West Bank09 September, 20263 min read
Red Cross Meets Israeli Security Officials at Detention Facility, Denied Access to Palestinian Prisoners
This article is an automated aggregation of coverage from news outlets. Our editorials offer in-depth analysis curated by the NewsCord team.
Red Cross delegation met Israeli security officials at military detention facility to renew prisoner visits. Red Cross denied access to Palestinian prisoners during the visit.
5 outlets told this the same way.
ICRC seeks access
The International Committee of the Red Cross met Israeli security officials at a military detention facility as part of efforts to renew its visits to Palestinian security prisoners and detainees, but the team did not see or have any direct access to those held there. Julien Lerisson, the head of the ICRC in Israel, said the team held a technical meeting and received a tour of the facility, while calling the discussions “positive” and “a step in the right direction toward resuming appropriate visits to detainees held in Israeli detention facilities.”
The Times of Israel reported that Israel halted the visits nearly three years ago after the Hamas-led October 7, 2023, attack on southern Israel, and that earlier this year the High Court of Justice ruled the government cannot prevent the visits. The Times of Israel also said National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir accused the court of harming the deterrence capability of Israel’s security forces, in the wake of reports that visits will resume.
Denial of resumption
وكالة سبأ reported that the ICRC confirmed visits to Palestinian prisoners in Israeli enemy prisons have not yet resumed, stressing that there are no arrangements or specific dates for a new visit at this time. The outlet said the ICRC clarified that a technical meeting and an assessment of one of the detention facilities are scheduled for tomorrow, Wednesday, but that these two procedures do not include meetings with prisoners and do not represent a resumption of visits.
In contrast, a Times of Israel liveblog entry said an ICRC spokesperson told the outlet that the meeting would not itself constitute a renewal of the visits, while adding, “We are continuing our dialogue with the authorities, and hope that visits — which, by definition, include meetings with detainees — will resume.” The Times of Israel liveblog entry also said Israel’s High Court of Justice in June unanimously ruled to annul the government’s blanket policy prohibiting the ICRC from visiting Palestinian security prisoners and halting the sharing of information about them following October 7.
Politics and conditions
The Times of Israel reported that National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir accused the High Court of “direct harm” to security as the Red Cross pushes to renew visits to prisoners, after the High Court unanimously ruled to annul the government’s blanket policy prohibiting the ICRC from visiting Palestinian security prisoners. Ben Gvir wrote on X that “The High Court’s directive to allow visits to the Nukhba terrorists, for the first time since October 7, constitutes direct harm to the State of Israel’s security deterrent,” and he also referred to human rights groups as the “enemy.”
The Times of Israel liveblog entry said a series of reports issued by the Public Defender’s Office and revealed in January found Palestinian security detainees held in Israeli prisons suffer from severe and systematic violence from prison guards, deprivation of food and medical neglect, as well as unsanitary conditions that caused and exacerbated outbreaks of disease in the prisons. Al-Jazeera Net said the ICRC prepared to resume visits after a technical meeting and an assessment tour at one of the military detention facilities, but confirmed that the team did not meet any prisoners during the visit and was not allowed to conduct any direct contact with the prisoners.