A United Nations report launched on Monday discovered indicators that sexual violence was dedicated in a number of areas through the Hamas-led Oct. 7 assault on Israel and stated that some hostages being held within the Gaza Strip had additionally been subjected to rape and sexual torture.
From late January to early February, the United Nations deployed a crew of consultants to Israel and the West Bank led by Pramila Patten, the secretary-general’s particular consultant on sexual violence in battle.
In their report, the consultants stated they’d discovered “reasonable grounds” to imagine that sexual violence occurred through the Hamas-led incursion into Israel, together with rape and gang rape in a minimum of three areas: the Nova music pageant website and the realm round it, in addition to Road 232 and Kibbutz Re’im.
“In most of these incidents, victims first subjected to rape were then killed, and at least two incidents relate to the rape of women’s corpses,” the report stated.
The U.N. report, which additionally cited allegations that Palestinians detained by Israel have additionally been sexually abused, was issued three months after The New York Times revealed an intensive report on sexual violence through the Hamas-led assault, together with a number of incidents alongside Road 232. Hamas leaders denied the accusations, and the U.N. report, noting the array of fighters who took half within the Oct. 7 assault, stated its consultants couldn’t decide who was accountable for the sexual assaults.
In their report, the U.N. consultants cited indications of sexual violence that had not beforehand been broadly reported, together with the rape of a girl exterior a bomb shelter on the entrance of Kibbutz Re’im. That incident was corroborated by witness testimony and digital materials, the report stated.
The consultants stated they’d additionally discovered “a pattern of victims, mostly women, found fully or partially naked, bound, and shot across multiple locations.” Although the proof was circumstantial, they stated, the sample might point out some type of sexual violence and torture.
When it got here to the hostages seized in Israel and brought to Gaza, the report supplied a extra conclusive discovering.
It stated it had discovered “clear and convincing information” based mostly on firsthand accounts of launched hostages that sexual violence, together with rape, sexualized torture, and merciless, inhumane and degrading therapy, was inflicted towards some ladies and youngsters throughout their time in captivity. It additionally stated there have been cheap grounds to imagine that such abuse was going down towards the hostages nonetheless being held.
Israel welcomed the report for recognizing “that the crimes were committed simultaneously in different locations and point to a pattern of rape, torture and sexual abuse,” a spokesman for the Foreign Affairs Ministry stated.
The U.N. report stated that its consultants couldn’t confirm the experiences of sexual violence in Kibbutz Kfar Aza or Kibbutz Be’eri. But in each locations, it stated, circumstantial info — “notably the recurring pattern of female victims found undressed, bound, and shot,” in Kfar Aza, for instance — indicated that sexual violence, together with “potential sexualized torture,” might have occurred.
It stated that two particular allegations of sexual violence in Kibbutz Be’eri that have been broadly repeated by the media, nevertheless, have been “unfounded.”
First responders instructed The Times they’d discovered our bodies of girls with indicators of sexual assault at these two kibbutzim, however The Times, in its report, didn’t refer to the particular allegations that the U.N. stated have been unfounded.
The U.N. report detailed the daunting challenges to figuring out what occurred on the day of the assault.
To start with, it was practically inconceivable to achieve entry to the type of forensic proof usually used to set up sexual assault. In half, this was due to the big variety of casualties and the broadly dispersed assault websites.
The report additionally stated that first responders — usually untrained volunteers — centered extra on search and rescue operations and the restoration of the useless than on gathering proof. And lots of the our bodies have been badly burned, compromising any proof.
The consultants stated they’d put out calls to ladies in Israel who survived assaults on Oct. 7 to come ahead, however had not talked to any immediately. A small variety of survivors, they stated, have been reported to nonetheless be in therapy for trauma.
They additionally famous a deep reservoir of suspicion amongst Israelis towards worldwide organizations just like the United Nations, in addition to the truth that the crew was on the bottom for a restricted interval of two and a half weeks.
“Overall, the mission team is of the view that the true prevalence of sexual violence during the 7 October attacks and their aftermath may take months or years to emerge and may never be fully known,” stated the report.
The report stated that the U.N. crew had additionally heard accounts of sexual violence towards Palestinians that implicated Israeli safety forces and settlers.
Palestinian officers and civil society representatives, it stated, instructed the U.N. crew of “cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment of Palestinians in detention, including various forms of sexual violence in the form of invasive body searches, threats of rape, and prolonged forced nudity, as well as sexual harassment and threats of rape, during house raids and at checkpoints.”
The U.N. crew requested the federal government of Israel to give entry to different U.N. our bodies, together with the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights and the Independent International Commission of Inquiry on the occupied Palestinian Territory, to allow them to conduct thorough unbiased investigations into these allegations.
The Foreign Ministry spokesman, Lior Haiat, stated, “Israel rejects the report’s call to investigate Palestinian claims regarding ‘sexual violence by Israeli elements.’”
Ms. Patten had stated that her journey was not supposed to be investigative — different U.N. companies have that mandate, she stated — however to “give voices” to victims and survivors and discover methods to provide them help, together with justice and accountability.
The U.N. crew included technical consultants who might interpret forensic proof, analyze open-source digital info and conduct interviews with victims and witnesses of sexual violence, the report stated.
Ms. Patten stated one problem the U.N. consultants had confronted was sifting via the paucity of dependable info, and inaccurate accounts from untrained folks.
“On one hand,” she stated, “we have the fog of war that often silences grounds of sexual violence. But we have also seen in the history of war instances where sexual violence can be weaponized.”
