Ms. Soussana, 40, is the first Israeli to speak publicly about being sexually assaulted during captivity after the Hamas-led raid on southern Israel. In her interviews with The Times, conducted mostly in English, she provided extensive details of sexual and other violence she suffered during a 55-day ordeal.
Ms. Soussana’s personal account of her experience in captivity is consistent with what she told two doctors and a social worker less than 24 hours after she was freed on Nov. 30. Their reports about her account state the nature of the sexual act; The Times agreed not to disclose the specifics.
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For months, Hamas and its supporters have denied that its members sexually abused people in captivity or during the Oct. 7 terrorist attack. This month, a United Nations report said that there was “clear and convincing information” that some hostages had suffered sexual violence and there were “reasonable grounds” to believe sexual violence occurred during the raid, while acknowledging the “challenges and limitations” of examining the issue.
That’s bullshit. There are many news articles literally every single day about the civilians killed in Gaza. Meanwhile, on Lemmy, you have people still denying that Hamas sexually tortured women captured on October 7. Sorry it doesn’t fit your narrative.
In my opinion, there is a huge difference between civilian collateral damage during a military operation and the use of rape as a weapon of war. We xan argue about how much force Israel is using and whether X amount of collateral damage is acceptable. But gratuitously raping people has no legitimate purpose, military or otherwise. It serves to sow terror and incite retaliation, which is why Hamas did it.