TEL AVIV, Israel (AP) — Israel has released hundreds of activists who attempted to breach Israel’s naval blockade of Gaza and is in the process of deporting them, according to a legal organization working with the flotilla.The Israel-based legal advocacy group, the Legal Center for Arab Minority Rights in Israel, or Adalah, said Thursday that all of the international activists are in transit to a civilian airport near the southern Israeli city of Eilat for deportation.The group said one participant, Zohar Regev, who holds Israeli citizenship, was in a court hearing in the southern city of Ashkelon on charges of illegal entry into Israel and unlawful stay. Regev has taken part in previous flotillas to Gaza.
Netanyahu calls for quick deportation after rebuking security ministerPrime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Wednesday he instructed that the activists be deported “as soon as possible,” after sharply rebuking Israel’s national security minister for a provocative video showing the minister taunting detained flotilla activists who were handcuffed and kneeling.Netanyahu said that although Israel has every right to stop “provocative flotillas of Hamas terrorist supporters,” the way National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir dealt with the activists was “not in line with Israel’s values and norms.”Ben-Gvir released videos Wednesday showing him walking among some of the approximately 430 detainees. In one, activists with their hands tied behind their backs are kneeling, their heads touching the floor inside what appears to be a makeshift detention area on the deck of a ship.
