Greta Thunberg describes ‘torture’ in Israeli custody, claims suitcase returned to her with ‘Whore Greta’ written on it

Greta Thunberg describes undergoing “torture” while in Israeli custody after violating the maritime blockade on Gaza on board the Global Sumud Flotilla, in an interview with the Swedish Aftonbladet newspaper.

Together with the interview, the newspaper publishes an image of Thunberg opening up her suitcase on which the words “Whore Greta,” are written along with a drawing of an Israeli flag and a penis. Thunberg says that the suitcase was confiscated by the IDF and returned to her like this.

After arriving in Ashdod, Thunberg describes being in a “dystopian” scene in which she was dragged to a paved area with iron fences.

“I saw maybe 50 people sitting in a row on their knees with handcuffs and their foreheads against the ground,” she claims. “They dragged me to the opposite side from where the others were sitting, and I had the flag around me the whole time. They hit and kicked me.”

“Then they ripped off my frog hat, threw it on the ground, stomped and kicked it, and kind of threw a tantrum,” she adds.

“The guards have no empathy or humanity, and they keep taking selfies with me. There’s a lot I don’t remember. So much is happening at once. You’re in shock. You’re in pain, but you go into a state of trying to stay calm,” she says.

She also recounts that 60 people were put into a small outdoor cage at one point at Ketziot Prison in southern Israel.

“It was so hot, like 40 degrees. We begged the whole time: Can we have water? Can we have water? In the end, we screamed. The guards walked in front of the bars the whole time, laughing and holding up their water bottles. They threw the bottles with water in them into the trash cans in front of us,” she says.

“When people fainted, we banged on the cages and asked for a doctor. Then the guards came and said, ‘We’re going to gas you.’ It was standard for them to say that. They held up a gas cylinder and threatened to press it against us,” she says.

“During the nights, guards regularly came by and shook the bars, shining flashlights, and several times a night they came in and forced everyone to stand up,” she states.

She was deported on October 6, days after being detained on the flotilla.

Ahead of their deportation, the Foreign Ministry denied claims that Israel was mistreating Thunberg and other detained activists on the intercepted flotilla.