Australian Foreign Minister Penny Wong intends to push for an international declaration on protecting humanitarian workers when she meets with counterparts and aid agencies on the sidelines of a United Nations summit in New York.
The move was spurred by pleas from the family of Australian Zomi Frankcom, who was among seven workers killed in drone strikes carried out by the Israeli Defense Force in Gaza on April 1 this year.
The government initially responded by commissioning a report from former Defence Force Chief Mark Binskin. Wong said at the time that Binskin would examine the “sufficiency and appropriateness of the steps taken by the Israeli government” in relation to the killings.
The Israel Defense Force (IDF) blamed the strike on mistaken identification and a breakdown in procedures following the attack on a World Central Kitchen (WCK) aid convoy that killed Frankcom and her colleagues. Several high-ranking officers were dismissed and others reprimanded.
Binskin did not have investigative powers and relied on IDF documentation and interviews with Israeli military personnel to piece together what had happened.
He concluded that there had been a “breakdown of situational awareness and confusion within [Israel’s] Southern Command” due in part to the orders relating to the operation not having been fully read, meaning those on the ground were “certain that the ‘white pick-ups’ were Hamas vehicles.”
There was also a “lack of real-time communications” between the IDF office which is the point for daily coordination of aid activities within Gaza, and World Central Kitchen aid workers on the ground, exacerbated by “the presence of armed locally-contracted security on the WCK aid convoy.”
“Had this [communication] been available, it is likely the confusion could have been quickly averted and the pre-conditions that led to the strikes occurring being corrected,” Binskin concluded.
In response to the report, Wong committed Australia to implement all of the recommendations in the Binskin report, including the recommendation for further calls on Israel to improve coordination and deconfliction with humanitarian organisations working on the ground.
“We are working with the U.N. and the international community to press Israel to reform its coordination with humanitarian organisations to ensure the tragic deaths of Zomi Frankcom and her World Central Kitchen colleagues are not in vain and not repeated,” Wong said.
“We will continue to press for full accountability, including any appropriate criminal charges.”
The latest commitment to work with humanitarian organisations and the U.N. on a declaration to better protect aid workers comes after Wong received further representations from the aid worker’s family.
They said it was important that Frankcom’s work wasn’t lost in the discussion as none of the killed humanitarian workers were “faceless, nameless aid workers.”
Frankcom deserved the right to live after serving people “in the most desperate moments of their lives,” they said in a statement supporting Australia’s push for a declaration.
Risk to Aid Workers Increasing
The foreign minister expressed concern at the increase in aid workers being killed, saying it signified that “the rules and norms that protect humanitarian personnel are at risk,” which signalled repercussions for future conflicts.She said “Australia felt this deeply” following the strike which killed Frankcom and her colleagues.
The proposed declaration will outline practical steps to protect aid workers in conflicts, while reaffirming humanitarian law.
Elaborating in a thread on X, Wong said, “You can’t protect civilians if you don’t protect the aid workers that are providing civilians with the food, water and medicine they need to survive. That’s why Australia has brought together a group of influential countries to pursue a new Declaration for the Protection of Humanitarian Personnel.
“Together, we will galvanise international pressure in upholding the international law that protects aid workers. We’ll channel this into practical action in Gaza, Sudan, Ukraine, and in all current and future conflicts.”
She thanked representatives from Jordan, Switzerland, Indonesia, Sierra Leone, the United Kingdom, Japan, Brazil and Colombia who met today to establish a Ministerial Group for the Protection of Humanitarian Personnel.
Gaza is the world’s most dangerous place for aid workers, with almost 300 killed since Israel began its nearly year-long counteroffensive after Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack.
More than 280 were killed in 2023, the deadliest year on record, but that figure is expected to be surpassed in 2024 as conflicts rage in Sudan, South Sudan, Ukraine, Yemen, and Gaza.
