Humanitarian concern?
Back in November, we noted that Israel’s Magen David Adom looked set to join the International Red Cross movement after many years of diplomatic efforts:
Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Silvan Shalom met yesterday morning with Swiss Foreign Minister Micheline Calmy-Rey at the home of the Swiss ambassador. Calmy-Rey informed Shalom that she intends to issue invitations in the coming days to an international diplomatic conference at the senior official and ambassadorial level, to which 192 countries would be invited, including the Vatican.
The purpose of the conference, which is to take place in Geneva at the beginning of December, is to ratify the addition of Israel’s Magen David Adom to the International Committee of the Red Cross as a life-saving organization.
But this has now hit a snag. According to the Jerusalem Post, Muslim opponents have used procedural moves to try to block the granting of full membership to MDA:
An attempt to end Israel’s long isolation from the Red Cross humanitarian movement hit a snag Tuesday as Muslim opponents used procedural moves to block progress at a decisive international conference, delegates said.
The International Conference of the Red Cross and Red Crescent, which opened Tuesday and is expected to conclude Wednesday, is being asked to approve changes to meet Israeli demands of almost six decades that it be granted full membership without using the cross or crescent to identify itself.
The Jerusalem Post goes on to report that member countries such as Syria, Iran, Yemen and Lebanon have in recent weeks tried to prevent MDA’s inclusion in the movement.
