This article contains graphic and distressing depictions of rape, sexual violence, and abuse.
A devastating new report on Israel from UN Independent International Commission of Inquiry on the Occupied Palestinian Territory demonstrates widespread Israeli sexual, reproductive, and gender-based violence. The report features the results of investigations since 7 October 2023, and compiles verified digital material, as well as victim and witness testimonies.
Navi Pillay, Chair of the Commission, said:
There is no escape from the conclusion that Israel has employed sexual and gender-based violence against Palestinians to terrorise them and perpetuate a system of oppression that undermines their right to self-determination.
The report did not receive any response from Israeli authorities after requesting information. And, they found that of the deplorable gender-based violence they uncovered, there exists a culture of impunity amongst Israeli forces and settlers as inaction from authorities:
send[s] a clear message to members of the Israeli Security Forces that they can continue committing such acts without fear of accountability.
UN report on Israel: collective punishment
The commission collected testimony from an obstetrician in Gaza who explained:
This is a war against women. Thousands of women have been killed and hundreds of thousands are living in extremely precarious conditions.
The commission also examined how men have been treated by the Israeli Security Forces (ISF), and more precisely, how they have been targeted:
The ISF claimed in October 2024 that it had killed about 17,000 Hamas operatives and members of other armed groups.
However:
Given that the number of adult male fatalities since 7 October 2023 has been around 16,735, this would mean that the ISF considers all adult male Palestinians in Gaza to be members of armed groups and so legitimate targets.
This analysis from the commission reveals what many have already suspected. Namely, that the ISF have been treating everybody as indiscriminate targets. And, as the commission found, this extended to:
intentionally destroying and causing suffering to the civilian population has been an increased impact on women and children. Entire families in Gaza have been killed together in their homes in unprecedented numbers.
Even by the ISF’s own demented logic, it’s simply not possible that every single person is a member of Hamas. Thus, the commission concludes that:
specific gendered harms have been suffered as a result of starvation as a method of warfare, forcible transfer, extermination and collective punishment.
They explicitly state:
Statements documented by the Commission asserted that everyone in Gaza should be considered responsible for the attack on 7 October 2023. Palestinians in Gaza are considered complicit, despite age, gender or civilian status, and should be exterminated.
This is the very definition of collective punishment, and goes some way to formally establishing the intention to destroy Palestinian life without discernment between militants or civilians. Again, this is something that has informally been evidenced on social media, but the evidenced documentation in this report lays out a stark assessment of Israeli tactics.
Destruction of medical infrastructure
The report goes into great detail about the impact deliberate Israeli destruction of medical infrastructure has on gendered violence:
The ISF’s destruction of healthcare infrastructure and facilities, including those providing necessary maternal, sexual and reproductive health services, violates the special protections under international humanitarian law provided to medical units and personnel.
They further detail how women and girls seeking out medical treatment by walking to hospitals were shot and killed by the ISF. The commission quote Eliyahu Yosian a commentator from the Misgav Institute for National Security speaking on a right-wing television show:
The woman is an enemy, the baby is an enemy, and the pregnant woman is an enemy.
As of April 2024, only two partially functioning hospitals out of a previous twelve were able to provide sexual and reproductive healthcare. The Al-Basma IVF Centre was bombed by Israelis in 2023:
destroying around 4,000 embryos, as well as 1,000 sperm samples and unfertilized eggs.
This was in spite of the fact that the commission didn’t find any information indicating that the building was used for any military purposes. Therefore, the commission found that:
the destruction of the Basma IVF clinic was a measure intended to prevent births among Palestinians in Gaza, which is a genocidal act under the Rome Statute and Genocide Convention.
Similarly to the IVF centre bombing,
The report also describes how:
the ISF controlled the entry, the content and the amounts of humanitarian assistance allowed into Gaza and that the ISF deliberately stopped humanitarian assistance which included items essential for pregnant women, new mothers and newborns from reaching Gaza, both through direct attacks and through the imposition of a total siege.
Their investigations paint a catastrophic picture for reproductive health in Gaza. The near-total destruction of medical facilities along with the purposeful throttling of aid has meant that the orchestrated lack of basic equipment for childbirth, menstruation products, and painkillers are resulting in avoidable illnesses and deaths. There has been a 300% increase in miscarriages since 7 October 2023. Many pregnant people are starving, and unable to breastfeed. Very limited access to water and menstruation products means that infections have been able to take hold and cause “miscarriage, loss of fertility, and in worse case, death.”
Sexual violence
A significant section of the UN report on Israel focuses on sexual violence against women, men, girls, and boys. The commission writes:
Women’s bodies and sexuality are often perceived as linked with the dignity of the nation and other negative gender stereotyping, such as the collective’s honour and emasculation. Several experts have noted that allegations of sexual violence against Israeli women on 7 October 2023 have resulted in attempts to rebuild Israeli national masculinity through aggression and in retaliation for the attacks carried out by the military wing of Hamas and other Palestinian armed groups.
The commission paints a picture of depraved and persistent sexual violence against Palestinian men and women, both at checkpoints and in detention. And, they also note that whilst “sexual and gender-based violence is by no means a new element of the Israeli occupation” they documented a noted increase of aggression and violence since 7 October 2023. They note the existence of many videos and photos recorded and posted by Israeli soldiers of them:
searching homes in the Gaza Strip, deliberately humiliating and mocking Palestinian women based on their gender and ethnicity…The Commission notes that the videos and photos show a clear gender and racial bias by the perpetrators, who intentionally target Palestinian women and attempt to humiliate and degrade them publicly.
Both female and male detainees are often ordered to strip naked by Israeli soldiers, whilst:
hundreds of Palestinian men and boys have been photographed and filmed in humiliating and degrading circumstances while subjected to acts of a sexual nature, including forced public nudity and stripping, full or partial.
The commission details many instances where groups of men and boys were rounded up, ordered to strip naked, and then marched to a checkpoint or held naked in public. In one particular instance:
They were told to hold their identity documents high in the air and continue walking while undressed. The ISF said that anyone who did not follow orders would be shot. The men were completely naked while walking and the women were in their underwear.
Women were regularly forced to remove their veils, and the commission noted the culturally specific psychological torture this amounted to. Palestinian men were often forced to strip in front of Palestinian woman, and vice versa, in depraved humiliation rituals. They detail one instance where a 14 year old girl was forcibly strip searched and groped by two soldiers.
Rape as a weapon of war
The report also finds that:
Acts of sexual violence documented by the Commission appear to have been motivated by extreme hatred towards the Palestinian people and a desire to dehumanize and punish them. Sexual and reproductive violence in detention has also been reported by the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, B’Tselem, Addameer, Amnesty and Healthcare Workers Watch.
The commission documents the detail they uncovered:
The Commission documented cases of rape and sexual assault of male detainees, including the use of an electrical probe to cause burns to the anus, and the insertion of objects, such as fingers, sticks, broomsticks and vegetables, into the anus and rectum.
One victim told the commission:
They took me into an interrogation room and suspended me by my arms behind my back. My toes barely touched the floor. A male guard inserted a metal stick in my penis on several occasions, about twenty times in total. I started bleeding. The pain was excruciating but the humiliation was worse.
In at least two cases, the investigators found that victims “needed medical treatment and/or surgery due to the injuries caused by rape.”
They further detail well-known rape at Sde Teiman prison:
In one case, a detained Palestinian man was raped after he was transferred from Ofer prison to Sde Teiman detention facility. According to an indictment submitted to an Israeli military court, the man was physically abused by five soldiers, reservists in Unit 100, during a search at Sde Teiman prison.
The man was so violently raped that:
The assault resulted in the fracture of several of the victim’s ribs and a punctured lung. The victim was also stabbed in the rectum with a sharp object. The victim’s rectum was raptured due to the assault, and he required surgery to the rectum. Following the assault, the victim was required to use a stoma bag due to the gravity of the injuries. A video filming the assailants were taken by a soldier.
With many of the rape cases the commission describes, they were able to geo-locate the locations via Israeli soldiers recording and posting the sexual assaults.
UN report on Israel: a culture of impunity
The report concludes that:
The Commission finds that there is a clear culture of impunity within the ISF and soldiers believe that they will never be held accountable for the crimes they have committed. This results in an implicit or tacit encouragement by the top civilian and military leadership to the soldiers who commit these crimes.
They explain how in July 2024 when ten Israeli soldiers were arrested for raping a Palestinian detainee at the Sde Teiman facility:
Knesset members from the coalition, right-wing activists and soldiers participated in demonstrations to protest the soldiers’ arrest, showing them support and legitimizing their actions. They attacked the Sde Teiman camp, including soldiers of the military police tasked with investigating the rape case, and occupied part of it.
This goes beyond a culture of impunity and is instead a culture of active facilitation and celebration of Israeli soldiers and settlers raping Palestinian men. The commission itself finds that the Israeli justice system:
cannot ensure fair trial guarantees as it is inherently discriminatory in its application of the law; domestic legislation continues to be used to persecute Palestinians and exculpate perpetrators who violate the rights of Palestinians. The Israeli justice system should not be relied upon to deal with accountability for Israeli civilian and military personnel in relation to Palestinians.
The report is a meticulous evidencing of reproductive violence, sexual harassment and violence, rape, and sexual humiliation rituals.
Women and girls in Palestine have been, and are continuing to suffer disproportionately with “outrages upon personal dignity.”
Palestinian men and boys are sexually harassed, raped, and tortured by the ISF. Repeatedly, the commission concludes that these acts meet the legal threshold for crimes against humanity based on gender, inhuman and degrading treatment, and severe deprivation of fundamental rights.
Featured image via the Canary
