Australian government agrees to investigate Israeli abuse, Flotilla activists say

Father of activist 'will not rest' until IDF soldiers are 'brought to justice'

The federal government has promised an independent police investigation into allegations of Israeli abuse against Australian participants on the Global Sumud Flotilla, activists say.

Foreign Minister Penny Wong held a meeting with several flotilla activists and their family members on Monday afternoon, where activists say Wong committed to an investigation.

International Development Minister Anne Aly, two Australian Federal Police (AFP) deputy commissioners and senior Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT) officials also sat in on the meeting.

Flotilla activists had demanded a meeting with Wong and the prime minister after returning from Israel in May, where they allege Israel Defense Force (IDF) soldiers and guards at Ktzi’ot prison subjected them to rape, sexual assault, beatings and forced injection of “unknown substances”.

Last week, Wong declined to commit to an independent investigation during Senate estimates questioning, prompting criticism from Greens Senator Mehreen Faruqi that the government was “[asking] Israel, the criminals, to investigate their own crimes”.

Government officials took allegations ‘seriously’

Barrister Patrick Keyzer – who was present in the meeting and whose daughter, Sumud activist Gemma O’Toole, alleges Israeli soldiers groped, beat and threatened to rape her – said Wong and Aly told the women they “believed” their stories.

“I was sitting across the table from these people, and it was clear that the government ministers and officials understood and took it seriously,” Keyzer told Deepcut.

“Each of the activists described what had happened to them – it was very emotional – before discussing what their demands were, the first of which was an independent Australian investigation. The ministers and the AFP committed to conducting that investigation.

“The AFP [deputy commissioners] said they were highly experienced in investigating sexual assaults,” he said. “They told us this was the first step in a process.”

Keyzer said Wong was dismissive of the activists’ other demands, including that Australia end the two-way arms trade with Israel, expel Israeli ambassador Hillel Newman and impose sanctions on the Israeli government. Newman has repeatedly dismissed their stories and claimed there were “no sexual attacks of any kind against the flotilla people”.

In May, the UN added Israel to a blacklist of nations suspected of sexual violence in armed conflict, prompting the Israeli mission to the UN to formally cut off contact with the office of UN secretary-general Antonio Guterres.

In 2025, the UN special rapporteur on violence against women and girls, Reem Alsalem, described the “systematic, large-scale and horrific sexual violence perpetrated by Israel against Palestinian women, men and children” as a “femi-genocide”.

Keyzer described Hillel’s denials as “minimising and lying about” the experiences of the activists in Israeli custody.

“It was clear the Foreign Minister wasn’t really interested in discussing those issues,” Keyzer said. “I think from their perspective, the meeting was about the activists and their treatment. There was a full, frank, fearless and sometimes feisty exchange of views on those [other] topics, but by that stage we were getting to the end of the meeting.

“In that sense the meeting was disappointing for the activists, but you can’t blame them for trying their best to advance their point of view,” he said. “I went into the meeting with no particular expectations but with a hope that there would be an investigation, and they said that they would do that.”

Push to investigate Australian IDF soldiers

Wong and the AFP also refused to commit to investigating Australians serving in the IDF, despite the UN and international law experts repeatedly warning that the government has a legal obligation to consider Australian IDF soldiers fighting in Gaza since October 2023 as suspects in genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity.

“The critical point that I made – and that I hope landed with them – is that there are over 500 Australians in the IDF, so I don’t know whether Australians beat and sexually assaulted my daughter,” Keyzer said.

“We don’t know whether they’re involved in the genocide. We don’t know if they’re carpet-bombing Lebanon. We don’t know whether they’re abusing Palestinians in the West Bank. We don’t know what they’re doing, because they’re not under our command and control.

“I said to [the officials], ‘But you know. You can find out. When people come back, you could investigate what they are doing. You could ask Israel to tell you where the Australian IDF soldiers were that they [and] what they were deployed to do.’”

Keyzer hopes the AFP investigation uncovers the identities of the people who sexually assaulted his daughter.

“There were cameras everywhere [in Ktzi’ot],” Keyzer said. “There were bodycams. When the IDF soldiers were stripping people down and sexually assaulting them, they would take off their balaclavas and take selfies and taunt the activists, and tell them ‘This is going to go all over social media’. I want every single one of these people to be brought to justice.”

“Whatever people think about our armed forces, at least in Australia, there’s a Victoria Cross recipient who’s been charged with war crimes. He’ll go through a criminal justice process and there’ll be an outcome. That’s a lock, stock and barrel demonstration of what we don’t have with Israel. We’ve got no idea what those Australian IDF soldiers are doing. They could have been sexually assaulting my daughter, and I’m going to find out. I will not rest until I find out.”

The AFP said in a statement it had “begun inquiries into allegations made by a representative of the group”.

“The AFP engages with a victim centric, trauma-informed approach. The AFP will provide an update at an appropriate time.”

DFAT did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

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