By Robert Inlakesh

Newly acquired testimonies reveal harrowing evidence of rape and sexual violence committed by Israel against Palestinian detainees from the Gaza Strip.

The Palestinian Center for Human Rights (PCHR) recently released harrowing evidence of rape and sexual violence committed against Palestinian detainees from the Gaza Strip. If such a press release about Israelis suffering the same abuses was published by a rights group, it would be headline news around the world. Instead, it has been completely ignored.

In a story that the corporate media in the West dares not touch, due to their blatant and racist double standards demonstrating their lack of value for Palestinian life, new testimonies recorded by PCHR workers reveal horrifying, detailed accounts of rape. Those interviewed were Palestinians from Gaza, who were kidnapped without justification and held hostage under military detention.

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The testimonies revealed a range of rape and sexual torture, including gang-rape, rape using dogs, in addition to rape with bottles and sticks. A 42-year-old Palestinian woman, who is also a mother, testified to being brutally raped by Israeli forces four times. Below is that testimony that Western media have not dared to report:

“At dawn I heard the soldiers shouting, saying that morning prayers were forbidden, and I think it was the fourth day after my arrest from Gaza. The soldiers moved me to a place I didn’t know because my eyes were blindfolded, and they ordered me to take off my clothes. I did so. They put me on a metal table, pressed my chest and head against it, cuffed my hands to the end of the bed, and pulled my legs apart forcefully. I felt a penis penetrating my anus and a man raping me. I started screaming, and they beat me on my back and head while I was blindfolded. I felt the man who was raping me ejaculate inside my anus. I kept screaming and being beaten, and I could hear a camera – so I believe they were filming me. The rape lasted about 10 minutes. After that, they left me for an hour in the same position, with my hands cuffed to the bed with metal handcuffs, my face on the bed, my feet on the floor, and I was completely naked.

“Again, after an hour, I was raped fully in the same position, with penetration into my vagina, and I was beaten while I screamed. There were several soldiers; I heard them laughing and the camera clicking as it took pictures. This rape was very quick and there was no ejaculation. During the rape, they beat me with their hands, on my head and back.

“I cannot describe what I felt; I wished for death every moment. After they raped me, I was left alone in the same room, hands still cuffed to the bed and without clothes for many hours. I could hear the soldiers outside speaking Hebrew and laughing. Later, I was raped again, vaginally. I screamed, but they beat me whenever I tried to resist. After more than an hour, I’m not sure about the time, a masked soldier entered, removed my blindfold, lifted his face covering; he had white skin and was tall. He asked if I spoke English; I said no. He said he was Russian and ordered me to masturbate his penis. I refused, and he hit me in the face after raping me.

“That day, I was raped twice. I was left naked the whole day in the room, where I spent three days. On the first day I was raped twice; on the second day I was raped twice; on the third day I remained without clothes, while they looked at me through the door slit and filmed me. One soldier said they would post my photos on social media. While I was in the room, my period started; then they told me to put on clothes and transferred me to another room.”

This series of newly recorded testimonies comes amidst Israel’s investigation into the leaking of a video from the infamous Sde Teiman torture facility, which has been compared to Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo Bay. The Israeli military’s top lawyer, Major-General Yifat Tomer-Yerushalmi, resigned from her position and confessed to leaking the footage of a brutal gang rape incident.

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Notably, Tomer-Yerushalmi was jailed and had even allegedly attempted suicide over the probe into her actions. The incident triggered an international outcry, as thousands of Israelis protested in favor of ten reservist soldiers who were accused of involvement in the gang rape, dubbed Israel’s “right to rape” protests.

These demonstrators and rioters, who even broke into a military base, were backed by members of the Israeli Knesset. Israel’s Security Minister, Itamar Ben-Gvir, had labeled the accused gang of rapists as “heroes”, while one of the released soldiers openly bragged about his actions on public television.

From the original 10 soldiers who were detained, only half of them are being charged, but not with rape. Meanwhile, the Israeli legal system appears more invested in punishing the army’s own top lawyer for leaking the video of what occurred.

Many of the recorded incidents of rape occurred at the infamous Sde Teiman detention facility, as survivors have detailed the horrors that they were subjected to there.

However, sexual violence and rape have been recorded inside Gaza, in addition to there being similar incidents inside Israel’s actual prison system. There are still approximately 11,000 Palestinians who are held hostage in these facilities, many of whom are likely suffering similar abuses.

Despite the copious documented evidence of the most brutal forms of rape and sexual violence, by a number of human rights organizations, the UN, and lawyers, the issue has never been taken seriously in the Western corporate media.

(The Palestine Chronicle)