Knesset Votes Down Bill to Bar Red Cross Visits to Prisons Holding Terror Inmates

The Knesset plenum voted down tonight (Monday), in its first reading, a proposed amendment to the Prisons Ordinance that would have prevented representatives of the International Committee of the Red Cross from entering prisons where terror inmates are being held.

Thirty-six members of Knesset supported the proposal, while 41 opposed it, and it was removed from the agenda. The practical meaning of that move is that it cannot be advanced for the next six months.

The bill stated that representatives of the Red Cross should be barred from entering prisons, as well as detention facilities operated by the IDF. It also proposed banning the transfer of information to the organization about prisoners and detainees, unless approved by the national security minister or the defense minister, and subject to security considerations.

As previously reported, at the beginning of the month a panel of High Court justices ruled that Red Cross teams would be allowed to visit terror inmates imprisoned in Israeli jails, including *Nukhba* terrorists. In doing so, the justices rejected the state's position. The decision was unanimous, issued by Justices Daphne Barak-Erez, Noam Sohlberg, and Yitzhak Amit.

The policy barring visits to terror inmates was put in place after the October 7 massacre, since Hamas did not allow the Red Cross to visit the Israelis abducted to the Gaza Strip. The panel of justices, led by Justice Barak-Erez, noted that "the government did not present a legal foundation for this policy, despite the prolonged proceedings and the countless opportunities it was given to explain its position in an orderly way and anchor it in law, as well as to update it in light of changing circumstances. This is especially so given that the central consideration behind the policy concerned the return of the last of the hostages from the Gaza Strip, yet no other concrete reason was presented in its place."

The bill was introduced, among other reasons, in order to bypass the High Court ruling, but as noted, the Knesset plenum removed the proposal from the agenda tonight.