NEW YORK—Israeli military forces attacked Amazon Labor Union co-founder Chris Smalls during their takeover of the humanitarian aid ship Handala on July 26. After being held in a cell in the port city of Ashdod for three days, Smalls was released and flown to the U.S. He says the Israelis singled him out as the only Black person among the 21 people it seized on the ship.
The other 20 humanitarians aboard the ship, including several Americans and two Italians, were also released. But none, Smalls said, had been manhandled as he was. The Freedom Flotilla, which sponsored the ship, said then that Smalls was beaten and choked before his release.
“My color definitely had a role to play. The discrimination against Black and brown and against Palestinian people, I got a glimpse of it myself, though it was nothing like what the Palestinian people go through,” Smalls told ABC News.
Smalls said he was separated from the other volunteers aboard the ship, which was attempting to bring food, medicines, and baby food to besieged Gazans who have been left starving, disease-ridden, and homeless by Israel’s war on them and their territory.
Two unions, the ALU—which is now a semi-independent Teamsters local—and National Nurses United, blasted the Israelis’ treatment of Smalls.
Was physically assaulted
“One of our union’s founding organizers and former president, Chris Smalls, was physically assaulted by the Israeli military,” ALU said in a statement posted on twitter/X, though not its website.
“We demand the immediate and unconditional release of all detained activists, an end to targeted racist treatment, and we call on the broader labor movement to take a stance for Palestinian liberation,” ALU declared.
National Nurses United declared it “stands with Chris Smalls, the American labor leader beaten and detained by Israeli authorities, and celebrates his release from Israeli detention,” along with the release, also after three days, of the 20 others.
“We renew our call for an immediate and permanent ceasefire in Gaza. We call for an end to Israel’s blockade on humanitarian aid to avert imminent mass starvation. And we echo the call of the National Labor Network for Ceasefire—a coalition representing over nine million union members—for the U.S. government to immediately halt military aid to Israel.”
The war has drawn international condemnation, which many countries say amounts to genocide. The Israeli military, armed with U.S.-made bombs and airplanes, has reduced Gaza to a smoking ruin and turned its remaining two million people into constant refugees. The Gaza Health Ministry estimates at least 60,000 have been killed, with two-thirds of them women and children.
This war is a continuation of the 76-year war against the Palestinian people by Israel The international community views Israel’s right-wing Benjamin Netanyahu regime as an imperialist occupier of Palestinian territory.
Israel’s original justification for this segment of the war—retaliation for the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas attack, which killed 1,200 people and took another 250 hostages—has long since gone by the boards. And Netanyahu has been under constant fiery criticism for carrying out his deadly attacks on the people of Gaza and the West Bank.
“We come with baby food, toys, medicine, and hope—not just for Gaza, but for the future of our children in America back at home. The world is watching,” Smalls said in a video on his Instagram site, taped on the Handala before the Israeli military boarded it.
“People have to understand that unions have a responsibility to protect, to be a shield, for the working class. And that includes the Palestinian people.”
And Amazon, which Smalls fought against as ALU leader, is fighting the Palestinians, too, he said on that video. It’s taken a $7.2 billion U.S. military contract for its Nimbus program to help provide intelligence and other services to the Israeli military.
Smalls told ABC seven Israeli soldiers threw him to the deck with three kneeling on each side to keep him down. The one in front of his head yanked him up by his hair and then grabbed the chains Smalls wore around his neck. That soldier called him racist names and repeatedly told Smalls to shut up when the former ALU leader spoke to defend himself and the aid mission.
“I was subjected to horrific conditions that nobody else had to face, and I kind of expected that, but I didn’t expect it to be that extreme. I’m glad to be here to tell the story and shed light on the atrocities Israel has imposed on the Palestinian people. We need to break that illegal siege,” he said.
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