Fiacc Ó Brolcháin on his experience on the Gaza-bound aid flotilla
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What happened during the interception of the Gaza-bound aid flotilla?
The Pat Kenny Show on Newstalk.
Yesterday on the programme, we heard from Rachel McNichol, whose husband, Fiak Obrolokoin, was among the Irish citizens on board the latest Gaza-bound aid flotilla intercepted by Israeli forces as it attempted to sail humanitarian supplies towards Gaza. The vessel was stopped at sea. Those on board were detained and the mission was cut short. Now, this morning, Fiak joins us to tell us all about what happened. Fiak, good morning.
Good morning, Pat. How are you?
I'm very well. How are you after your adventure?
I'm fine, actually. I'm pretty good. A lot better than many of my co-sailors about a quarter of whom had to go off to hospital to be checked out after their treatment by the Israelis.
Now, will you describe to us, you were on the high seas, you were still a long way off your destination of Gaza, but you must have anticipated that the Israelis would intervene at some point.
We did.
How did Fiacc Ó Brolcháin prepare for the flotilla mission?
And the thing was, I was gone about three weeks ago and I was in Sicily preparing the boat and preparing the crew and doing various training sessions. And all went very well. And then we headed off to sea There was five on the vessel I was on. I was skipper and I was training them to take the boat further on. I had promised Rachel that I wasn't going to get involved with the Israeli Defence Forces. And so my idea was to train the crew and that I would leave in Greece and they would carry on with the boat. And Obviously, the Israelis didn't read my brief and they decided to go early. So we were still, we were about 70 miles west of Crete when I was actually asleep because I wasn't on watch and they suddenly appeared on board, threw a flashbang into the cockpit, got on board and said, we're the Israeli Defence Forces and we can do whatever we want.
That's what they said.
That's word for word.
Because, I mean, they were on the high seas. They had no right to interfere with a vessel in international waters. But as far as they were concerned, they felt they had that right.
What was the experience like during the Israeli forces' boarding?
They could do whatever they... The people going through the list of violations, humanitarian and... and the sea regulations, and so on, and so on, and so on. It just goes on, and on, and on. But, I mean, in fairness, this is nothing new. This is what the Israelis have been doing in Gaza for the last whatever number of years, and that's why it was there in the first place, you know?
So, when they boarded your vessel and roused you from sleep, I mean, did they handcuff you? Did they detain you? Did they manhandle you in any way?
They did. They They dragged us around the place a bit on the boat and searched us. And then the only thing they did was that they wanted us to have our passports with us. And that's fairly normal with them, apparently. So they dragged us over to the foredeck, searched us, took anything we had off us, apart from passports, and then loaded us into a rib and over onto this, like a big landing craft. And where we were made, kneel down on the deck and hands behind our back, our hands on our head.
How were the detainees treated after being captured?
And if you glanced around the place, you were threatened. And a number of people got a bit of a kicking at that stage and so on, you know. And they took whatever we had off us. I was able to hang on to my medicine, but that was about it. And that was even that I think was a concession to my great age. And so they put us into this the waist of the vessel which had four containers forming a square with a load of razor wire and three of the containers were for us to sleep in and the area about the same as the four containers again was open but there was 185 of us and you do the maths of trying to get people to lie down in three containers and it just does not work you know And they flooded the deck every now and again just for fun, you know.
And tell me, did they indicate to you where you were about to be brought? I mean, did you think you were going to be brought all the way to Israel? You were still many hundreds of kilometres away. Or did they indicate they were going to land you back in Crete?
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Chapters
8 chapters
1
What happened during the interception of the Gaza-bound aid flotilla?
0:01–1:05
2
How did Fiacc Ó Brolcháin prepare for the flotilla mission?
1:05–2:23
3
What was the experience like during the Israeli forces' boarding?
2:23–3:31
4
How were the detainees treated after being captured?
3:31–4:50
5
What was the reaction of the detainees to the Israeli forces' actions?
4:50–6:08
6
What was the fate of the crew members after the interception?
6:08–7:04
7
What are the funding sources for the Gaza-bound flotilla?
7:04–8:03
8
Would Fiacc Ó Brolcháin participate in a flotilla mission again?
8:03–10:03