Comment by klipt

Why did Israel refuse cooperation if there was any evidence for sexual violence?

"The UN's special representative on conflict-related sexual violence asked to investigate Hamas' alleged crimes on October 7 and towards the hostages, but Israel refused her request to access Israeli detention facilities to examine claims of IDF abuse. Israeli women's rights groups warn this could lead to Israel, instead of Hamas, being added to the UN's sexual violence blacklist" [1]

The UN envoy also stated in its report they did not and could not collect any forensic evidence due to the lack of Israel's cooperation. "In the more than 5,000 photos and around fifty hours of footage from the attacks that the mission team reviewed, “no digital evidence specifically depicting acts of sexual violence was found.” Further, “no tangible indications of rape could be identified” in digital analyses of corpses by the mission team." [2]

There is however forensic evidence and video footage of israelis raping[3] Palestinians: "After the Haaretz report of dozens of deaths, there was no new comment. Later that same week in June, the New York Times published an investigation into the conditions at Sde Teiman, which contained testimony from former prisoners that their Israeli jailors had tortured them with anal rape by a metal rod, among other abuses."

[1] https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/2025-01-08/ty-article/.p...

[2] https://progressive.org/op-eds/what-did-the-un-report-on-sex...

[3] https://theintercept.com/2024/08/09/israel-prison-sde-teiman...