UN finds ‘convincing information’ that Hamas
raped and tortured Israeli hostages
Pramila Patten’s findings are based on interviews with
released hostages, whose testimony suggests abuses are continuing in Gaza
Julian
Borger in Washington
Mon 4 Mar
2024 23.29 GMT
The UN’s
special envoy on sexual violence in conflict has reported “clear and convincing
information” that some women and children hostages held by Hamas had been
subjected to rape and sexualised torture and that there were “reasonable
grounds” to believe such abuses were “ongoing”.
The special
envoy, Pramila Patten, also reported on Monday that there were “reasonable
grounds” to believe sexual assaults including rape and gang-rape in several
places took place during the 7 October attacks by Hamas.
Patten led
a nine-strong team of experts to Israel and the West Bank in the first half of
February, but cautioned that there were limitations on what it could achieve in
a limited time given a number of constraints.
Primary
among those limitations was that the team did not manage to meet any survivors
of sexual violence during the 7 October attacks, “despite concerted efforts
encouraging them to come forward”.
Patten said
some were still undergoing trauma therapy, some had been relocated inside
Israel or moved abroad, and some first responder witnesses had been deployed in
the army.
She added:
“The lack of trust by survivors of the 7 October attacks and families of
hostages in national institutions and international organisations, such as the
United Nations, as well as the national and international media scrutiny of
those who made their accounts public, hindered access to survivors of the
attacks, including potential survivors/victims of sexual violence.”
However,
the UN team was able to talk to multiple witnesses, review a large quantity of
video footage and pictures, and interview released hostages.
“Based on
the first-hand accounts of released hostages, the mission team received clear
and convincing information that sexual violence, including rape, sexualized
torture, and cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment occurred against some women
and children during their time in captivity and has reasonable grounds to
believe that this violence may be ongoing,” the report said.
It added
there were reasonable grounds “to believe that female hostages were also
subjected to other forms of sexual violence”.
As part of
a proposed new ceasefire agreement being negotiated in Cairo, 40 vulnerable
hostages, including elderly people, the sick and women, are due to be released
in an initial phase of a six-week truce. But progress in Cairo has been
stalled, at least in part because Hamas has yet to provide a list of the 40
hostages.
In Patten’s
team’s assessment of abuse on the day of the Hamas raids into southern Israel,
the report found “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.”
The Patten
team also visited the West Bank to talk to Palestinian authorities, human
rights groups and some released detainees about allegations of sexual assault
of Palestinians in Israeli detention camps.
The
allegations were first raised last month by a panel of UN experts who said
there “credible allegations” of sexual abuse.
Patten’s
report said there were no cases of alleged rape, but there were allegations of
many other forms of assault, including “invasive body searches of detainees
which include unwanted touching of intimate areas and forced unveiling of women
wearing hijab; beatings, including in the genital areas; threats of rape
against women and threats of rape against female family members (wives,
sisters, daughters) in the case of men.”
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