Gerald Steinberg
Quillette, Jan. 29, 2025
“Many members of the International Committee of the Red Cross—who visited Gaza, held press conferences and left without bringing holy hell down on Hamas, kicking and screaming and demanding that they see the hostages—have blood on their hands.”
On 19 January 2025, following the conclusion of Israel’s ceasefire agreement with Hamas, three Israeli women were released after 471 days of captivity in Gaza. The hostages were transferred to Red Cross vehicles, where they were harassed and taunted by armed “militants” and a menacing crowd that pressed itself against the windows and chanted “Allahu Akbar!” Officials of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) did nothing to interfere with this intimidating display of indignity and public humiliation. Instead, uniformed ICRC officials complied when Hamas fighters handed them “certificates of completion to sign.” The three young women were then forced to hold these documents while their pictures were taken, as if they had come to Gaza for university courses.
This grotesque spectacle highlighted the degree to which the ICRC has been willing to serve as a prop for Hamas, before and after the Palestinian jihadists perpetrated the atrocities of 7 October 2023. More than 250 captives were seized from Israel on that terrible day. Most of them were alive, some were already dead, and a still-unknown number have since died in captivity or been murdered by their abductors. Not one of the Israeli abductees received a visit from the organisation ostensibly responsible for implementing the requirements of the Geneva Convention. The Red Cross did not provide a shred of information to the tormented families regarding the condition of the captives because, as its own official statements blandly insist, without the agreement of the Hamas, “the ICRC cannot act.”
Justifications like these are technically correct, but they sidestep the main issues raised by the ICRC’s critics. The anger expressed by Israelis and others is not caused by the ICRC’s failure to somehow force Hamas to allow visits and provide medications. The problem is that the organisation was largely passive and failed to use its vast prestige to demand access to the hostages or campaign for their release. The Red Cross officials who travelled throughout the region, including Qatar, did not hold press conferences where this message would have been amplified. Nor did they publish public letters addressed to, say, the heads of the Qatari government demanding assistance in pressing Hamas to follow basic humanitarian and legal principles on the treatment of its “prisoners.” ...SOURCE