By Ezequiel Peressini, a leader of the Socialist Left, the Argentinian section of the IWU-FI
24 June 2026. After holding them captive for 30 days in eastern Libya, authorities released the 10 comrades of the Global Sumud Flotilla (GSF) land convoy. On 24 May, the 5+5 checkpoint in the town of Sirte detained them, and they took them to the city of Benghazi. The Libyan Arab Armed Forces (LAAF), commanded by the mercenary military leader Khalifa Haftar, arrested them and took them hostage there.
The comrades were seeking to break the criminal siege by which Israel uses starvation as a method of warfare against the Palestinian population in Gaza. Their aim was to open the Rafah crossing on the border with Egypt, which remains closed, preventing the entry of sufficient food, medicine, and humanitarian aid that is spoiling in trucks stranded at the border.
The 10 people, part of a negotiating delegation with Libyan authorities, experienced detention, abduction, forced transfer to illegal detention centres, and denial of contact with family and lawyers, which kept them incommunicado. The GSF reported that Libyan intelligence abducted another Tunisian volunteer on 19 May while returning home to Tunisia and disappeared for 19 days before being released on 7 June.
As part of a larger trend, the authorities took the land convoy volunteers into custody. The ongoing interception of vessels and participants in the Sumud Global Flotilla included this kidnapping. They sailed in the Mediterranean, and assailants abducted them in Crete, Greece, and Cyprus with extreme violence. The FGS has stated that the Libyan Arab Armed Forces (LAAF) acted in a coordinated manner and under the orders of the Al-Sisi dictatorship governing Egypt to prevent the convoy’s arrival.
The freeing of the 10 comrades abducted in Libya marks a success for the mobilisation, demonstrations at several foreign ministries, and the worldwide movement backing Palestine. While Israel and its accomplices have prevented the flotilla and the land convoy, they have not defeated the global movement in solidarity with Palestine, much less the resistance. Because of the growing number of people turning against Israel. Netanyahu and Israel face isolation and suffer Trump’s defeat in Iran. From the International Workers’ Unity – Fourth International (IWU-FI) we celebrate the freedom of our comrades and we are ready, together with the global movement for Palestine, to sustain the mobilisations for a free Palestine from the river to the sea.
