Hamas continues to release Israeli hostages as part of the ceasefire deal reached under U.S. pressure. The group has said it will release six living hostages and the bodies of four murdered Israelis this week. The images of gaunt men highlight the abuse Hamas inflicted on the hostages. That such torture and abuse occurred under the nose of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) and the international community could have far-reaching implications beyond Israel and Gaza.
That the ICRC violated its mandate under the 1949 Geneva Conventions “to provide humanitarian assistance to people affected by armed conflict and other violence and promote the laws that protect victims of war” is beyond doubt. The ICRC neither visited the Israeli hostages nor did the group transfer medicine to them. Both failures violate ICRC obligations under international humanitarian law.
Turning a blind eye and a deaf ear to the plight of Israeli hostages emboldens other belligerents to repeat the exploitation of hostages in other contexts.
What happens in Israel does not stay in Israel. Turning a blind eye and a deaf ear to the plight of Israeli hostages emboldens other belligerents to repeat the exploitation of hostages in other contexts. In September 2023, Azerbaijani forces seized portions of Nagorno-Karabakh, driving out the indigenous Armenian population, destroying cultural heritage, and taking civilians, soldiers and politicians hostage. Azerbaijan acknowledges holding 23 Armenian prisoners captured in 2023, though Armenian authorities possess evidence that Azerbaijan holds an additional 32 individuals. Human rights lawyers believe there are an additional 80 Armenian detainees, several of whom were farmers and other civilians seized from border areas and passengers dragged out of cars. Azerbaijani forces treat them as hostages, and abuse and torture them in prison.
Azerbaijan allows the Red Cross to visit only the 23 prisoners it declares. The ICRC’s refusal to pressure Hamas convinced Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev that he would face no consequences for his failure to declare the dozens of other Armenians he holds in captivity.
Turkey provides another example. The European Court of Human Rights accuses Turkey of using incarcerations to suppress political pluralism. Turkey’s prisons are inhumane. Prisoners lack access to clean water. Food quality is low and illness rampant. Guards sexually and physically abuse prisoners and deny other medical treatment.
While the ICRC says it monitors Turkish prisons, Turkey now denies access to high-profile political prisoners.
While Turkey’s Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan served as intelligence chief, he oversaw the kidnapping and detention of scores of political and religious dissidents from Kosovo to Kenya to Kyrgyzstan. Turkey has imprisoned Turkish philanthropist and human rights defender Osman Kavala for more than seven years on spurious charges and Turkish officials have also imprisoned Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP) leaders Selahattin Demirtaş and Figen Yüksekdağ, as well as elected HDP mayors. While Turkey accuses the party of having ties to the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), the Turkish government only cracked down on the HDP when the group refused to endorse President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s agenda.
Turkey has held former PKK founder Abdullah Öcalan in isolation since abducting him from Kenya more than a quarter-century ago, with years between visits. While the ICRC says it monitors Turkish prisons, Turkey now denies access to high-profile political prisoners. If Hamas can filibuster the ICRC and still receive hundreds of millions of dollars in aid, why should Turkey provide the Red Cross with access to high-value political prisoners?
Partisans on American campuses, in European foreign ministries and United Nations agencies, and in marquee human rights groups like Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch blinded by their hatred of Israel may cheer Hamas in the Orwellian notion that the terror group should be a progressive cause, but the reality is opposite. By prioritizing politics above principle and failing in its mission, the ICRC may sow the seeds of its own demise. Dictators from Ankara to Baku to Caracas to Donetsk will see the ICRC and its backers as paper tigers. Starvation will become standard and torture routine.
