Greta Thunberg among 70 Gaza flotilla detainees to be released today

Athens: Swedish activist Greta Thunberg will be among more than 70 people of different nationalities to leave Israel on Monday after they were seized aboard an intercepted Gaza aid flotilla.

Most, if not all, those being released from Israeli detention will be flown to Greece, where they will be able to get flights to their home countries, their respective governments said on Sunday.

Those flying out of Israel on Monday include 28 French citizens, 27 Greeks, 15 Italians, and nine Swedes.

Twenty-one Spaniards separately returned to Spain on Sunday from Israel.

The release still leaves several foreigners in Israeli custody, including 28 Spanish nationals.

All had been on board the 45-vessel Global Sumud Flotilla carrying activists and politicians, who had been aiming to get past an Israeli blockade to deliver aid to Gaza, where the United Nations says famine has taken hold.

Israel started intercepting the ships in international waters on Wednesday. An Israeli official said on Thursday that boats with more than 400 people on board had been prevented from reaching the Palestinian territory.

The Italian and Greek foreign ministries said their released nationals would on Monday fly from Israel to Athens. Italian Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani said on X that the 15 Italians would have assistance for a subsequent transfer to Italy.

France’s foreign ministry said the 28 French citizens would be flown to Greece. They accounted for most of the 30 French nationals Israel seized aboard the flotilla.

The Swedish foreign ministry did not say where the Swedes would fly to, but Swedish media said they, too, could be put on the flight to Greece.

– ‘Treated like monkeys’ –

A first group of 26 Italians already left Israel on Saturday. But the last 15 had to wait for their judicial expulsion from the country as they refused to sign a form allowing their voluntary release.

Several of the Italians in the first group said after returning to their country that they were subjected to degrading treatment by the Israeli authorities.

Saverio Tommasi, a journalist for the online media site Fanpage, said he was hit in the back and on the head by his Israeli captors.

“We were treated like old monkeys in the worst circuses of the 1920s,” said Tommasi, cited by the Ansa press agency.

Sweden’s Foreign Minister Maria Malmer Stenergard told AFP that embassy staff in Tel Aviv had been able to visit the nine Swedes in detention.

“Late Sunday, the Israeli authorities informed us that they were set to authorise the Swedish citizens to leave Israel tomorrow (Monday) by plane,” she said.

One of the Spaniards who returned home on Sunday, Rafael Borrego, told reporters that those detained by Israel had suffered “repeated physical and mental abuse”, including receiving blows and being forced to the ground.