Israeli authorities are holding 8 of the 12 Madleen boat activists on the basis of the law forbidding illegal entry into Israel. The Madleen, carrying food, baby formula and medicine to Gaza, was seized by Israeli authorities in international waters and brought to the port city of Ashdod. A representative of the Freedom Flotilla Coalition stated yesterday that “Israel is handling the custody of all 12 as though they had entered illegally—even though they were forcibly abducted from international waters and brought into Israel against their will.”
Late last night, Israel’s Detention Review Tribunal upheld the orders of the Interior Ministry’s border control administration to keep the eight in custody. The lawyers for the Adalah civil rights organization, representing the activists, had made the obvious argument in the tribunal that the law under which the activists have been detained is inapplicable since the activists “neither sought to enter Israel nor intended to enter Israeli territorial waters.” Rather, the Madleen was in international water when Israeli naval forces seized it. Further, they had no intention to sail to Israel, but to “the internationally recognized territorial waters of the State of Palestine” and in to Gaza. Yet, the tribunal asserted that Israel’s naval blockade on Gaza is lawful under Israeli law and that the activists planned on breaching it.
