ICRC officials to meet UK Foreign Office over plan for Palestinian detainees

Officials from the International Committee of the Red Cross will hold talks with the UK Foreign Office over concerns about British plans to visit Palestinian detainees in Israeli jails. (ICRC)
Officials from the International Committee of the Red Cross will hold talks with the UK Foreign Office over concerns about British plans to visit Palestinian detainees in Israeli jails. (ICRC)
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Updated 17 May 2024
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ICRC officials to meet UK Foreign Office over plan for Palestinian detainees

ICRC officials to meet UK Foreign Office over plan for Palestinian detainees
  • David Cameron reportedly negotiated deal with Israel’s government to allow two British legal observers and Israeli judge to visit some prisoners

LONDON: Officials from the International Committee of the Red Cross will hold talks with the UK Foreign Office over concerns about British plans to visit Palestinian detainees in Israeli jails.

Foreign Secretary David Cameron has reportedly negotiated a deal with Israel’s government to allow two British legal observers and an Israeli judge to visit some prisoners being held in Israeli prisons amid reports of “inhumane treatment,” The Guardian reported on Thursday.

In an interview with the BBC at the weekend, Cameron said he had spoken to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu about the issue.

“It’s not all bleak ... I said it (the lack of access to detainees) was not good enough, that we needed to have a proper independent system for inspecting and regulating, and the Israelis have announced they are now doing that,” he said.

Netanyahu’s government has blocked ICRC staff from having any access to Palestinian detainees since the Hamas-led attack on Oct. 7. It has said the block will remain until Hamas allows access to Israeli hostages taken during the attack.

Critics say this stance could constitute a breach of the Geneva Conventions, with the ICRC having made repeated requests to both sides in the conflict to allow access to all those detained, as set out in the conventions.

Observers have also raised concerns that the UK plan will “weaken the rule of law” and could set a “dangerous precedent” for how detainees are treated in other conflict zones, The Guardian report added.

The ICRC’s director for the Middle East region, Fabrizio Carboni, is in London to hold talks with Foreign Office officials.

In a statement to The Guardian, the aid organization said Palestinian detainees must be treated as protected persons with access to the ICRC, as proscribed under the Geneva rules.

The statement added: “We have seen the reports of a government of Israel decision to allow observers to visit some places of detention. The ICRC remains hopeful that suitable steps are taken that could protect the health and welfare of detainees, which remains paramount. We reiterate our readiness to resume our mandated detention activities.”

Arab News columnist and director of the Council for Arab-British Understanding, Chris Doyle, said the Foreign Office plan risked establishing a system that bypassed the ICRC and internationally accepted regulations.

“There is no transparency about Cameron’s alternative … I very much doubt that two Foreign Office-appointed lawyers in the company of a judge from the occupying power are going to have the expertise of the ICRC, but will instead be taken around sanitised prisons,” he said.

“What has happened to the thousands of Palestinians taken from Gaza to Israel is a huge issue. (Neither) we nor their families know where they are, whether they are combatants or children, or why in some cases they are being stripped to their underpants. We have heard nothing from the UK government about this,” he added.

During a week-long truce between Hamas and Israeli forces in November, the ICRC played an active role in facilitating the swap of 105 Israeli hostages held by Hamas and 240 Palestinian prisoners from Israeli jails.


Turkiye says forces killed 24 Kurdish militants in Syria, Iraq in a week

Turkiye says forces killed 24 Kurdish militants in Syria, Iraq in a week
Updated 13 March 2025
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Turkiye says forces killed 24 Kurdish militants in Syria, Iraq in a week

Turkiye says forces killed 24 Kurdish militants in Syria, Iraq in a week
  • A defense ministry source said the deal between the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) and Damascus did not change Turkiye’s commitment to counter-terrorism in Syria

ANKARA: Turkish forces killed 24 Kurdish militants in northern Iraq and Syria over the past week, the defense ministry said on Thursday, continuing attacks in the region after a disarmament call from the PKK leader and a separate accord between US-backed Kurds and Damascus.
Speaking at a briefing in Ankara, a defense ministry source said the deal between the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) and Damascus did not change Turkiye’s commitment to counter-terrorism in Syria, and that it still demands that the YPG militia, which spearheads the SDF, disband and disarm.
Turkiye views the SDF, which controls much of northeast Syria, as a terrorist group linked with the outlawed Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) militant group, which has waged a decades-long insurgency against the Turkish state. It has carried out several cross-border offensives against the group.
The PKK’s leader, jailed in Turkiye, called for the group to disarm last month. The group is based in northern Iraq.


Lebanon army says Israel releases fifth detainee

Lebanon army says Israel releases fifth detainee
Updated 13 March 2025
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Lebanon army says Israel releases fifth detainee

Lebanon army says Israel releases fifth detainee
  • Israel had earlier said it was releasing the five as a goodwill gesture to Lebanon’s recently appointed President Joseph Aoun

BEIRUT: The Lebanese army said it received on Thursday a soldier taken by Israel last weekend, after Israel handed over four other detainees earlier this week.
“The army through the International Committee of the Red Cross received (on Thursday) the soldier who was kidnapped by the Israeli enemy” on Sunday, the army said on X, adding that he had been transported to a hospital for treatment.
On Tuesday, Lebanon received four detainees who had been taken into custody by Israel during its war with Hezbollah, after Israel announced it was releasing them.
“Lebanon received four Lebanese prisoners who were detained by Israeli forces during the last war,” the presidency said at the time, adding the fifth was due to be released the following day.
Israel had earlier said it was releasing the five as a goodwill gesture to Lebanon’s recently appointed President Joseph Aoun.
“In coordination with the United States and as a gesture to Lebanon’s new president, Israel has agreed to release five Lebanese detainees,” the office of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said.
The office said the decision came after a meeting held earlier in the day in the Lebanese border town of Naqoura that included representatives of the Israeli army, the United States, France and Lebanon.
In an interview to Lebanese news channel Al-Jadeed, US deputy special envoy for the Middle East Morgan Ortagus said the five Lebanese prisoners were a mix of civilians and soldiers.
On November 27, Israel and Lebanon agreed to a US-French mediated truce that has largely halted more than a year of hostilities between Hezbollah and Israel, including two months of full-blown war in which Israel sent in ground troops.
While the ceasefire continues to hold, Israel has periodically carried out air strikes on Lebanon that it says are to prevent Hezbollah from rearming or returning to the area along its northern border.


Israel attacks on Gaza reproductive centers ‘genocidal’: UN probe

Israel attacks on Gaza reproductive centers ‘genocidal’: UN probe
Updated 13 March 2025
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Israel attacks on Gaza reproductive centers ‘genocidal’: UN probe

Israel attacks on Gaza reproductive centers ‘genocidal’: UN probe
  • The commission found that Israeli authorities have destroyed in part the reproductive capacity of Palestinians in Gaza as a group through the systematic destruction of sexual and reproductive health care
  • The United Nations’ genocide convention defines that crime as acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group

GENEVA: A United Nations investigation concluded Thursday that Israel carried out “genocidal” acts in Gaza through the systematic destruction of sexual and reproductive health care facilities.
The UN Commission of Inquiry said Israel had “intentionally attacked and destroyed” the Palestinian territory’s main fertility center, and had simultaneously imposed a siege and blocked aid including medication for ensuring safe pregnancies, deliveries and neonatal care.
“Israel categorically rejects the unfounded allegations,” its mission in Geneva said in a statement.
The commission found that Israeli authorities “have destroyed in part the reproductive capacity of Palestinians in Gaza as a group through the systematic destruction of sexual and reproductive health care,” it said in a statement.
It said this amounted to “two categories of genocidal acts” during Israel’s offensive in Gaza, launched after the attacks by Hamas militants on Israel on October 7, 2023.
The United Nations’ genocide convention defines that crime as acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group.
Of its five categories, the inquiry said the two implicating Israel were “deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction” and “imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group.”
“These violations have not only caused severe immediate physical and mental harm and suffering to women and girls, but irreversible long-term effects on the mental health and reproductive and fertility prospects of Palestinians as a group,” the commission’s chair Navi Pillay said in a statement.
The three-person Independent International Commission of Inquiry was established by the UN Human Rights Council in May 2021 to investigate alleged international law violations in Israel and the Palestinian territories.
Pillay, a former UN rights chief, served as a judge on the International Criminal Court and presided over the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda.
Israel accused the commission of advancing a “predetermined and biased political agenda... in a shameless attempt to incriminate the Israel Defense Forces.”


The report said maternity hospitals and wards had been systematically destroyed in Gaza, along with the Al-Basma IVF Center, the territory’s main in-vitro fertility clinic.
It said Al-Basma was shelled in December 2023, reportedly destroying around 4,000 embryos at a clinic that served 2,000 to 3,000 patients a month.
The commission found that the Israeli Security Forces intentionally attacked and destroyed the clinic, including all the reproductive material stored for the future conception of Palestinians.
The commission found no credible evidence that the building was used for military purposes.
It concluded that the destruction “was a measure intended to prevent births among Palestinians in Gaza, which is a genocidal act.”
Furthermore, the report said the wider harm to pregnant, lactating and new mothers in Gaza was on an “unprecedented scale,” with an irreversible impact on the reproductive prospects of Gazans.
Such underlying acts “amount to crimes against humanity” and deliberately trying to destroy the Palestinians as a group, the commission concluded.


The report came after the commission conducted public hearings in Geneva on Tuesday and Wednesday, hearing from victims and witnesses of sexual violence.
It concluded that Israel had targeted civilian women and girls directly, “acts that constitute the crime against humanity of murder and the war crime of wilful killing.”
Women and girls have also died from complications related to pregnancy and childbirth due to the conditions imposed by the Israeli authorities impacting access to reproductive health care, “acts that amount to the crime against humanity of extermination,” it added.
The commission added that forced public stripping and nudity, sexual harassment including threats of rape, as well as sexual assault, comprise part of the Israeli Security Forces’ “standard operating procedures” toward Palestinians.
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Egypt appreciates Trump’s decision not to displace Gazans

Egypt appreciates Trump’s decision not to displace Gazans
Updated 13 March 2025
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Egypt appreciates Trump’s decision not to displace Gazans

Egypt appreciates Trump’s decision not to displace Gazans
  • Donald Trump had proposed a US takeover of Gaza, after earlier suggesting that Palestinians in the enclave should be permanently displaced
  • Earlier in March, Arab leaders adopted a $53 billion Egyptian reconstruction plan for Gaza that would avoid displacing Palestinians

DUBAI: Egypt said on Thursday it appreciated US President Donald Trump’s remarks on not demanding that residents of Gaza leave the enclave, according to a statement from the foreign ministry.
“Nobody is expelling any Palestinians from Gaza,” Trump said on Wednesday, in response to a question during a meeting in the White House with Irish Prime Minister Micheál Martin.
“This position reflects an understanding of the need to prevent further deterioration of the humanitarian situation in Gaza and the importance of finding fair, sustainable solutions to the Palestinian issue,” the Egyptian foreign ministry added.
Trump had proposed a US takeover of Gaza, where Israel’s military assault in the last 17 months has killed tens of thousands, after earlier suggesting that Palestinians in the enclave should be permanently displaced.
Palestinian militant group Hamas carried out a cross-border raid into southern Israel on October 7, 2023, triggering the devastating war in the Gaza Strip.
Hamas on Wednesday welcomed Trump’s apparent retreat from his proposal for the displacement of Gazans, urging him to refrain from aligning with the vision of the “extreme Zionist right.”
Earlier in March, Arab leaders adopted a $53 billion Egyptian reconstruction plan for Gaza that would avoid displacing Palestinians to counter Trump’s vision of a “Middle East Riviera.”


Canada eases sanctions on Syrian Arab Republic, names ambassador

Canada eases sanctions on Syrian Arab Republic, names ambassador
Updated 13 March 2025
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Canada eases sanctions on Syrian Arab Republic, names ambassador

Canada eases sanctions on Syrian Arab Republic, names ambassador
  • Easing of sanctions would help prevent Syria from falling into chaos and instability, said Canada’s special envoy Omar Alghabra
  • Liberated from the Assad regime last December after 13 years of war, Syria is now led by former rebel leader Ahmed Al-Sharaa

OTTAWA: Canada announced plans Wednesday to ease its financial sanctions against Syria and to appoint an ambassador, as the Damascus interim government seeks international support.
Canada’s special envoy for Syria, Omar Alghabra, said: “Canada can play a meaningful role in enabling Syrians to build an inclusive country that respects all of its citizens.
“We also can help prevent Syria from falling into chaos and instability.”
A statement from Canada’s foreign ministry said sanctions would be eased “to allow funds to be sent through certain banks in the country, such as Syria’s Central Bank.”
Canada’s ambassador to Lebanon, Stefanie McCollum, will now take on a parallel role as a non-resident ambassador to neighboring Syria.
Previously, Canada — along with many other world powers — had strict sanctions in place to punish the now-ousted government of Bashar Assad.
“These sanctions had been used as a tool against the Assad regime and easing them will help to enable the stable and sustainable delivery of aid, support local redevelopment efforts, and contribute to a swift recovery for Syria,” the Canadian statement said.
Assad fled Syria late last year and opposition forces overthrew his administration in early December. An interim government under former jihadist leader President Ahmed Al-Sharaa is now in place.
Many capitals welcomed Assad’s fall, but gave only a cautious welcome to the victorious rebels.
Sharaa’s Hayat Tahrir Al-Sham (HTS) Islamist group has its roots in the Syrian branch of Al-Qaeda.
The new government has vowed to protect Syria’s religious and ethnic minorities, but security forces have reportedly killed hundreds of Alawite civilians in recent days.
In the statement announcing sanctions relief, Canadian Foreign Minister Melanie Joy and Minister of International Development Ahmed Hussen expressed concern over the killings.
“We utterly condemn these atrocities and call on the interim authorities to take all necessary measures to end the violence,” they said.
“Civilians must be protected, the dignity and human rights of all religious and ethnic groups must be upheld, and perpetrators must be held accountable.”