Israel Blasts International Red Cross: Aid Agency Has Lost Its 'Neutrality'

Israel slammed the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) on Friday after a Red Cross official claimed that Israel was responsible for a lack of food and water in Gaza, ignoring the fact that Hamas steals humanitarian aid that Israel delivers there.

Eylon Levy, a spokesman for the Israeli government, told reporters in a press briefing on Friday that the Red Cross had lost its “neutrality.” He added — as he has for several days — that Israel is not the limiting factor in aid reaching Palestinians in Gaza, since it is speeding up the inspection and delivery of aid trucks across various border points. Rather, he said, Hamas’s role in stealing humanitarian aid — documented on social media accounts in Gaza, and even on Al Jazeera — was a major limiting factor.

On Thursday, as the Times of Israel reported, “International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) President Mirjana Spoljaric Egger … met with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Foreign Minister Eli Cohen, President Isaac Herzog and representatives of the families of the hostages, but offered no real response to the matters raised about the 135 hostages still in Gaza.” The Red Cross has yet to visit the hostages; in contrast, Red Cross representatives regularly meet Palestinian convicts in Israeli prisons.

The Red Cross has tried to defend its inaction, saying that “we’re not bulletproof,” and that the agency has to be invited by the warring sides in a conflict. “We can only take humanitarian action when the authorities in a given area give us the permission.”

However, as UN Watch pointed out earlier this week, the Red Cross has been overwhelmingly anti-Israel in its public statements, ignoring the responsibility of Hamas for starting the war and for causing suffering among civilians on both sides. It has also made videos about the suffering of Palestinian civilians in Gaza — for which it had full access to the territory – while ignoring Israeli civilians, 250,000 of whom have been displaced. It has also participated in Hamas propaganda videos during hostage releases.

Joel B. Pollak is Senior Editor-at-Large at Breitbart News and the host of Breitbart News Sunday on Sirius XM Patriot on Sunday evenings from 7 p.m. to 10 p.m. ET (4 p.m. to 7 p.m. PT). He is the author of the new biography, Rhoda: ‘Comrade Kadalie, You Are Out of Order’. He is also the author of the recent e-book, Neither Free nor Fair: The 2020 U.S. Presidential Election. He is a winner of the 2018 Robert Novak Journalism Alumni Fellowship. Follow him on Twitter at @joelpollak.