The detention and humiliation of Global Sumud Flotilla activists not only reveals Israel’s approach to Gaza, it raises questions about Australia’s response to an ally which is responsible for genocide.
The footage released by Itamar Ben-Gvir, Israel’s current national security minister on May 21, quickly spread across international news outlets and social media. It shows that hundreds of detained activists from various countries, including 11 Australians, were forced to kneel with their hands restrained behind their backs while Ben-Gvir walks past mocking them. Among the peace activists are doctors, students, academics and filmmakers.
The flotilla had again been attempting to deliver humanitarian aid to Gaza, and challenge the illegal blockade. They were again intercepted illegally in international waters, but the outcry at their treatment has only come after Ben-Gvir’s public humiliation.
Ben-Gvir’s video was not just about controlling the detainees; it was a public display of the Israeli state’s power. The forced kneeling, restraints and ridicule were part of a political performance designed to send a wider message: Israel will stop all attempts to challenge the blockade of Gaza.
Some detainees were restrained with plastic ties; others were forced to kneel while the Israeli national anthem played through loudspeakers. This was a deliberate display of domination. They report that they were sexually abused, punched, tasered and kept in inhumane conditions.
Basic humanitarian law means even in situations involving detention or maritime interception, civilians must be protected. This is why European officials, the first to speak out, described the scenes as degrading and unacceptable.
Australia’s foreign minister Penny Wong followed suit, saying the footage was “shocking and unacceptable”.
However there is another broader issue — Wong’s restrained response.
The Benjamin Netanyahu government, of which Ben-Gvir is a senior minister, is one of the Labor government’s closest strategic partners.
Australia’s foreign policy is supposed to be framed around protecting human rights, opposition to arbitrary detention and the defence of its citizens overseas.
It raises a deeper question which has received less attention: Why didn’t Wong speak up when the flotillas were intercepted in international waters? Labor was very quiet when Australians aboard the various flotillas have been illegally detained, or mistreated.
The Israeli ambassador was not summonsed to meet Wong when six Australians were illegally detained by Israel in a previous attempt to deliver aid. Wong said nothing about their mistreatment by the IDF, including the sexual abuse and other forms of torture.
The significance of the current incident lies not only in the humiliation itself, but in the message embedded within.
As French philosopher Michel Foucault argued, power is exercised not only through direct force, but by the shaping of public meaning through spectacle and discipline.
Ben-Gvir’s video was not just about controlling the detainees; it was a public display of the Israeli state’s power. The forced kneeling, restraints and ridicule were part of a political performance designed to send a wider message: Israel will stop all attempts to challenge the blockade of Gaza.
If Israel knows that international reactions are likely to be limited to statements of concern, rather than military sanctions and political isolation, the cost to it of mistreating flotilla activists is marginal.
But perhaps Ben-Gvir has done us a favour by revealing how Israel treats supporters of Palestine. The flotilla activists’ accounts of their abuse, and the abuse they saw meted out to Palestinian prisoners, don’t leave much to the imagination.
This is why Wong’s response is wholly inadequate. If the defence of human rights is a principle, Wong and Labor should be just as concerned about Israel’s genocide and mistreatment of Palestinian prisoners.
Australia must cut military ties apartheid Israel and demand the siege on Gaza is immediately lifted.
[Shamikh Badra, originally from Gaza in Palestine, is a convener of the Coalition for Justice and Peace in Palestine and a PhD candidate at the School of Humanities and Social Inquiry at the University of Wollongong.]