Israeli association publishes report on sexual violence committed during October 7 attacks

Israel accuses Hamas of having followed a method in the use of rape during the October 7 attack. A conclusion which is based on the report of an association specializing in support for raped women.

For 30 years, the Association of Rape Crisis Centers in Israel (ARCCI) has been supporting victims in the country. After the Hamas attacks of October 7, she was one of those who quickly collected testimonies. In its report, it analyzes the elements it has in its possession, and those collected elsewhere, to draw initial conclusions.

What emerges, according to the director of the organization, is a modus operandi that is repeated at all crime scenes, whether at the festival, the kibbutz or the barracks. The association notes similarities in the way women are attacked, with identical and premeditated attacks and sexual mutilations. According to this report, sexual violence would therefore be an integral part of the abuses of October 7, which the Palestinian movement has always denied.

No precise figure

For Orit Sulitzeanu, there is a sadistic intention behind this criminal scheme. “Attacking women’s bodies, pulling on their genitals, pulling on their faces until they can no longer be recognized, raping them in groups and cutting out their organs”lists the director of the Association of Rape Crisis Centers in Israel.

“Doing this is like destroying the symbol of women, to destroy the entire nation. It is a means to terrorize the nation, and they have succeeded in deeply terrorizing the entire country.”

Orit Sulitzeanu, director of the Association of Rape Crisis Centers in Israel

at franceinfo

However, this report does not make it possible to assess the number of victims of these sexual crimes during the October 7 attacks. The lack of direct and public accounts from survivors and the absence of forensic expertise has not yet made it possible to draw a clear picture of the abuses and their scale. If the report was sent to the UN representative for sexual violence, the Israeli police opened an official investigation and a parliamentary commission dedicated to these sexual crimes was created.