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London: Swedish activist Greta Thunberg could be detained in a prison cell for terrorists if arrested trying to reach Gaza, Israel Hayom newspaper reported.

She is currently on the Global Sumud Flotilla that left Spain on Sunday for the Palestinian enclave.

The flotilla, which will be joined by other boats along the way, aims to break the siege of Gaza and raise awareness of developments as Israel steps up its military campaign.

However, Israel is expected to stop the flotilla before it reaches Gaza, and National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir has drawn up plans to send the activists to the Ktzi’ot and Damon detention centers if arrested, Israel Hayom reported.

Ktzi’ot is Israel’s largest prison, located in the Negev desert. Damon is notorious for its poor treatment of female prisoners, especially Palestinians.

“Following several weeks at Ktzi’ot and Damon, they’ll be sorry about the time they arrived here. We must eliminate their appetite for another attempt,” sources close to Ben-Gvir told the newspaper.

Thunberg was arrested along with 11 other activists while taking part in the Madleen flotilla in June.

At the time, Thunberg said she and her fellow activists “were kidnapped in international waters …We were well aware of the risks of this mission. The aim was to get to Gaza and to be able to distribute the aid.”

She said before departing on Sunday that more than 26,000 people had signed up to be part of the efforts to break the siege of Gaza, where international observers have warned of widespread famine.

She told Iran’s Press TV that the Global Sumud Flotilla would “deliver humanitarian aid and break Israel’s illegal siege on Gaza and open up a people’s humanitarian corridor.”

Thunberg said: “This project is part of a global uprising of people standing up … When our governments fail to step up, the people will take their place … Their atrocities and their complicity in the genocide in Gaza right now … is not something that we can stand for.”

She told the UK’s Sky News: “It is not antisemitic to say that we shouldn’t be bombing people, that one shouldn’t be living in occupation, that everyone should have the right to live in freedom and dignity no matter who you are.

“For every politician that is fueling the genocide further, environmental and climate destruction, and further colonization and fascism, there will be people escalating the resistance against that.”

NEW DELHI: India and Russia are exploring ways to deepen their cooperation, Prime Minister Narendra Modi said on Monday, after talks with Russian President Vladimir Putin in China.

Modi and Putin were both in the northern Chinese city of Tianjin to attend the Shanghai Cooperation Organization’s leaders’ summit, where they underscored their friendly ties by traveling in one car to the meeting’s venue.

Modi said on social media they had an “excellent meeting” and discussed “ways to deepen bilateral cooperation in all sectors,” including trade, space, and security.

“We exchanged views on regional and global developments, including the peaceful resolution of the conflict in Ukraine. Our Special and Privileged Strategic Partnership remains a vital pillar of regional and global stability,” he wrote on X.

In a video from the meeting, he said that “even in difficult times, India and Russia have walked shoulder to shoulder” and that their close relationship is important not only for the two countries, “but also for global peace, stability, and prosperity.”

He also invited Putin to visit New Delhi in December to take part in the India-Russia Annual Summit, which is a key a platform of the Special and Privileged Strategic Partnership.

The meeting with Russia’s leader followed Modi’s one-on-one with Chinese President Xi Jinping a day earlier, marking a thaw in relations between the Asian giants that were locked in a years-long standoff over their disputed Himalayan border.

The breakthrough with China and plans of increased cooperation with Russia form the backdrop to India’s souring relations with its main partner, the US, after the Donald Trump administration imposed a 50 percent duty on Indian goods as punishment for buying Russian oil.

The White House last month alleged that New Delhi’s oil purchases were indirectly helping to fund Russia’s war in Ukraine.

This week’s meetings with Xi and Putin show efforts to recalibrate India’s foreign policy, which over the past few years was strongly US-oriented.

“This is important because this is a kind of departure from the policy that we have been pursuing with the US for the last 20 years,” Prof. Rajan Kumar from the Centre for Russian and Central Asian Studies, Jawaharlal Nehru University, told Arab News.

Modi’s engagements at the Shanghai Cooperation Organization meeting sent a “clear and loud message” to the US and other Western powers that India would pursue a policy of multi-alignment, he said.

“It will have its ties with the US, but also it will not disrupt its ties with Russia, China, and other countries just because the US would like India to behave in a certain way.”