Horror encounters in Israel

ACTIVIST SPEAKS

- THOBEKA NGEMA

DR FATIMA Hendricks, an occupational therapist, was among the South Africans on the Global Sumud Flotilla who were held in captivity by Israel.

(TUMI PAKKIES Independent Newspapers.)

STRIPPED, mocked and humiliated by Israeli forces during a six-day detention in an Israeli prison, Dr Fatima Hendricks recounted the horror to a packed auditorium at the University of KwaZulu-Natal’s Westville on Thursday.

A breast cancer survivor who underwent a bilateral mastectomy and chemotherapy, Hendricks said Israeli soldiers degraded her for not having breasts during a strip search.

“They chose that particular moment in my strip search to mock my body. The female soldiers told all the male soldiers that I did not have breasts and what I looked like as an act of humiliation,” Hendricks said.

Hendricks, an occupational therapist, author and educator, who also lives with Guillain-Barré syndrome, was one of six South Africans — Hendricks, Inkosi Zwelivelile Mandla Mandela, Zukiswa Wanner, Reaaz Moolla, Dr Zaheera Soomar, and Carrie Shelver - captured by Israeli forces on the Global Sumud Flotilla in international waters.

The flotilla’s mission, she explained, was to deliver aid to Gaza and establish a sustainable humanitarian sea corridor, allowing subsequent aid boats to follow.