Greta Thunberg Says Tortured With Others in Israeli Prison

Date: 08 October 2025 - 21:09

News ID: ۱۴۴۳۹۲

STOCKHOLM (Dispatches) —Swedish activist Greta Thunberg
revealed that she and other detainees of the Gaza flotilla were subjected to torture in the Israeli prison they were held.
Thunberg told a news conference in Stockholm that she and others were “kidnapped and tortured” by the Israeli military.
“Personally, I don’t want to share what I was subjected to because I don’t want it to make headlines and ‘Greta has been tortured’, because that’s not the story here,” she said, adding that what they were subjected to paled in comparison to what people in Gaza experienced daily.
Thunberg was part of the Global Sumud Flotilla, a group of vessels that tried to reach Gaza to bring aid supplies and draw attention to the plight of the enclave, where most of the 2.2 million residents have been driven from their homes and the United Nations says hunger is rampant.
Thunberg was detained along with 478 people in the flotilla and expelled from Israel on Monday.
Thunberg and other participants also complained that the Swedish government had not given them sufficient help while detained.
David Adler, a Jewish American activist and co-coordinator of Progressive International who was also detained, shared a detailed account of the events.
He described a violent naval interception involving water cannons and attempts to ram the flotilla vessels. Upon detention, activists were forced into submissive positions, stripped, zip-tied, blindfolded, and taken to Ketziot prison in the Negev desert, a facility known for harsh conditions.
Adler recounted psychological pressure, beatings, and solitary confinement, especially when requesting vital medications such as insulin.
Activists also faced intimidation from Israeli far-right minister Itamar Ben Gvir, who reportedly referred to them as terrorists deserving strict treatment. They endured tear gas, riot gear, police dog attacks, and heard nightly sounds of Israeli fighter jets bombing Gaza.
Families of detainees expressed frustration with the limited support from U.S. and UK governments. Adler described the U.S. consular response as dismissive, calling the experience a difficult ordeal for peaceful activists attempting to deliver humanitarian aid.
Among those detained were four Polish activists, including Franciszek Sterczewski, a Polish parliamentarian, who described Israel as a “barbaric state” after their release.
The activists were detained following the flotilla’s interception and were released after five days, returning to Poland.
“It is an honor to be a drop of this great wave of solidarity with you. We hope that politicians will also stand with society and begin to counteract this barbaric state that Israel has become and the genocide it is committing,” Sterczewski, a ruling Civic Coalition (PO) member of Sejm, or the lower house of the bicameral parliament, wrote on Facebook from Athens after being released by Israel.