10 Photos of Thiago Avila: Greta Thunberg's Gaza Flotilla Hit By Sexual Misconduct Claims Against Senior Leader

Greta Thunberg's latest pro-Palestinian 'freedom flotilla' to Gaza has been plunged into controversy after a senior organiser was accused of sexual misconduct with at least three volunteers while at sea, according to campaign groups involved in the mission. The claims centre on Brazilian activist Thiago Ávila, a key figure in the Global Sumud Flotilla, which left Barcelona on 12 April with hundreds of participants on board.

The news came after months of simmering tensions inside the flotilla coalition, where Greta Thunberg has become the most recognisable face of a sprawling, loosely organised protest fleet attempting to reach the besieged Gaza Strip. In June, she first sailed on the 12-person vessel Madleen alongside Ávila, before joining larger missions later in the year. Those earlier voyages ended with the boats intercepted by the Israeli navy, activists detained and deported, and a wave of celebratory images shared online by participants portraying the trips as both political and communal adventures.

Greta Thunberg Flotilla Hit By Allegations At Sea

The latest allegations surfaced from Palestinian group Heart of Falastin, which claimed in a social media post that 'a senior leader within the flotilla — a member of the steering committee, the highest governing body of the organisation — engaged in sexual relations with multiple activists while on the boat heading to Gaza. Not one person. Not two. Three different individuals.'

The group framed the alleged behaviour as an abuse of power, arguing that 'to do it on the boat, while heading to a nation undergoing genocide, with volunteers who are under your authority... is a clear violation of ethics and power.' They did not publish names, but a Brazilian collective soon did.

A self-described left-wing critics' group, Anti Esquerda Club, publicly identified the man as 39-year-old Brazilian activist Thiago Ávila. In an expletive-laden post on X, the group accused him of turning a humanitarian trip into a sexual escapade and noted that he was among those detained when the Israeli navy intercepted an earlier flotilla.

Ávila has travelled repeatedly with the missions, leaving behind his wife and two-year-old daughter in Brazil to join four separate voyages since June, including two attempts to reach Gaza and a trip to Cuba. Photographs from the Madleen voyage showed him in relaxed, affectionate poses with Greta Thunberg, arms around each other and apparently at ease as they sailed towards the eastern Mediterranean.

By September, Ávila had become a coordinator of the larger Global Sumud Flotilla, a convoy that expanded to about 40 boats and 500 activists. That trip was already marked by internal rows. According to Italian newspaper Il Manifesto, Thunberg resigned from the steering committee mid-voyage, frustrated that senior figures were obsessed with 'internal affairs' rather than the situation in Gaza. She left the main boat altogether, dragging her suitcase along a Tunisian dock to board another vessel.

The mood on board was far from uniformly solemn. One ship's radio was hacked to blast ABBA songs at full volume, in what participants interpreted as a pointed jibe at the Swedish climate activist.

Thiago Ávila Denies Misconduct As Flotilla Faces Scrutiny

Thiago Ávila flatly rejects the sexual misconduct claims, describing them as politically motivated. Speaking to the New York Post via WhatsApp while sailing off the coast of Spain on the latest mission, he said: 'These allegations are obviously not true.' He insisted that the flotilla's own ethics panel had already handled the matter.

'The ethics committee talked to all three people mentioned and they confirmed that this is just a smear campaign, that we are comrades and nothing ever happened,' Ávila said, before veering into what the paper called a 'bizarre rant' about the Epstein files. No transcripts or independent corroboration of those internal interviews have been published.

A spokesperson for the Global Sumud Flotilla confirmed that an investigation had been opened after the allegations first surfaced in November. The press team said legal professionals had been brought in to form an ethics committee following the 2025 trips, and that the panel had reviewed the case.

'In the absence of any complainant, witnesses or evidence, there was no basis for the matter to proceed,' the flotilla said. The same statement acknowledged the committee had examined other misconduct cases in the past, adding that 'disciplinary action has been taken where evidence has warranted it.' No further details were given, and none of those outcomes has been made public.

Nothing has been independently verified and no formal complaint appears to have reached law enforcement, so all the accusations remain unproven and should be treated with caution.

Greta Thunberg has yet to comment the allegations or whether they played any role in her stepping back from leadership responsibilities within Global Sumud. Her silence leaves an uncomfortable gap at the heart of a movement that has traded heavily on her moral authority and public profile.

Meanwhile, the flotilla sails on. Around 70 boats are reported to be participating in this spring's effort, which organisers say aims to raise $3.5 million for the mission. The donor list is not public. Critics, including Palestinian commentators, question how much of that money translates into tangible help for civilians in Gaza.

'At a time when Palestinians in Gaza are being starved... we would expect mobilisation to reflect the respect and seriousness this moment deserves,' the group Palestinian Reveals argued, condemning what it described as a party atmosphere at a Barcelona launch event, complete with concerts, a stage and music.

Journalist Mohammed AbuSalama, citing a Gaza resident living in tents, wrote that 'it would have been better to donate money to Gaza instead of throwing it into the sea without benefit.' It is a harsh verdict, but one that chimes with videos from Ávila's own Instagram stories in recent days, where he laughs about spotting dolphins and a whale, and overlays a sunset at sea with Bob Marley's Redemption Song.

To supporters, these voyages are acts of non-violent resistance and a last-ditch show of solidarity with a trapped population. To critics, they increasingly look like expensive, self-referential spectacles, now clouded by an allegation that reaches into the flotilla's inner circle and presses on the question its leaders most wanted to avoid: who, exactly, is being protected here, and who is not.