St Andrews academic and Barcelona mayor: Europeans who paid price for sailing to Gaza
Three years into the genocide, the faces of Europe's resistance are specific people: Scottish geographer chained at Ben Gurion, former Barcelona mayor deported, French activists hospitalised with broken ribs
EDINBURGH (MNTV) — When Israeli commandos boarded the Global Sumud Flotilla in international waters, the activists they seized were not an abstraction. They had names, universities and city halls — and their treatment in Israeli custody became one of the sharpest flashpoints in Europe’s confrontation with Israel over Gaza.
Among those detained was Antonis Vradis, a geographer at Scotland’s University of St Andrews — one of two Scots held after their vessel was intercepted while trying to break Israel’s blockade and deliver aid to the famine-struck enclave.
He was later released to Türkiye, the university confirmed. Alongside him, across successive 2026 flotilla missions, were figures such as Ada Colau, the former mayor of Barcelona, who was deported to Greece, and Spanish-Swedish organiser Saif Abukeshek, held without charge at Ashkelon’s Shikma facility and released only after a hunger strike and international pressure.
The accounts that emerged from detention were grim. The Italian journalist Alessandro Mantovani described being taken to Ben Gurion airport in handcuffs and leg chains before being flown to Athens. Five French activists were hospitalised in Türkiye, some with broken ribs or fractured vertebrae.
Detainees from more than 40 countries alleged beatings, sexual assault and the denial of medical care — allegations Israel’s prison service denied, insisting detainees’ rights were upheld.
The episode that most inflamed Europe was a video filmed by Israel’s far-right national security minister, Itamar Ben-Gvir, taunting activists as they knelt with their hands bound. It drew condemnation even from Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and prompted France to ban Ben-Gvir from its territory, with Foreign Minister Jean-Noël Barrot calling his actions toward French and European citizens “unspeakable.” Luxembourg’s foreign minister asked openly how long such behaviour from politicians would be tolerated.
Three years into the genocide, the flotilla volunteers — academics, former mayors, journalists, pensioners — have given Europe’s solidarity a human face.
And their treatment, filmed and chained, forced governments that had hidden behind statements to respond to something they could no longer look away from.
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