Israel to sue The New York Times over report on alleged sexual abuse of Palestinian prisoners

Netanyahu and Foreign Minister Gideon Saar ordered to “initiate a defamation lawsuit against The New York Times“, according to a joint statement issued by their offices.

The text states that the lawsuit is filed “following the publication by Nicholas Kristof of one of the most horrible and distorted lies ever published against the state of Israel in the modern press, which was also supported by the newspaper.”

The investigation, published on Monday as an opinion article by columnist Kristof, is based on testimonies collected in the Israeli-occupied West Bank from 14 men and women who claimed to have suffered sexual assaults by Israeli settlers or members of the security forces.

The report describes “a pattern of widespread Israeli sexual violence against men, women and even children, by soldiers, settlers, interrogators from the Shin Bet internal security agency and, above all, prison guards.”

The long article in the American newspaper states that “there is no evidence that Israeli leaders order rapes.” However, Kristof adds, “in recent years they have built a security apparatus where sexual violence has become, as a United Nations report indicated last year, one of Israel’s ‘standard operating procedures’ and ‘a major element in the mistreatment of Palestinians.'”

The journalist also recalls that “a report published last month by the Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor, a Geneva-based advocacy group often critical of Israel, concludes that Israel employs ‘systematic sexual violence‘which is ‘widely practiced as part of organized state policy.'”

Among the testimonies collected for the article, some victims reported blows to the genitals, shots aimed at that area and the use of portable metal detectors to humiliate the detainees. According to former prisoners, the Israeli authorities had also ordered them to remain silent about these events.

Kristof admits that it is impossible to determine the exact magnitude of the abuse, although he maintains that the stories coincide in describing systematic practices. It also highlights that social and cultural factors make reporting difficult, since victims fear stigma within their communities.

The Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs categorically rejected the report, ensuring that it is based on “unverified sources linked to networks close to Hamas” and is part of an “anti-Israel, false and carefully orchestrated” campaign.

He also accused the newspaper of trying to undermine an independent Israeli report on sexual violence committed by the ultra-Islamic group Hamas during the October 7, 2023 terrorist attack.

Along the same lines, the government described the accusations as an “inversion of reality” and of reproducing one of the worst forms of defamation historical.

The context of the investigation is the increase in violence in the West Bank since the start of the war in Gaza, triggered after the Hamas attack in 2023, since when thousands of Palestinians have been detained by Israeli forces.

Israel published this Tuesday a report on acts of sexual violence during and after the massacre of October 7, 2023compiled based on thousands of photos and videos of the attack, detailing the rape, humiliation, torture and abuse systematically committed by Hamas militants, as well as by Palestinian civilians who infiltrated from Gaza that day.