This is the face of Israel

Itamar Ben-Gvir posted social media footage showing Israeli forces detaining flotilla activists. In one clip, a handcuffed activist shouts “Free Palestine” as Ben-Gvir strolls past, then security personnel seize her by the hair and shove her to the ground. In another clip, detainees are shown bound and kneeling with their foreheads to the floor, forced into stress positions while the national anthem plays. Ben-Gvir waves an Israeli flag and taunts the detainees, saying they are in charge. Several governments condemned the footage and discussed sanctions, including targeted measures against Ben-Gvir. The response is framed as insufficient because it leaves the broader system enabling violence and settlement expansion intact.

"In one clip, a handcuffed activist shouts Free Palestine as Ben-Gvir strolls past. She is immediately seized by the hair and shoved to the ground by security personnel. Ben-Gvir looks on, gleeful. In another, dozens of detainees are shown bound and kneeling with their foreheads to the floor, forced into stress positions as the Israeli regime's national anthem blares from a loudspeaker. Ben-Gvir waves a large Israeli flag and bellows at them: Welcome to Israel we are in charge here."

"Ben-Gvir knows he can do this and face no serious consequences. Why would he think otherwise? His country has just got away with a genocide livestreamed to a global audience. There have been condemnations, though, notably, from governments whose citizens happen to be among the detained. Italy's prime minister, Giorgia Meloni, called the footage unacceptable and a violation of human dignity. Spain's prime minister, Pedro Sanchez, declared that he would not tolerate the mistreatment of his country's citizens and announced that he would push at the European Union level for sanctions against Ben-Gvir specifically, having already banned him from entering Spain."

"But, however genuine the outrage, sanctioning Ben-Gvir targets just one cog in a far larger genocidal machine. It is the same tactic European states have deployed when confronted with illegal settlement-building in the occupied West Bank: Sanctioning a handful of violent settlers while leaving untouched the state structure that plans, funds and protects the settlement enterprise. The gesture creates the appearance of consequences without threatening the system that produces them."

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