On August 21, Turkey announced it had sought an arrest warrant for the Israeli Prime Minister in relation to the treatment of members of an aid flotilla sailing towards Gaza that left Turkey in May. The Turkish warrant accuses Benjamin Netanyahu, among other things, of crimes against humanity, genocide, aggravated deprivation of liberty, and torture.
Last Spring, dozens of vessels sailing towards Gaza with food, medical supplies and hygiene products were intercepted by the Israeli military in international waters, and 428 international activists, journalists, doctors and politicians on board were brought to Israel, where they were detained. Upon release, flotilla participants denounced sexual violence, beatings, and humiliations at the hands of Israeli officials – who have denied the violations.
Turkish Justice Minister Akın Gürlek said in a post on X that Netanyahu, an Israeli military official called Afek Moskovitch and 33 other defendants are being prosecuted by a Court in Istanbul over these alleged crimes.
Investigations in Italy, France, Spain and Poland
This was not the only episode of its kind. Last year, a previous mission of the Global Sumud Flotilla was attacked by Israeli drones and later intercepted in international waters, around 70 nautical miles off the coast of Gaza. The people on board were detained by Israel.
Many of the arrested members of the Gaza-bound flotillas are citizens of European countries and have filed criminal complaints in their own jurisdictions. Italy, France, Spain, and Poland have opened investigations, while the Netherlands might soon follow suit. Lawyers have also sent a communication to the International Criminal Court (ICC), demanding that it include the alleged crimes in its Palestine investigation.
Broken bones and humiliations
According to a timeline issued by the Global Sumud Flotilla, on April 29, the flotilla was travelling towards the Greek island of Crete, over 600 nautical miles from Gaza (1,100 km) when Israeli military boats surrounded 21 vessels carrying around 180 people. Some of the vessel’s engines were smashed, and participants were beaten. Two activists, Saif Abukeshek and Thiago Ávila, were brought to a prison in occupied Palestine and were released after 10 days. The others were detained on a ship, where they stayed for over a day. According to their accounts, they were denied adequate food or water, and Israeli soldiers flooded sleeping areas with cold water. And 34 had to be taken to hospital after their release.
Then after regrouping in Turkey, 54 boats carrying nearly 500 participants from 45 countries set sail towards Gaza. Between May 18 and 19, the fleet was intercepted in international waters. Participants were carried in ships towards the port of Ashdod, 30 km south of Tel Aviv. From there, 428 of them were brought to the Ketziot prison, a detention site where Palestinians, often from Gaza, have been reportedly detained and brutally tortured.
Israel’s National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir sparked international condemnation and was banned from entering several countries after he posted a video in which he mocked flotilla members forced to the ground in the port of Ashdod. For hours they were kept in a kneeling position, with their foreheads pressed to the ground and their hands behind their backs, while the Israeli national anthem played on repeat. During the detention on the ship, at the port and in prison, flotilla activists said they were beaten, humiliated, sexually assaulted and faced degrading conditions. Many reported broken bones and other injuries: 67 needed medical evaluation and 12 were hospitalised.
The contested legality of the blockade of Gaza
Israel has argued that its blockade of Gaza, which started back in 2009 to restrict the Hamas ability to smuggle weapons, is legal under a codification of customary international law on naval warfare called the San Remo Manual. According to Tel Aviv, they are allowed to stop vessels believed to be breaching the blockade.
Alice Giannini, assistant professor of criminal law at Maastricht University, says that “there are no legal grounds to justify the interception of the flotilla”. She explains that “even if one were to argue that the naval blockade is legitimate, they could only intervene when they think there are imminent threats. But there were none here, and that is indisputable”. The flotilla was made of civilians carrying humanitarian aid, and when it was intercepted, it was in international waters, far from Gaza, she adds.
The movement leading to today’s Flotilla has been active since 2008. After an Israeli attack in 2010, where 9 people on board a Turkey-flagged vessel were killed, a United Nations fact-finding mission found the blockade of Gaza illegal as “it resulted in excessive damage to the civilian population in relation to the concrete and direct military advantage anticipated from the blockade”. As a result, the boarding of the ships too was found illegal, “unless it could have been justified on grounds other than the blockade, and (…) there was no such lawful alternative justification”.
If that was the report’s decision already 15 years ago, Giannini argues that “it cannot now be denied that the blockade on Gaza is being imposed with the sole aim of starving people”.
First investigation in Italy
While the European Union (EU) as an institution failed to reach agreement on sanctioning Israel’s National Security Minister, a handful of EU countries opened criminal investigations.
Italy was first. Soon after the October 2025 interception, the prosecutor in Rome opened an investigation following the complaints lodged by Italian parliamentarians and activists who were part of the flotilla. The prosecution qualified the acts of robbery, kidnapping, causing damage that endangered the vessel’s safety, and torture. Witnesses and victims have been heard, and videos, photos and other documentary evidence collected.
Following the boarding of the flotilla on April 29, a separate investigation for kidnapping was opened by the same prosecutor in early May. Three complaints were lodged, two concerned Avila and Abukeshek, who were taken from Italian-flagged vessels. The prosecution is still to define the charges, but according to Italian press agency ANSA torture and sexual violence are being considered.
For now, the investigations are against unknown persons, with the exception of Ben Gvir, after the prosecutors reviewed his video. Suspects could include the navy involved in the sea intervention, the military responsible at the Ashdod port and the prison police officers at Ketziot. For the first strand of the investigations, the Rome prosecutor has submitted a letter rogatory to Israel, asking for information on the procedures followed and the chain of command that ordered the operation.
However, flotilla lawyers in Italy remain sceptical about the possibility that Israel will collaborate. They are now collecting victims’ testimonies to prepare a second complaint, as lawyer Tatiana Montella explains to Justice Info. Rome has jurisdiction because the plaintiffs are Italian nationals and the alleged crimes happened, at least in part, on Italian-flagged boats. But it will be up to the Public Prosecutor’s Office to decide whether to dismiss the case or move the case to trial, once the investigation phase is completed.
An investigation launched in Poland
In Poland, an investigation into the arrest of four Polish participants of the flotilla in October 2025 was officially brought before the Prosecutor’s Office in the city of Gdańsk on June 2. Prosecutors have heard witnesses. The charges include maritime piracy and unlawful detention involving cruelty. Among the complainants is Polish parliamentarian Franciszek Sterczewski. “We were not allowed to sleep; the guards shone flashlights in our eyes for hours”, he told Rzeczpospolita, adding that they “set dogs on us, spat at us and threatened us with guns”.
The Hind Rajab Foundation (HRF), in partnership with two victims, said it submitted evidence to the Polish prosecution about the chain of command, relying on open source Israeli reports. “We focused on the highest level”, says Natacha Bracq, head of litigation at the HRF. “There were two operations, the one at sea and the one on land. So there were two different chains of command, Israël Katz, then minister of Defence, and the Navy involved in the first interception; and Ben-Gvir and the Israeli prison service being involved in the land operation and the detention. And then when you go up the chain it goes to Netanyahu”, adds Bracq.
In May, the HRF, together with two Polish-Palestinians and other organisations, filed a separate criminal complaint in Poland, this time before the Wrocław District Prosecutor’s Office. It is against senior Israeli political and military officials, accused of genocide, crimes against humanity, war crimes, and public incitement to international crimes for starving the population and obstructing humanitarian aid, including the flotilla. The complaint names several Israeli ministers and military generals, among others. This filing “was a way to show that the flotilla being arrested is not just crimes committed against Europeans or foreigners. It’s also a crime, first and foremost, committed against Palestinians”, says Bracq.
An investigation into war crimes in France
A few days after Poland, on June 5, France’s national anti-terrorist prosecutor’s office (PNAT) opened an investigation into an alleged “war crimes” and “torture” over Israel’s treatment of French activists. The probe was opened at the government's request and is now entrusted to the investigators of the Central office for the fight against crimes against humanity and hate crimes. Initially, it related only to the interceptions of April and May, but later in July the PNAT expanded its investigation to include the 2025 one.
“I take the first blow. Slaps that knock you out. Everything happens at the level of the head”, French Meriem Hadjal’s testified in a Flotilla press release. She recounted being dragged towards a dark shipping container, where she was beaten. The soldiers touched her and “pulled at her chest and pants”, she declared, adding that she was also stripped naked and crammed into a container with others, while they could hear fellow activists scream.
“We believe there is very strong evidence that torture, war crimes and other violations of international humanitarian and human rights law have been committed”, lawyers from the legal team of Global Sumud France tells Justice Info in a written interview, stating that they prefer not to be named. For now, there are over 30 complainants, the lawyers say.
However, in France too enforcement can be a challenge. “No arrest, detention, or effective service of sentence could occur unless a suspect enters French jurisdiction, is voluntarily surrendered, or is extradited by another State”, they say, adding that “questions of immunity are likely to be at stake”. In July 2025, France’s highest court ruled that functional immunity – granted to people who perform certain functions of state – could be lifted in the case of accusations of severe crimes. It also affirmed that a head of State’s personal immunity could not be waived.
Spain then gets on board
On July 10, Spain also opened a probe into the October 2025 operation. The Audiencia Nacional judge Francisco de Jorge accepted the lawsuits against the heads of the Israeli Armed Forces and Navy, El Pais reported. Spanish flotilla activists, supported by a coalition of left-wing groups, submitted the complaints.
The judge decided to limit the investigation to what happened on board Spanish-flagged vessels. He said that Israeli troops boarded the vessels in international waters, damaged property and illegally detained crew members, including dozens of Spanish nationals.
The judge added that he asked the ICC to clarify whether the activists’ detention falls within the Court’s ongoing investigation into Palestine.
Complaints before the ICC and Netherlands
On May 29, lawyers of the Flotilla submitted a communication to the ICC. They accused “Israeli military commanders and top political leaders of committing war crimes, crimes against humanity, torture and conduct relevant to the execution of the crime of genocide”, their press release stated.
According to a November 2025 legal analysis published by the organisation, the Israeli attacks on the flotilla were done as part of its naval blockade of Gaza, and should therefore constitute crimes that the Court has jurisdiction over, as they were committed on vessels sailing under the flags of states parties to the ICC and to citizens of member countries.
Dutch flotilla lawyers have also announced they will file complaints against Israeli soldiers before the Dutch Public Prosecution Service, together with seven Dutch citizens who were on board the April and May mission, for accusations of sexual violence, assault, humiliation, torture and kidnapping. “The idea is that national investigations should reinforce international ones and vice versa”, stresses Montella. “Israel has a method, a strategy, and a pattern of systematic violence that is directed towards Palestinian prisoners,” she adds. “The idea is not merely to hold Israel accountable for their direct responsibilities towards the flotilla members but also to identify a prisoner management that amounts to ‘systemic torture’”.
