Police, at Croydon Airport, detained yesterday a gang of men who had arrived from Gaza, in Palestine, and ordered them to leave England. The men, who numbered about twenty, came from a communist colony in Gaza, and had intended to proceed to the United States. Some of them carried red flags, and all of them wore red badges. In reply to questions, they said they were socialists, and members of the international working-class movement. They claimed to have been urged to emigrate by the belief that the United States offered better prospects to workers than any European country. The police declined to allow them to land, and ordered them back to the continent. The men were thereupon conveyed to Newhaven, and sent on to Dieppe. The authorities at Dieppe refused to let them come ashore, and they were taken back to Newhaven, from which port they ultimately departed for Ostend. The Gazette says the men appeared to be honest, hard-working fellows, and expressed regret at not being permitted to continue their journey.
Original dispatch: Police beat and detain Gaza flotilla activists at airport