«As a Ukrainian, I identified with what was happening to the people of Palestine». Interview with the Ukrainian participant of the «Sumud» flotilla — before and after detention by the Israeli authorities

The first part of the conversation between Maria Bunina and Nina Potarska was recorded on April 27, the second — on May 10, 2026.

- Please tell us how you ended up on the flotilla?

- I can’t say it was by chance, because back in August and September we were already holding solidarity actions in Kyiv near the Holodomor museum for the people who are now in Gaza.

I worked in an organization that focuses on the Middle East, women’s rights, and situations in conflict zones. So I often have access to first-hand information about what is really happening with the humanitarian situation. As a mediator and facilitator of dialogues, I remain in contact with both Israeli and Palestinian groups. And for me, everything that happened on October 7 and after was very hard, because they promised “revenge”, but it was difficult to imagine the scale of it.

- And how do you view the events of October 7 themselves? Critics of the pro-Palestinian movement insist that Israel suffered an unprecedented terrorist attack comparable to September 11, 2001, and launched a campaign of revenge. Their opponents, on the contrary, date the beginning of the war to long before October 7. What do you think about that?

- We can endlessly rewind history and each time find an explanation for why one side believed itself to be right. But I think that right now it’s important to acknowledge that everything that happened to us is horrible. And what is happening now is inhumane. There are no excuses here. We have already gone too deep into this situation. But it’s hard for me to move forward with my head constantly turned back. So I would like the focus to shift from looking for the guilty to looking for a way out. To how we can find, together, the strength, words, and ways to hear each other again. How to overcome fear, distrust, hurt, hatred, and move forward. Because it is impossible to move forward while constantly looking back.

Many people draw parallels with 9/11 and with the fact that after those events Iraq was punished. There really is a similarity here in the sense that one event led to the complete erasure of the land, the people, the total destruction of a country. And no, of course, that cannot be justified.

October 7 is often used as an argument in response to criticism of the war in Gaza: “why didn’t you write and speak about it earlier”, “where were your voices”? And that is understandable from the standpoint of a demand for justice. But October 7 is over, and what is happening in Gaza is not. How many more victims will there have to be for October 7 to stop hurting so much, for society to be able to move forward instead of only looking back?

- How do you feel about the fact that after October 7 Israelis sometimes compare their experience with that of Ukrainians? Who do Ukrainians more often identify with? And how is your political position perceived by other Ukrainians?

- As a Ukrainian, I identified with what is happening to the people of Palestine. On the level of rhetoric there is a similarity between how the Israeli authorities talk about Palestinians and how the Russian authorities talk about Ukrainians. Of course, these are different contexts, but I hear very similar formulations: that “you don’t exist”, that “there are only fascists there”. This rhetorical connection is very noticeable and painful for me. And at the same time, despite my Polish-Jewish roots, I absolutely cannot understand how something like this could have happened at all — that people who fought so hard for their right to “exist” became so consumed with “revenge” that now it is very hard to understand how to stop it.

How is my position perceived by others? There is a lot of support, and I am very grateful for it. There is also a lot of misunderstanding. But we are here, among other things, to avoid shutting ourselves off from these people and instead try to explain our position. I often see from the way people phrase their messages that fears lie behind the accusations and aggression.

I think the Ukrainian audience simply lacks information. We are very deeply immersed in our own tragedy. Many people think I am distracting attention from Ukraine, but in fact I am, on the contrary, drawing attention to Ukraine. There is a clear link between the fact that our authorities — and any authorities — are not the whole people, and the fact that people’s needs very often do not coincide with the interests of states and government representatives. I am a great patriot of my people, my land, and my country, but I have a lot of questions for my state and my government. And I think many people here, in this flotilla, have a similar position.

And there is also an important point about the selective application of international law. It seems to me that Ukraine, Palestine, and in general any country that finds itself in a situation of war or crisis become hostages of an international relations system in which double standards are effectively part of the system. That is why one of the theses we tried to promote is that

if international law does not work for everyone, then it does not work for anyone. And we see proof of that almost every day.

My experience, my knowledge, and the way I grew up led me exactly here. I grew up on a Soviet naval military base in Murmansk Oblast. I was born into a military family: my great-grandfather was a military pilot, my father was a submariner, and my first husband was a military signalman. And I am a black sheep even within my own family.

It is hard for me to read news that fighter jets are taking off from the Olenya base to bomb Kyiv when I am there. Because for me that place is connected with childhood. There was a lot of freedom there: there was no police, children played outside for as long as they wanted, there was a lot of snow, sleds, winter games, trips into the hills, mushrooms, friends. I have many bright and warm memories of that place. I still have classmates who live there. And it hurts me deeply that I cannot keep in touch with them, because it would not be safe for them or for me. Many of them serve in the military. One of my classmates, with whom I sat at the same desk, later served in Iraq. And I still have very strange feelings about that, because today my close friends from Iraq are helping me on this trip.

And I cannot reformat myself so that I fit perfectly into just one context. It seems to me that it is precisely through connectedness and wholeness that I feel more alive, healthier, and more real. And war destroys not only my life, it destroys my identity. And that, probably, is my main motivation. I am, as if, a hostage of this situation. But it is very important to me to preserve a connection with all these parts of myself. Because these are all parts of me that I need to learn to live with in peace. I cannot simply switch off or delete any of them.

- Yes, I understand. So, you decided to become a participant in the flotilla.

- When I was invited to join the flotilla, I hesitated until the very end, because I currently have many projects in Ukraine. But in a fairly random way I ended up with free time, and the people around me, when they learned that I would like to go, helped me get here: they took on some of my responsibilities and partially paid for the trip. So my arrival happened largely thanks to the community I work with and my friends.

The cost of participation is often brought up. It is always very funny to hear all these “how much were you paid”. I spent about a thousand dollars just preparing for the trip. Several European organizations paid for my tickets — mainly trade unions, some Spanish political groups, and a support group for Ukraine. Another thousand dollars or so went to a sleeping bag and other camping gear. Over the past four years of constant movement, I have lost or given away many things; refugee life teaches you to live with at most one suitcase. I came with a suitcase of clothes, cosmetics, and medicines for a month-long assignment, and right after that I was supposed to go to Turkey, Poland, and Ukraine.

Participation in the flotilla is entirely voluntary. People and organizations that are invited or nominated usually have to find funding themselves. Some necessary items were provided centrally. For example, as far as I remember, motion-sickness tablets were distributed through the common coordination headquarters. Food for the duration of the mission, some of the most essential items.

The issue of financing is often framed as an accusation, although we all understand that for something to function, someone has to pay for it. Naturally, the yachts, food, and humanitarian aid were paid for by someone. But the coordination of the flotilla itself and the coordination of the aid delivered through it is also enormous work. Some participants are on board, while others support from shore.

Returning to the question of why I decided to participate: I have been involved in high-level advocacy for many years and often meet with people who make decisions. Very bad decisions. Cruel decisions. And I don’t understand how to bring them back to the logic of creation and the idea that it is impossible to build paradise in one place on Earth by making the rest of the world hell. There is neither balance nor justice in that. Part of the reason I decided to join the flotilla was precisely this: it is impossible to pretend that it does not concern you, because it concerns all of us.

I wanted both to be part of this experience and at the same time study it, to understand how we might be able to self-organize by nonviolent means and, roughly speaking, outsmart the political debate and the system of power. It is both a tactical and a strategic experience — an opportunity to think about whether we even have a chance at nonviolent resistance to violence.

- And who actually becomes a participant in the flotilla? Who are these people?

- It’s hard for me to say, because I applied simply through the website. There are many people here who volunteer in Ukraine, travel as doctors to help, and send humanitarian convoys. Many help not only Ukrainians and Palestinians, but also people in other countries.

On our ship we have a great team: people from Australia, America, Slovakia, Ukraine, Italy, Colombia, and Britain. We come from very different fields: teachers, doctors, journalists, human rights defenders, cultural figures… It is a very pleasant and professional team of honest people who sincerely want to help and consciously accept the risks. And the risks are obvious now: for example, detention in neutral waters while attempting to create a corridor. There are also risks that are hard to predict, because last year the situation in the region was calmer. And this year, every week brings a new shock, a new wave of escalation and destruction.

- There are many different nonviolent practices and communities. What does the flotilla bring that is new?

- Last year, one or several boats from the flotilla reached the twenty-kilometer zone. And then it became clear that Israel’s ability to fully control the coast was limited. This year there are many more boats. And that is exactly why there is hope: that physically it will not be possible to stop all the vessels, and that some boats will still be able to get through and create a corridor, a kind of “human shield”, so that a barge with humanitarian aid can pass between them and deliver food and medicines to Gaza.

I keep thinking of a popular image where many small fish try to resist a big one, as opposed to the big fish swallowing the small. Any system has its vulnerabilities, and it is important to find the brick that needs to be removed so that the whole wall collapses.

- One of the biggest objections to the flotilla, even among supporters of nonviolent resistance, is that it is a very expensive project. What do you think about that?

- On the one hand, yes, a lot of resources are truly involved here. But not all of them are measured in money or can be reduced to currency. I think this is more about the time and effort that people invest. Although, yes, we do travel on ships that cost money. We carry food that costs money.

One of the topics of my research is what happens in the social sphere. In particular, in Bosnia, Iraq, and Haiti during reconstruction and recovery. If you compare these amounts, the flotilla’s expenses are a drop in the ocean. Because the humanitarian system has in many ways become a money-laundering machine. Many dissertations and articles have already been written on this topic, and people working in the sector have understood it for a long time.

I don’t have an internal dilemma about how expensive or resource-intensive this is. War is even more expensive. And rebuilding after war... I don’t even know how many hundreds of years it will take to eliminate the environmental consequences of all the war debris that now lies on the soil of Ukraine and the countries of the Middle East.

Iraq, for example, still has not recovered from the war. Despite the presence of American bases, no one has truly invested in rebuilding the country so that it could become a full participant in the global world and economy. The world is full of double standards, and against that backdrop the Sumud flotilla is a fairly honest project. Everything is funded from private means, and the financial reporting is publicly available on the website.

EDITOR’S NOTE FROM MOST.MEDIA: On the Global Sumud Flotilla website, in the Financial Transparency section, no financial statements, audit reports, or detailed information on the use of funds are published. The movement justifies its accountability by pointing to a registered Spanish foundation, the use of a European maritime company to purchase vessels, and the participation of legal observers. At the same time, a significant portion of financial information is not disclosed under the pretext of protecting donors and ensuring the safety of mission participants. The names of the foundation and the maritime company are also not disclosed. On the flotilla website, in the Donate section, as of June 7, information was available that 8,713 donors had raised €661,766 toward the project’s €1 million goal.

The project’s legal structure was reconstructed using open Spanish registries. In the Catalan foundation registry, the Fundación Global Sumud Flotilla GSF foundation was found, registered on January 22, 2026, and in commercial registries — the company Cyber Neptune SL that founded the foundation. A comparison of registration data showed that both structures are linked through a shared address in Barcelona and the project’s management.

On the other hand, there will now be a lot of media attention, and that is also a reason to wake up those who try to live only their own lives and follow the path of conformity. Personally, for me, fear and conformity, especially in conditions of war, double standards, and constant moral choice, are the greatest sins, if I may put it that way. When people are afraid of losing safety, well-being, or status, it is easier for them not to notice that somewhere in the world, or even next to them, someone has fewer rights and is not even considered a human being. So that is probably how I would answer the question about money.

If you look at the people here on the flotilla, they are mostly people who are not focused on material values. They are anarchists, people who respect their own freedom and recognize the freedom of others. We spent more than a week in the port, where everything was built on self-organization, care for one another, and constant meetings to hear feedback from everyone and make the participation of all delegation members safe both physically and psychologically.

There is a lot of care here, including for physical comfort. We have a list of allergies, and we try to plan the menu so that everyone can travel safely and calmly. And honestly, I have not felt this relaxed in a very long time, because here people will take care of you: they will make sure you go to bed on time, that there is no unnecessary noise, that food appropriate for you is set aside. I, for example, have many food allergies. Any mistake becomes a risk for the whole team. And I really like when there is an understanding in the group that caring for the vulnerable and caring for your neighbor is the key to the success of the whole group, its growth, and its forward movement. And I think it is very important to have in life the experience of trusting the society in which you live.

And it is very sad that in the real world logic works differently. We are always running. The wartime context especially leaves its mark. Sometimes I feel like a participant in another episode of “The Hunger Games”: you always win by taking more resources, and someone else is left with less. And you understand that in this game not everyone can win. Simply because the logic of the game itself is arranged that way: there can only be a few winners, and the rest must lose. And I do not agree with that logic. Because our land is so rich and diverse, there are so many resources, and we could reduce suffering or at least not increase it.

- Do you think the parallels between Ukraine and Palestine help people understand anything about these conflicts?

- On the one hand, you cannot put an equal sign between them — these are different contexts. But the dynamics are similar in some respects.

I know people in Donetsk and Luhansk who, while living in the same city, changed citizenship several times in their lives: first the Soviet Union, then independent Ukraine, then LPR and DPR passports, and now Russian passports. People are not to blame for that. But in political rhetoric, responsibility is very often shifted onto ordinary people: that they voted wrong, wanted the wrong thing, looked in the wrong direction. In reality, this is a very infantile position on the part of the state and a transfer of responsibility.

As a citizen of Ukraine, by law I am supposed to say “occupied territories”. For residents of Donetsk Oblast, these may be “liberated territories”. For citizens of Russia — “new territories”. But the people themselves still remain in some gray zone: they were “not-quite-Ukrainians” and remain “not-quite-Russians”. Everyone argues about them, everyone “liberates” them, but in fact the territory is destroyed, and by and large nobody cares about these people. They become refugees in Europe with no prospects of citizenship and stability, labor migrants all over the world. And this is a very complex and politically slippery topic.

I am overwhelmed with anger at everyone who brought us to this situation and forced ordinary people to kill each other. And after this phrase, accusations usually follow that this sounds like Russian propaganda about a single brotherly people and a civil war. But if you set propaganda aside and look only at the facts, about 16 million people in Russia have relatives in Ukraine.

My daughter’s older brother lives in Moscow, and during the first year of the war she was terrified by the prospect that her brother would be drafted into the army on one side and her father on the other. There is great tragedy and injustice in that.

- In your opinion, who should bear responsibility for war crimes and crimes against humanity: the government, the military, the soldiers, or society?

- There is no simple answer to that question. First of all, I do not think collective responsibility is the right approach. For example, sanctions against all citizens. We see how Russian human rights defenders, our main allies, become victims of sanctions and repression themselves because they cannot easily move and settle elsewhere. And then the question arises: whom are we punishing? Those who are already fighting? Those who are weak before the system? Those whom the system has already been grinding down?

But on the other hand, it would be good if every person bore responsibility for the cruelty that is happening. For the fact that the Geneva Conventions are not being respected, that international humanitarian law is being violated. But where are we to find so many courts, and how are we to render so many decisions so that each person receives some kind of, let’s say, just punishment? Because justice is also an attempt to give those who suffered the chance to heal and not carry hatred and the desire for revenge forward.

When high-ranking officials ask me, “And what would you do?” — I only have a counterquestion: “Didn’t you know where you were going?” I want to return to my village and plant flowers. I was happy living in a village near Kyiv. I never wanted to bear responsibility for other people’s political decisions or take part in risky things. For ten years now I have just been trying to return to life alongside my children — my son is already 24, my daughter is 16. Without seeing their mother, they themselves became activists. And I am very grateful to them for their support. We simply found ourselves in this situation and are trying to live in it as best we can.

- What would you like people in Israel to understand about your participation in the flotilla?

- I would like to say that I understand their fears. I understand what it means to live under fire and feel constant threat. I understand that there has been a lot of injustice. I understand that there is enormous fear about the future. Often the feeling is: either us or them. But for me, the way out lies in standing at the point where there is both us and them — without excluding anyone from this coordinate system. Because only that way can balance and security be achieved. And I wish everyone to stand to the very end on humanistic positions and not let hatred into their hearts, because it destroys us from within.

EDITOR’S NOTE: Three days after this conversation, on April 30, Israel intercepted 22 of the flotilla’s 58 vessels carrying 175 activists off the coast of Crete. Among them was the ship on which Nina was aboard.

On May 19, Israel intercepted the remaining flotilla vessels — those that had started out initially and those that joined near the coasts of Greece and Turkey. This involved nearly 430 participants from more than 40 countries. At that moment, the closest vessel to Israel was about 80 nautical miles from the coast of Gaza. This time, those detained were brought to Israel.

On May 20, Israel’s National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir posted online a video of the detention of pro-Palestinian activists from the “Sumud” flotilla, who were trying to break the maritime blockade of the Gaza Strip and deliver humanitarian aid there. In the video, they are shown kneeling in the port of Ashdod with their hands tied behind their backs and their heads lowered to the ground, while Ben-Gvir walks among them with an Israeli flag and shouts in Hebrew: “Welcome to Israel, we are the bosses here”. The caption to the video in Ben-Gvir’s post says: “This is how we welcome supporters of terrorism”. The EU and the US condemned Israel’s actions in connection with this situation. In Israel, the video was also met with a broad wave of condemnation.

Maria Bunina spoke with Nina Potarska in the interval between these events — on May 10, when Nina was released.

- It seemed strange to me to publish an interview now in which you are full of hope, after your ship was intercepted off the coast of Greece.

- I am still full of hope and full of optimism. The flotilla continues to move. That’s one. More boats have joined. That’s two. It seems there were initially around 60 boats. 22 were detained. The fate of those boats is different: some were sunk, some were not. But in Greece, I believe, about 20 more boats joined, and in Turkey — another 30 or so. So in terms of representation, the situation has not changed much. On the contrary, it helped people unite more and understand that they need to keep going.

Despite the fact that we were detained, I think it had a very big resonance. Even bigger than if we had been detained near Israeli international waters, closer to Israeli territory. We were not planning to step directly onto Israeli soil; we planned to open a corridor so that boats with humanitarian aid could enter. We were supposed to become a kind of “human shield”.

If such force and unmotivated cruelty were used against us — doctors, teachers, human rights defenders, journalists — I can only imagine with fear what is happening to Palestinians in prisons.

- And tell us, what happened to you?

- We had training on how to behave during detention, what might happen, and what cases had happened before. Plus, I work in international advocacy, and quite often I have to review and cite various provisions of international humanitarian law. But I didn’t even have such a scenario in my head when assessing risks, that an Israeli ship would come in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea, a thousand kilometers from its own shore, and carry out a detention.

The previous evening there was increased drone activity. We started noticing objects in the sky; from a distance some looked like moving stars. But since I had already seen a lot of that, I had no doubts. We began documenting the drones according to protocol: where they were flying from, whether it was a reconnaissance drone or whether it was carrying something. Other ships were sending similar reports.

The next day after sunset, many drones appeared again. Then we started receiving messages that there was a warship nearby and that motorboats were approaching us. It was not immediately clear which country they belonged to. According to protocol, we were supposed to put on life jackets and offer no resistance. In general, we had nothing to hide.

Until the very end I thought it was most likely the Greek maritime police, but when I saw armed men with Israeli insignia — I was very surprised. According to protocol, we had to go out on deck, put on life jackets, sit in a prearranged order, raise our hands, and obey orders, not escalate. Realizing that Israeli military forces had approached us, I immediately threw my computer overboard first, then my phone, and continued to sit calmly.

- What do you mean, you “threw it away”?

- That is a fairly common protocol in wartime: if there is a risk of losing access to devices, we destroy them. I would rather throw my equipment into the sea than hand it over to the Israeli army. They do not need to know how we communicate with each other, or have access to all my contacts, friends, and personal information.

After that, we were moved to the stern, and for some time we sat there on our knees; we were not allowed to turn or move. They tore the sail, broke the Starlink, and apparently made a hole in the hull, because there was a long loud sound, as if something were being chopped. Then they told us to go downstairs one by one and gather our personal belongings for four months. I even thought: what do they mean? Four months? On what grounds at all? Where are they legally going to fit this whole idea? I took my pills, some personal items. They took all the backpacks and bags for additional inspection and search. We were transferred to a military motorboat, and then we went to a larger ship. Everything happened quite slowly. I and someone else asked to go to the toilet. They did not let us.

During the seizure of our boat they were shouting and giving orders, but they behaved fairly civilly. But as soon as I took the first step onto the warship, the situation changed sharply. They rather rudely explained how we had to kneel, lie on the floor, press our heads to the floor, and not look anywhere. Apparently, either from the cold or from stress, something happened to my leg, and I could not bend over and lie down the way they wanted — the muscle simply would not let me. I was pushed hard so that my head would be closer to the floor.

Several times we were lined up in groups on the floor: on our knees, heads to the floor. They told us to remove our outer clothing, pulled us out one by one, and took us for inspection. They checked us with a metal detector and recorded our data.

They returned the passports, but took the Polish permanent residence card and the Ukrainian internal passport — I’ll have to replace them.

They took off the outer pants that protected me from water and wind. I was left in only very light ones, and I was wearing a thin blouse directly on my bare body because I had been planning to sleep. It was about fifteen degrees outside. Someone came out with two jackets and shared one with me. That greatly improved my situation. And another crew member, Ben, a social journalist from Britain, was in shorts and a T-shirt: they took everything off him, and he was very cold. He kept moving around to keep warm.

Then they transferred us one by one to an area surrounded by freight containers. On the sides there were plastic toilets, the kind usually found at events. When I went inside the container, there were already other detainees there, our colleagues and volunteers. The floor was covered with foam rubber mats. It was already dark and cold, condensation literally everywhere, and finding even a dry and warm place was very difficult. The four of us sat huddled together just to try to keep warm.

We all held assemblies together to organize daily life: we divided the space, split the toilets into shared and women’s ones, and tried to make shelters out of the mats, because there was not enough room for everyone to sleep in the containers. There were elderly people among us; one woman with a cane could not use the toilet. We also demanded sanitary pads.

I am lactose and gluten intolerant, and I had a minute of doubt: what should I do about that? I did not want to be separated from the group and lose contact with everyone, and the food they gave us twice a day — hot dog buns and sometimes cheese — I cannot eat. In the end I simply joined the group that declared a hunger strike. There were about 30 of us: we asked to be shown the other people who had been taken, to be given sanitary pads, and to improve the conditions of confinement, which were very far from the minimum standards for holding prisoners.

I have back problems and circulation issues. When we had to sit on the floor for another count, put our hands behind our heads, and lower our heads, there were several times when I felt that if it went just a little further, I would lose consciousness. But I really did not want to lose consciousness, because then I would most likely be isolated from the group, and I felt calmer in the group. Those who had been isolated said they were kept in an air-conditioned room at fifteen degrees. There was no sense in that — just unmotivated cruelty.

We spent the evening, the night, and the next day on the warship. In the morning they brought us water and told us to form groups of ten and move to another ship, but they did not say where or why. We replied that we would not go anywhere and demanded to see the people they had taken, because we did not want to leave without them. So we just kept standing, doing nothing, and not reacting to the orders. We occasionally clapped our hands and banged on the walls of the container. It felt safer to stay where we were all together than to allow ourselves to be divided and sent again somewhere unknown.

I think they got scared when they realized that we were not going to cooperate. Although that is strange.

I have been to protests both in Russia and in Belarus. In principle, security forces have a million ways to lift an activist and put them into a police van without beating them, without smashing them against a wall, and without hitting their head on the floor. But for some reason they chose a different path. So, despite the fact that we were not moving, all of this happened quite roughly.

When it was my turn, they pointed a rifle at me and said: “That’s it, go”. Before that they had already used rubber bullets several times. Of course, there is not much pleasant about that. But since we decided not to cooperate, I kept standing calmly, clapping my hands, and demanding that they return our comrades.

For some reason, what hit me very hard was that these guys were about the same age as my son. The guy started shouting at me, pushing me, doing something, and I somehow got angry — I don’t know, as a mother and as a teacher. I didn’t even expect that from myself. At first I told him: “Your mother must be proud of you”. And of course that caused a new burst of aggression. He shoved me into another container that was being used as a corridor or filtering room. There they again tried to make me lie on the floor, I was in pain, and I said I could not do that. Then I no longer held back and said I was ashamed to share a Jewish bloodline with him. After that he started kicking me in the legs. I have bruises. Then I was thrown face-down onto the floor, and I landed in someone’s blood. I started shouting that they were criminals and would not hide it. They splashed water in front of me and wiped the bloody floor with a towel.

After that container there was another roll call: they brought us to a table where we had to give our first and last names. One of them came up to me and asked: “Do you know this woman’s name?” I turned around and saw a woman lying face-down on the floor, motionless. He said she had no documents. I replied that they were idiots and criminals, that they had done this and would have to explain it themselves. But I really could not identify her, because I did not know everyone in the group; we had very little time to get acquainted and talk in the port.

And then there was a moment that seemed very important to me. I did not understand where they were taking us; there was no information. But when I was being transferred to a small vessel, the feeling was completely different: after aggressive hands, I was suddenly taken very carefully and gently by other people. At first I did not even see the insignia, but I understood that it was someone else. And then I noticed that it was the Greek police. They said: “Everything is fine, you are safe, we are taking you to shore”.

- And how are you now?

- Everything is fine. I have a lot of work.

- One more question about comparing the experiences of Palestinians and Ukrainians. After this interception of the flotilla, has your sense of how similar or different those experiences are changed in any way?

- I think it became very clear that just as the Russian army and propaganda question the very fact of our existence [Ukraine and Ukrainians — Most.Media] and our right to exist as an identity, a similar story is happening on the part of the Israeli state toward Palestine. Probably, this was the most bodily experience I was able to feel. Because any violence can be justified if you believe that someone is “subhuman”, that they do not have the same rights, that they should never have existed at all. From a historical and political point of view, this is a very similar story for me. And if before I had already seen many similar dynamics — though the contexts are, of course, different — now I am finally convinced: the logic of dehumanization works the same way.

When your very right to exist is called into question, it gives the person with the rifle the feeling that they can do anything to you. Because in their picture of the world you should not exist at all. And it is very sad that these were young guys, and they had already lost any sense of the value of human life and dignity.

If they could behave like that with teachers, doctors, people with passports from “civilized countries”, then I cannot imagine what situation Palestinians are in. What worried us most was those whom, by first and last name, even with another citizenship, they could identify as Palestinians, because they were most likely treated even more harshly. And that is exactly what happened: we were dropped off in Greece, and Saif and Thiago were taken further, to Israel. They were brought to Israel and tried*.

*According to Israel, Saif Abu Keshek, an activist of Palestinian-Spanish origin, was suspected of “ties to a terrorist organization”, and Brazilian Tiago Ávila of “unlawful actions”. Both activists denied these allegations, were held under detention conditions that human rights defenders describe as torturous, and were deported from Israel on May 10.