ROME, June 8 (Reuters) – Italian prosecutors put Israel’s far-right National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir under investigation over the treatment of activists who were part of a Gaza flotilla last month, a judicial source said on Monday.<\/p>\n
The source, who asked not to be named, confirmed earlier reports by Italian news agencies and said Ben-Gvir was being investigated on suspicion of torture and kidnapping of Italian citizens who were among the activists.<\/p>\n
If the probe determines charges are warranted, prosecutors could lodge a formal request for trial. <\/p>\n
In response to the Italian investigation, Ben-Gvir said in a statement: “I will not shy away from one investigation or another and will continue to stand proudly alongside our fighters.” <\/p>\n
Israel and Ben-Gvir have faced mounting international criticism after the minister in late May released a video showing detained Gaza activists kneeling with their hands bound after Israel intercepted the aid flotilla in international waters.<\/p>\n
Organisers said the 430 activists detained by Israeli police included citizens of Italy and South Korea.<\/p>\n
In a video Ben-Gvir posted on X, officers forced an activist to the ground after she chanted “Free, free Palestine”. <\/p>\n
The government of Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni called the treatment of the activists “unacceptable” and summoned the Israeli ambassador for an explanation.<\/p>\n
Italy subsequently asked the European Union to discuss sanctions against Ben-Gvir, while France has decided to ban Ben-Gvir from its territory.<\/p>\n
Flotilla organisers say they aimed to break Israel’s blockade of Gaza by delivering humanitarian assistance, something aid bodies say is still in short supply despite a U.S.-brokered ceasefire between Israel and Hamas in place since October 2025 that includes guarantees of increased aid.<\/p>\n
Israel says its naval blockade on Gaza is lawful.<\/p>\n
(Reporting by Marco Roberti; Additional reporting by Steven Scheer; Writing by Angelo Amante; Editing by Mark Porter and Cynthia Osterman)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"ROME, June 8 (Reuters) – Italian prosecutors put Israel’s far-right National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir under investigation over…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":482902,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[85,46,43],"class_list":["post-482901","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-israel","tag-il","tag-israel","tag-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/482901","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=482901"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/482901\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/482902"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=482901"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=482901"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=482901"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}