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UN team says rape, gang rape likely occurred during Hamas attack on Israel (www.reuters.com)

submitted 8 months ago by Rapidcreek@lemmy.world to c/world@lemmy.world

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[–] givesomefucks@lemmy.world 34 points 8 months ago

The U.N. team said it also received information from institutional and civil society sources and direct interviews, about "sexual violence against Palestinian men and women in detention settings, during house raids and at checkpoints" after Oct. 7. The detention centers were in Israel.

The U.N. team said it raised the allegations with the Israeli Ministry of Justice and Military Advocate General, which said no complaints of sexual violence against members of the Israeli Defense Forces had been received.

One side is a literal terrorist group and the other is supposed to be the beacon of freedom and western values...

But Israel denies it ever happens and not only doesn't investigate reports, they don't actually record them anywhere.

It's state sponsored and approved.

Which explains why the people who have been their victims for generations sink to the same level as their oppressors.

[–] Kusimulkku@lemm.ee 18 points 8 months ago (1 children)

I thought we knew this already

[–] Linkerbaan@lemmy.world 10 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago) (1 children)

We know that the initial allegations from NYT were completely false and made up. And that there is zero forensic evidence. This just seems like another PR stunt from israel.

Edit: New breaking points video detailing how broken this report is. A big takeaway is this quote from the UN "investigator"herself:

[–] Kusimulkku@lemm.ee 10 points 8 months ago (1 children)

I don't think NYT was the only one making those allegations. They came from many directions afaik.

This just seems like another PR stunt from israel.

This is from an UN team of experts though

[–] Linkerbaan@lemmy.world -2 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago) (1 children)

NYT hired an ex-IDF soldier to scourge for any allegation of rape. The statements which were made in that article have all been proven false or non-credible as their stories changed multiple times.

As this report contains no additional information or facts it seems they just copy-pasted the NYT stuff.

[–] Kusimulkku@lemm.ee 6 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Uhm, wasn't this a UN specialist trip to the area to gather their own information?

The UN team visited Israel between 29 January and 14 February.

The trip was led by Pramila Patten, the UN Special Representative on Sexual Violence in Conflict.

"The mission team found that there are reasonable grounds to believe that conflict-related sexual violence occurred in multiple locations during the 7 October attacks," the UN report said.

In the report, the UN said it had "found clear and convincing information that sexual violence, including rape, sexualized torture, cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment has been committed against hostages".

[–] Linkerbaan@lemmy.world -3 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago) (1 children)

She offered zero evidence.

[–] Kusimulkku@lemm.ee 11 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago) (1 children)

The report does make a convincing case of the sexual violence having been happened.

Based on the information gathered by the mission team from multiple and independent sources, there are reasonable grounds to believe that conflict-related sexual violence occurred during the 7 October attacks in multiple locations across Gaza periphery, including rape and gang rape, in at least three locations. Across the various locations of the 7 October attacks, the mission team found that several fully naked or partially naked bodies from the waist down were recovered – mostly women – with hands tied and shot multiple times, often in the head. Although circumstantial, such a pattern of undressing and restraining of victims may be indicative of some forms of sexual violence.

At the Nova music festival and its surroundings, there are reasonable grounds to believe that multiple incidents of sexual violence took place with victims being subjected to rape and/or gang rape and then killed or killed while being raped. Credible sources described finding 5 murdered individuals, mostly women, whose bodies were naked from their waist down – and some totally naked – tied with their hands behind their backs, many of whom were shot in the head. On Road 232, credible information based on witness accounts describe an incident of the rape of two women by armed elements. Other reported instances of rape could not be verified in the time allotted. The mission team also found a pattern of bound naked or partially naked bodies from the waist down, in some cases tied to structures including trees and poles, along Road 232. In kibbutz Re’im, the mission team further verified an incident of the rape of a woman outside of a bomb shelter and heard of other allegations of rape that could not yet be verified.

You should read the report, it's much more even handed than you give it credit. It notes the issues in their findings, it does bring it all up straight away, goes after two false claims and doesn't claim to be comprehensive proof, but does make the case that from everything they could find out, sexual violence very likely happened.

And I think all such claims shouldn't be dismissed lightly. And from all we know so far, I think it's very likely sexual violence did happen.

[–] Linkerbaan@lemmy.world -5 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago) (1 children)

These are the same "allegations" which NYT gave which have been fully debunked.

The fact that these are included is practically evidence that the report is filled with disproven IDF propaganda and the UN "investigator" did not in fact investigate anything.

It is highly unlikely that sexual assault happened during the attack. Sexual assault always happens after battles are over. Nobody goes on a raping spree while there's an IDF helicopter firing at them.

The fact that all the main claims have been fully debunked proves it. The only people that still buy into this myth are those that want to believe it.

[–] Kusimulkku@lemm.ee 8 points 8 months ago (1 children)

I don't think your article debunks the claims made by the UN Special Representative. From your linked article

The question has never been whether individual acts of sexual assault may have occurred on October 7. Rape is not uncommon in war, and there were also several hundred civilians who poured into Israel from Gaza that day in a “second wave,” contributing to and participating in the mayhem and violence. The central issue is whether the New York Times presented solid evidence to support its claim that there were newly reported details “establishing that the attacks against women were not isolated events but part of a broader pattern of gender-based violence on Oct. 7” — a claim stated in the headline that Hamas deliberately deployed sexual violence as a weapon of war.

NYT reported that the sexual violence was a systematic thing employed by Hamas as a tool while the UN report is about sexual violence having occurred there.

Also the report specifically mentions some of the same claims and says they've been disproven. And how they've done their own interviews and seen the photographic evidence for other things. So it doesn't seem to be the same NYT thing you're focused on.

[+] Linkerbaan@lemmy.world -8 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago) (1 children)

There was no photographic evidence nor any video evidence such as CCTV or gopro footage. Nor any forensic evidence, No evidence whatsoever. Just more completely made up Zaka-style claims

Credible information was obtained regarding multiple incidents whereby victims were subjected to rape and then killed. There are further accounts of individuals who witnessed at least two incidents of rape of corpses of women.

including one case of genital mutilation of one male soldier and several female soldiers during the attack on the military base, which likewise could not be established.

So the UN is making a wild claim that Hamas was raping corpses. (and what seems to imply chopping off penises?) Yet no forensic evidence was found. it's literally just the same shit from NYT. With the same Zaka people makes. And multiple of these statements look so made-up that the UN already says "no corpses in this condition were found".

[–] Kusimulkku@lemm.ee 7 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago) (1 children)

There was no photographic evidence nor any video evidence such as CCTV or gopro footage.

I'm talking about this

"The mission made up of Ms. Patten and nine experts – which was not investigative in nature – conducted 33 meetings with Israeli representatives, examining more than 5,000 photographic images and 50 hours of video footage. It conducted 34 confidential interviews including with survivors and witnesses of the 7 October attacks, released hostages, first responders and others."

And the report has it like this, for example

"In the medicolegal assessment undertaken by the mission team of available photos and videos of crime scenes, a few corpses with conspicuously spread legs were observed. These postures could not be adequately explained by, for instance, “postmortem pugilistic posturing” due to burn damage. The reviewed photos and videos further revealed a minimum of twenty corpses with partially or fully exposed intimate body parts such as breasts and genitalia, resulting from the absence, displacement, or tearing of clothing. Also, at least ten distinct corpses displayed indications of bound wrists and/or tied legs."

They are not saying they have videos or photos of acts of rape but rather that they have reviewed photographic evidence such as that that strongly circumstantially suggests sexual violence. With the whole report calling for further investigation based on the photos and videos they've seen.

So the UN is making a wild claim that Hamas was raping corpses.

No. They are reporting of about an "accounts of individuals who witnessed" rape of corpses (not specifically by Hamas). As your quoted part even says, "There are further accounts of individuals who witnessed at least two incidents of rape of corpses of women".

I feel like you don't understand that they're purposefully using that careful language.

[+] Linkerbaan@lemmy.world -6 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Your example is literally just Gal Abdush, The most debunked claim of all.

Why are you writing long comments before having read the debunking of the NYT article?

[–] Kusimulkku@lemm.ee 6 points 8 months ago (1 children)

I've read both, that and the report. We already discussed this. But if you want to debunk a specific claim here (I guess to show the report in all parts unreliable) you should probably quote the relevant parts here so the discussion is easier to follow.

[–] Linkerbaan@lemmy.world -4 points 8 months ago (1 children)

If you ctrl+f Gal Abdush in the article I linked you will find her story quite similar to your claims.

If you have any actual evidence to present I will concede my point.

The problem with this UN report here remains clear; no CCTV evidence, no forensic evidence, no people claiming they were raped. only "witness statements". You cannot seriously expect anyone to believe this.

If anything it's evidence that no rapes happened as they could not find a shred of conclusive evidence while looking for it so hard. That's why the title here contains the word "likely".

[–] Kusimulkku@lemm.ee 2 points 8 months ago

If you ctrl+f Gal Abdush in the article I linked you will find her story quite similar to your claims.

It would be a lot easier to discuss if you'd quote the relevant parts from both here and show how you feel it debunks it.

If you have any actual evidence to present I will concede my point.

I'm genuinely not sure what your point is. I feel like you at first misunderstood the report and then what is being claimed here. After review of the available evidence (photos, videos testimonies) the UN people came away with the conclusion that very likely sexual violence was done during (or in the immediate aftermath) of the attack. And the link you provided to debunk this report seems to consider it very likely too, just not how NYT wrote about it.

The problem with this UN report here remains clear; no CCTV evidence, no forensic evidence, no people claiming they were raped. only "witness statements". You cannot seriously expect anyone to believe this.

I mean I think most believe sexual violence happened there and the report, the debunking you provided and really just a layman's view of the attack and knowledge about how prevalent war rape is would all speak on behalf of it very very likely to have happened. All these factors pointing at the direction of the sexual violence are hard to dismiss.

The doubtful part is what NYT claimed, that it was systematic tool used by Hamas.

If anything it's evidence that no rapes happened as they could not find a shred of conclusive evidence while looking for it so hard. That's why the title here contains the word "likely".

The report was a two week mission and clearly states it wasn't a proper investigative one. That's why they are calling it just likely and calling for a proper and through investigation

[–] Arete@lemmy.world 16 points 8 months ago (2 children)

This is completely, utterly uncontroversial, except by a subset of the extreme far left at war with reality. Let's see where the downvote ratio ends up.

[–] hydroxide@lemmy.ml 13 points 8 months ago (2 children)

What's controversial is the depiction of Palestinians as rapists and outlining a systemic, racial, or cultural issue of rape within Arab populations, then pointing to the few instances it does occur as proof for a racist point of view.

Both parties are guilty of rape and sexual assault. None of that is okay. However only one is being racially profiled as having an innate proclivity for rape.

[–] Kusimulkku@lemm.ee 8 points 8 months ago

I just saw people saying the attackers raped people during the attack.

[–] Arete@lemmy.world 5 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Nobody is saying this. It's kind of racist to even assume people are, actually.

Hamas raped a bunch of people on October 7th and the far left can't handle that without making it a systemic race issue. That's pretty fucked up.

[–] hydroxide@lemmy.ml 7 points 8 months ago (2 children)

You are ridiculous. First you spread misinformation about the ICJ ruling, bending what the ruling meant. Now you are trying to use a 'no, you' card to bend my words and pretend that there hasn't been a racist campaign against Palestinians and Arabs for decades.

There were likely rapes that occurred on October 7th, and there have been rapes of Israeli detained Palestinian hostages as well. How can you not see that one is now being used as a racial justification for genocide while the other is ignored.

[–] Zeroxxx@lemmy.id -1 points 8 months ago

'likely'

Left oh left.

[–] Arete@lemmy.world -2 points 8 months ago (1 children)

You're confusing a political justification for war against a terrorist organization with a racial justification for genocide. There are millions of arabs living in Israel, and they aren't being killed. Not everything is systemic racism.

And as far as your history goes you're missing a bunch of wars the surrounding Arab countries declared on Israel. This isn't a simple "white people bad" situation.

[–] hydroxide@lemmy.ml 7 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago) (2 children)

Non-Jewish Arabs in the basic laws of Israel do not have rights to self determination. Its a fucking apartheid state. Its like saying millions of native Africans lived in South Africa. These people only had a reason to attack because they live in an open air prison that mirrors a Warsaw ghetto with complete siege from their neighbor. A lot of the things they did was retaliation and a deep brewing anger. What the fuck were they supposed to do? March peacefully? Israel shot them by the thousands in 2018 when they tried to. where is your humanity?

[–] Atin@lemmy.world 2 points 8 months ago

And yet Israeli Muslims, and Christians too, can vote, they can become members of the Knesset, can become high level judges, can join the military.

[–] Arete@lemmy.world 0 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago) (2 children)

Tell me about the rights of Jews in any of the surrounding Arab countries first. They don't have any either, where they weren't forcibly expelled.

Comparing pre-war Gaza to the Warsaw ghetto is so fucking outlandish that I know you've never actually read about it. You probably read that on Twitter and have been parroting it back. I won't argue with you on there being apartheid, but let's lay off the extreme hyperbole.

And as for what they were supposed to do? Maybe lay off the terrorism and take one of the several deals they get offered once a decade. They could've had statehood with a fucking elevated highway connecting Gaza to the West Bank, but they turned that down. Defending a 9/11 scale terrorist attack on the basis of "what else should they have done" is frankly unconscionable.

[–] dubyakay@lemmy.ca 2 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Tell me about the rights of Jews in any of the surrounding Arab countries first. They don't have any either, where they weren't forcibly expelled.

What a low bar to set for a supposedly first world nation.

[–] Arete@lemmy.world 1 points 8 months ago (1 children)

The second world gets a pass on ethnic cleansing? What a weird policy.

[–] dubyakay@lemmy.ca 3 points 8 months ago (1 children)

You are saying because Arab countries are shit to Jews, it's okay for Israel to be shit to Arabs in their own country.

[–] Arete@lemmy.world 1 points 8 months ago (1 children)

No, I'm saying this issue is complicated and if your primary sources of information are Twitter and tiktok then you should do some actual research before making blanket statements of good and evil.

[–] dubyakay@lemmy.ca 2 points 8 months ago (1 children)

I'm not sure what you are insinuating. I'm not reading twitter or TikTok. My primary source is you. I quoted your post. Let me rephrase for you:

Someone else said that Arabs don't have rights in Israel. You said that it's the same as Jews not having rights in surrounding Arab Nations, coupled with them actually being expelled from those countries. You are justifying Israel being shitty towards Arabs within Israel with the surrounding nations being shitty towards them.

This would be as if Hungary was shitty towards Romanians in Hungary (they are not) just because Romanians have been shitty towards Hungarian minority living in Romania after decades of propaganda. Or as if francophones were treated badly in Ontario (they are not) just because Québec treats Anglos like second class citizens.

Let me see what random goalpost moving shit you bring up in your next post.

[–] Arete@lemmy.world 2 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Context clues mate. Consider the point the person I was replying to was trying to make. I never suggested anything was "okay" for anyone to do, just that the "pro October 7th" narrative they were trying to spin was insane and they had absolutely no idea what they were talking about about.

[–] dubyakay@lemmy.ca -1 points 8 months ago

Fine. I'll concede that. But maybe add a /s for clarity.

[–] Krackalot@discuss.tchncs.de -2 points 8 months ago (1 children)

"Tell me about the rights of Jews in any of the surrounding Arab countries first." Sorry, gotta expect more out of the most moral army in the world than an eye for an eye.

[–] Arete@lemmy.world 4 points 8 months ago

Who called the IDF "the most moral army in the world"? Certainly not me. However someone peddling a "white oppressor vs brown oppressed" ought to at least know the history of the region.

[–] Eyck_of_denesle@lemmy.zip 7 points 8 months ago (1 children)

It's hard to believe when israel lies about everything constantly. Once people saw how the 40 babies rumor was being spread by israel, it's normal to be critical of information.

[–] Arete@lemmy.world 4 points 8 months ago

I encourage you to look into how an Israeli soldier saying "1 decapitated, 40 burned" got turned into "40 decapitated" by a game of telephone. The Israeli government never claimed that, and clarified when they got asked by journalists.

[–] militaryintelligence@lemmy.world 6 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Israel and Hamas are both bad, roast me

[–] kromem@lemmy.world 36 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago)

That's not really the point here. If you haven't noticed, recently a lot of people on Lemmy have been suggesting that the reports of rape on Oct 7th were made up or propaganda.

The UN saying that it likely happened is important to counter that propaganda.

Similar to if reports of shooting civilians by IDF were being denied but then validated by 3rd party investigators, rational people should rightfully want to see that spread to counter misleading propaganda.

[–] xePBMg9@lemmynsfw.com 1 points 8 months ago (1 children)

So the conclusion is that there are rape happening on both sides in a war. That is somewhat unsurprising considering they hate each other and are distinctly different groups of people. Why is it being tolerated by the organisations involved? Probably they are not prioritizing the issue. Why would they deny that it is happening? Probably for PR reasons. They prefer dealing with it internally, at a later date, when it is convenient.

[–] Shou@lemmy.world 1 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Isn't rape one of the normal aspects of war anyway? Or am I missing something here.

[–] bigMouthCommie@kolektiva.social -1 points 8 months ago

lets not pretend anything about war is normal, please.

[+] Jamil@lemm.ee -19 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago) (4 children)

Read the article and there's zero evidence as before. "Credible circumstantial information", what does that even mean?

Just more Western media doing what they do best, lie on behalf of Israel.

[–] throwwyacc@lemmynsfw.com 24 points 8 months ago

Ah yes the UN famous Western media outlet

[–] Arete@lemmy.world 11 points 8 months ago

DNA evidence, fingerprints, blood, etc are all "credible circumstantial information". It's a common category of evidence, encompassing pretty much everything except direct testimony.

[–] blahsay@lemmy.world 4 points 8 months ago

There's literally video and images thanks to hamas body cams. It's rough going and I doubt you'd watch it.

[–] kick_out_the_jams@kbin.social 1 points 8 months ago

At the Nova music festival and its surroundings, there are reasonable grounds to believe
that multiple incidents of sexual violence took place with victims being subjected to rape and/or
gang rape and then killed or killed while being raped. Credible sources described finding 5
murdered individuals, mostly women, whose bodies were naked from their waist down – and
some totally naked – tied with their hands behind their backs, many of whom were shot in the
head. On Road 232, credible information based on witness accounts describe an incident of the
rape of two women by armed elements. Other reported instances of rape could not be verified in
the time allotted. The mission team also found a pattern of bound naked or partially naked bodies
from the waist down, in some cases tied to structures including trees and poles, along Road 232.
In kibbutz Re’im, the mission team further verified an incident of the rape of a woman outside of
a bomb shelter and heard of other allegations of rape that could not yet be verified.

If you want to read more try the actual report