Freed Hamas hostage Mia Shem says UN ‘hasn’t lifted a finger’ to help remaining captives

At a press conference on Wednesday outside the United Nations National Security Council in New York, a former hostage of Hamas in Gaza delivered a scathing indictment of the international body’s failure to intervene on her behalf. 

“Not a single humanitarian agency saw me or treated me,” said Mia Shem. “Where was the Red Cross? Where was the U.N. demanding that they have access to us?”

Mia Shem, 22, a dual Israeli-French who was released on Nov. 30 in a deal with Hamas. AFP via Getty Images

Israel’s U.N. Ambassador Danny Danon, also spoke at the press conference, describing the U.N.’s “complete moral failure” as “unforgivable.” While Shem was “locked in a cage alongside other women, none of the U.N. bodies … found the decency to condemn Hamas and demand the hostages’ release,” he said.

“It’s been over a year and the United Nations hasn’t lifted a finger to free the hostages,” said Shem, 22, a dual Israeli-French who was released on Nov. 30 in a deal with Hamas. “For 50 days, I was kept alone, suffering from an unbearable pain in my hand, without any treatment. A Hamas terrorist sat in front of me in a dark room with a gun pointed at my head. Not a single humanitarian agency saw me or treated me even as my arm got worse,” she added.

The United Nations and its security council have urged Hamas to release Israeli hostages. It has, however, stopped short of outlining any sanctions or consequences for failing to do so. Some Security Council resolutions that called for the hostages’ release also called for increasing humanitarian aid to Hamas-controlled Gaza.

The Red Cross says on its website that it wants to visit Israeli hostages but “as a neutral humanitarian organization, the ICRC may not be as outspoken as many would want them to be.”

In the first weeks of the war that broke out on Oct. 7, 2023, the Red Cross adopted an “overwhelmingly skewed approach” against Israel, according to Geneva-based monitoring group U.N. Watch. The Red Cross promoted the false Hamas story that Israel had attacked Gaza’s Al-Ahli hospital, stating that it was “shocked and horrified” that “hundreds were killed.” Human Rights Watch later concluded that a Palestinian rocket had caused the explosion.

The United Nations and its security council have urged Hamas to release Israeli hostages. Getty Images

Shem, who was wounded in the arm during her abduction from the Nova music festival near Kibbutz Re’im, shocked many Israelis with her account of captivity in the home of a Palestinian family, where a man sexually harassed her and a child taunted her with his candy. She told Channel 12: “There are no innocents in Gaza, not even one.”