On Wednesday, Oct. 8 nine participants from the Global Sumud Flotilla were welcomed back home in New York City to a joyous crowd of friends and loved ones. Supporters arrived early at JFK International Airport in anticipation of the activists’ landing, holding signs that said, “Welcome home Global Sumud Flotilla!” and “Let Gaza live!”
The nine flotilla participants included musicians Leila Hegazy and Carsie Blanton who represented Artists Against Apartheid, Drop Site News journalist Alex Colston, and U.S. army veteran Susan Jernstedt. They, along with hundreds of other flotilla activists, were sailing to break Israel’s siege of Gaza and deliver desperately needed humanitarian aid. But Israeli forces violently intercepted the flotilla boats in international waters and illegally abducted and detained all those on board. According to organizers of the flotilla, the boats were carrying “$110,000 in medicines, respiratory equipment and nutritional supplies intended for Gaza’s starving hospitals.”
“For over 31 days, we did what our governments would not do,” said Colston in a press conference immediately following their arrival. “We organized and traveled to open a humanitarian corridor by sea to facilitate aid to the Palestinian people in Gaza, who have suffered 77 years of brutal occupation and oppression while living the past 17 years under an illegal Israeli blockade and siege.”
Israeli authorities placed the Sumud participants in Ketziot prison, a maximum security detention facility in the Naqab desert notorious for its inhumane and torturous conditions toward Palestinian political prisoners. The flotilla participants were held for five days and four nights, and they described having medications thrown away, being forced to sleep on concrete floors, and being zip tied for five hours while Israeli Minister of National Security Itamar Ben Gvir taunted them, calling them “terrorists” and “baby killers.”
And while the participants denounced their own treatment in Ketziot, they were quick to emphasize that despite what they had suffered, it was Palestinians who had endured far worse for far longer.
“While I was in detention, the thing that kept going through my mind constantly is that at some point I will be out,” Hegazy told Liberation News. “But there are currently 11,000 Palestinians currently in detention and many of them have no idea when they will be out. And every day that goes by they still don’t know.”
“They are subjected to much worse treatment than even I was subjected to, and it was pretty terrible,” Hegazy continued. “That’s where my heart is.”
Participants also drew parallels between the brutality of the Israeli regime and Trump’s ICE terror.
“A major issue with our treatment is that it’s not unknown in the States,” stated Jernstedt during the press conference. “When we were screaming for our lawyers, the same things are being echoed in ICE detention centers. This is a normalized thing … And civilians need to step up! We run this country — it’s ‘we the people,’ not ‘we the politicians’”!
Jernstedt also called for the end of U.S. tax dollars going to support Israel’s genocide.
“The illegal siege of Gaza must be broken and the illegal occupation of Palestine must be ended — especially with our money” she declared. “It’s our tax money. It should be going to our families. It should be going to our children. We have children starving in America right now who don’t have enough food! Why is our money going toward killing children in Gaza?”
Despite their ill treatment, flotilla activists remained more determined and committed than ever to the Palestinian struggle and to break the illegal blockade of Gaza.
“The fight is obviously far from over,” stated Hegazy. “We have to do everything we can to break the siege — by land, by air, by sea, by everything all at once. And we will continue to do so.”
Feature photo: Supporters greet musician Leila Hegazy of Artists Against Apartheid at JFK International Airport. Credit: X/Artists Against Apartheid
