Gilad Erdan, Israel's Ambassador to the United Nations, on Wednesday accused the International Committee of the Red Cross of trying to cover up Hamas' war crimes committed against countless Israeli civilians.
"The Red Cross refuses to publicly condemn Hamas, which even denies access to the hostages or the transfer of medication to them and carries out the most serious war crimes," Erdan said after meeting with Laetitia Courtois, the permanent observer of the U.N. and the head of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC).
"Hamas is committing heinous and abhorrent war crimes, and the Red Cross covers it up, refusing to condemn its actions publicly and not presenting to the world the monstrous behavior of Hamas towards the captives," Erdan added.
An increasing number of former Israeli hostages have revealed details about the systematic crimes committed by Hamas operatives against Israeli civilians, especially against women.
Terrorists from Gaza kidnapped Aviva Sigal, 62, and her husband Keith Sigal, 64, from their home in Kfar Aza, an Israeli rural community close to the Gaza Strip border on Oct. 7.
While Aviva Sigal was released in late November as part of the hostage negotiations between Israel and Hamas, her husband is still being held captive inside Gaza. Aviva Sigal recently revealed that she witnessed how a Hamas terrorist abused a young Israeli girl.
"I saw that she shut down and was quiet and that's not her," she said. "And forgive me, I'm going to say bad words, but this son of a b**** touched her. And he wouldn't even let me hug her after it happened. It's terrible, just terrible. I told her I was sorry.
"They tortured her next to me. And I am a witness to it. I am a witness to what is happening there. What is happening there is simply a catastrophe. It is impossible to continue. I've been talking here for a minute or two, and I'm saying so much."
Mia Schem, 21, a French-Israeli woman who was kidnapped by Hamas and released in late November, rejects the international community's insistence on differentiating between Hamas operatives and the wider Gazan population.
"I experienced hell. Everyone there are terrorists … there are no innocent civilians, not one," Schem said.
Schem was held captive by a Gazan family with children and said the mother was mean.
"There are no innocent citizens there. Their families are controlled by Hamas. Their children who, from the moment they are born, they teach them that Israel is Palestine and just to hate Jews," she said.
Another key player in Gaza is the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA), which is tasked with providing humanitarian aid for the civilian population while avoiding incitement and terrorism.
However, a recent U.N. watch report revealed that a Telegram group consisting of some 3,000 UNRWA teachers in Gaza contained many posts that openly praised the Hamas terror massacres of more than 1,200 Israelis on Oct. 7.
Osama Ahmad, a UNRWA teacher, celebrated during the mass slaughter of Israeli civilians.
"Allah is great, Allah is great, reality surpasses our wildest imagination," Ahmad wrote in the group. Many other participants expressed similar support for Hamas and its unprecedented crimes.
Republished with permission from All Israel News.