al-Assad in support of the resistance.
In turn, Hassan Rifai said the Israeli decision to attack the supporters was made in advance, as there were dozens of martyrs and victims within half an hour, adding that the occupation soldiers fired directly at supporters, killing two immediately with shots to the head.
“Those who came from Syria to participate in the Freedom Flotilla walked the path of resistance and determination consolidated by President Bashar al-Assad, not only in Syria, but on the Arab, Islamic and international levels,” he said.
For his part, Mohammad Satalah expressed satisfaction over what the supporters achieved, noting that the world reacted positively to the human condition of the supporters who were brutally attacked by Israel.
H. Sabbagh / Al-Ibrahim
