{"id":475721,"date":"2026-06-04T10:31:09","date_gmt":"2026-06-04T10:31:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/475721\/"},"modified":"2026-06-04T10:31:09","modified_gmt":"2026-06-04T10:31:09","slug":"israeli-high-court-overturns-ban-on-red-cross-visits-to-security-prisoners","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/475721\/","title":{"rendered":"Israeli High Court overturns ban on Red Cross visits to security prisoners"},"content":{"rendered":"

The High Court of Justice unanimously accepted a petition on Wednesday against the state\u2019s sweeping ban on visits by the International Committee of the Red Cross<\/a> to security prisoners and detainees held in Israel Prison Service and IDF facilities, ruling that the policy was unlawful and must be canceled.<\/p>\n

The petition was filed by the Association for Civil Rights<\/a> in Israel, Physicians for Human Rights-Israel, HaMoked, and Gisha. It challenged both the ban on Red Cross visits and the state\u2019s refusal to provide the organization with information about detainees held by Israel.<\/p>\n

The ruling was issued by Supreme Court<\/a> President Isaac Amit, Deputy President Noam Sohlberg, and Justice Daphne Barak-Erez, who wrote the main opinion.<\/p>\n

The policy was introduced after Hamas\u2019s October 7, 2023<\/a>, massacre and the outbreak of the war, and remained in force for more than two years. The court said that despite the sensitivity of the issue and the wartime context, the state failed to present a coherent legal basis for the policy, even after repeated extensions and opportunities to do so.<\/p>\n

Barak-Erez wrote that the proceedings had been \u201cexceptional\u201d in nature, noting that the state repeatedly requested extensions and delays before eventually filing a response that did not fully address the legal questions at the center of the case.<\/p>\n

\"PalestinianPalestinian prisoners who were released in a hostage deal between Israel and Hamas arrive to the West Bank city of Ramallah, October 13, 2025. (credit: FLASH90)Red Cross access to security prisoners had been a longstanding policy<\/p>\n

The court said the state was given \u201ccountless opportunities\u201d to present a structured, reasoned position, but ultimately failed to provide a detailed legal foundation for the sweeping prohibition.<\/p>\n

Before the war, Red Cross access to security prisoners had been part of Israel\u2019s detention policy for decades. The ruling cited arrangements dating back to the aftermath of the Six-Day War, as well as Israel Prison Service procedures from 2002 that regulated Red Cross visits to prisons and the transfer of information about detainees.<\/p>\n

The justices stressed that the petition concerned prisoners and detainees from the West Bank and Gaza held by the IPS or the IDF, including those held through criminal proceedings, administrative detention, or as unlawful combatants.<\/p>\n

According to the ruling, the state relied largely on a political-security directive rather than a clear legal source.<\/p>\n

In its response to the court, the state had argued that until all hostage bodies were returned from Gaza, Red Cross visits should not resume, and that security officials feared information passed through apparently innocent channels could be exploited by terrorist organizations.<\/p>\n

The court rejected the state\u2019s position, saying that the central justification repeatedly raised by the state, the return of the hostages, was no longer accompanied by a concrete, updated explanation.<\/p>\n

Barak-Erez held that neither Israeli law nor international law allowed a sweeping, open-ended ban of the kind imposed by the state.<\/p>\n

Existing legal exceptions, she wrote, allow restrictions in specific circumstances, but not a blanket policy applied to an entire category of detainees without individualized justification.<\/p>\n

Sohlberg agreed with the result, but said it was enough to decide the case on the basis of Israeli law. He wrote that the state had chosen not to amend or repeal the relevant domestic provisions and had failed to present any legal basis that would allow it to ignore them. For that reason, he said, there was no need to rule on the broader questions of international law.<\/p>\n

Amit joined Barak-Erez\u2019s ruling and Sohlberg\u2019s comments regarding the many opportunities the state had been given to clarify its position. He added that at a time when Israel faces serious allegations in the international arena, external monitoring and documentation mechanisms recognized by law are of particular importance.<\/p>\n

The ruling follows an October hearing in which the petitioners argued that the suspension of Red Cross access violated Israeli law and international humanitarian norms. The state, in turn, argued at the time that the issue was tied to the hostages and to sensitive security considerations, and had previously explored alternative monitoring mechanisms rather than restoring full Red Cross access.<\/p>\n

ACRI welcomes court ruling, highlights abuse and poor conditions in prisons<\/p>\n

ACRI legal adviser Oded Feller welcomed the ruling, saying that conditions<\/a> in prisons and military detention facilities were \u201chorrific.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cSince the beginning of the war, we have received terrible testimonies about abuse, violence, and starvation of Palestinian prisoners, without exception,\u201d Feller said. \u201cWe regret that the legal proceedings took so long. We hope that the return of the Red Cross to the prisons will finally lead to restraint of the IPS\u2019s abusive policy.\u201d<\/p>\n

National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir sharply criticized the ruling, calling it \u201ca disgraceful decision by disconnected judges, who sit in an ivory tower and continue to care for terrorists while Israeli citizens pay the price of terror.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cEvery such decision is a reminder of why the judicial system needs deep change,\u201d he said. \u201cReform now!\u201d<\/p>\n

The ruling comes amid broader scrutiny of conditions for security prisoners and detainees since the start of the war, including claims by rights groups of overcrowding, violence, lack of medical care, and food deprivation. The IPS has denied systematic neglect and has said that prisoners are held according to the law and court rulings.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The High Court of Justice unanimously accepted a petition on Wednesday against the state\u2019s sweeping ban on visits…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":475722,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[68510,85,46,43,3642,22360,58],"class_list":["post-475721","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-israel","tag-geneva-conventions","tag-il","tag-israel","tag-news","tag-palestinian-prisoners","tag-red-cross","tag-the-october-7-massacre"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/475721","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=475721"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/475721\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/475722"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=475721"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=475721"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=475721"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}