A newly released report led by Israeli legal and gender experts presents detailed evidence alleging “widespread and systematic” sexual violence during the Hamas-led terror attack on 7 October.

Warning: This story contains descriptions of rape and sexual violence

The findings, published by the Dinah Project, argue that these acts amount to conflict-related sexual violence (CRSV), and assert that “Hamas used sexual violence as a tactical weapon of war”.

The report draws on 18 months of investigation and is based on survivor testimonies, eyewitness accounts, and interviews with first responders, morgue personnel and healthcare professionals.

According to the Dinah Project, the documented patterns – such as forced nudity, gang rapes, genital mutilation, and threats of forced marriage – indicate a deliberate and coordinated use of sexual violence by Hamas operatives during the attack.

Reported incidents span at least six locations, including the Nova music festival, and several kibbutzim in southern Israel.

One section of the report describes victims “found fully or partially naked from the waist down, with their hands tied behind their backs and/or to structures such as trees and poles, and shot”.

At the Nova music festival and surrounding areas, the investigators found “reasonable grounds to believe” that multiple women were raped or gang-raped before being killed.

The report’s findings are consistent with earlier investigations by the United Nations and the International Criminal Court (ICC).

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The UN’s Special Representative on Sexual Violence in Conflict previously concluded that there were “reasonable grounds to believe” CRSV took place during the attack.

Significantly, the Dinah Project urges the international community to officially recognise the use of sexual violence by Hamas as a deliberate strategy of war and calls on the United Nations to add Hamas to its list of parties responsible for conflict-related sexual violence.

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The nature and scale of sexual violence on 7 October have been a subject of intense controversy, with some accusing parties of weaponising the narrative for political ends.

This report seeks to confront what its authors call “denial, misinformation, and global silence,” and to provide justice for the victims.

Hamas has denied that its fighters have used sexual violence and mistreated female hostages.

A UN expert has said some young soldiers in the Israeli Defence Forces are being left “psychologically broken” after “confront[ing] the reality among the rubble” when serving in Gaza.

Francesca Albanese, the UN Human Rights Council’s special rapporteur on the occupied Palestinian territories, was responding to a Sky News interview with an Israeli solider who described arbitrary killing of civilians in Gaza.

She told The World with Yalda Hakim that “many” of the young people fighting in Gaza are “haunted by what they have seen, what they have done”.

“It doesn’t make sense,” Ms Albanese said. “This is not a war, this is an assault against civilians and this is producing a fracture in many of them.

“As that soldier’s testimony reveals, especially the youngest among the soldiers have been convinced this is a form of patriotism, of defending Israel and Israeli society against this opaque but very hard felt enemy, which is Hamas.

“But the thing is that they’ve come to confront the reality among the rubble of Gaza.”

Being in Gaza is “probably this is the first time the Israeli soldiers are awakening to this,” she added. “And they don’t make sense of this because their attachment to being part of the IDF, which is embedded in their national ideology, is too strong.

“This is why they are psychologically broken.”

Jonathan Conricus, a former IDF spokesman who is now a senior fellow at the Foundation for Defence of Democracies, said he believes the Sky News interview with the former IDF solider “reflects one part of how ugly, difficult and horrible fighting in a densely populated, urban terrain is”.

“I think [the ex-soldier] is reflecting on how difficult it is to fight in such an area and what the challenges are on the battlefield,” he said.

‘An economy of genocide’

Ms Albanese, one of dozens of independent UN-mandated experts, also said her most recent report for the human rights council has identified “an economy of genocide” in Israel.

The system, she told Hakim, is made up of more than 60 private sector companies “that have become enmeshed in the economy of occupation […] that have Israel displace the Palestinians and replace them with settlers, settlements and infrastructure Israel runs.”

Israel has rejected allegations of genocide in Gaza, citing its right to defend itself after Hamas’s attack on 7 October 2023.

The companies named in Ms Albanese’s report are in, but not limited to, the financial sector, big tech and the military industry.

“These companies can be held responsible for being directed linked to, or contributing, or causing human rights impacts,” she said. “We’re not talking of human rights violations, we are talking of crimes.”

“Some of the companies have engaged in good faith, others have not,” Ms Albanese said.

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The companies she has named include American technology giant Palantir, which has issued a statement to Sky News.

It said it is “not true” that Palantir “is the (or a) developer of the ‘Gospel’ – the AI-assisted targeting software allegedly used by the IDF in Gaza, and that we are involved with the ‘Lavender’ database used by the IDF for targeting cross-referencing”.

“Both capabilities are independent of and pre-ate Palantir’s announced partnership with the Israeli Defence Ministry,” the statement added.

Israel’s prime minister has nominated Donald Trump for the Nobel Peace Prize.

Benjamin Netanyahu made the announcement at a White House dinner, and the US president appeared pleased by the gesture.

“He’s forging peace as we speak, and one country and one region after the other,” Mr Netanyahu said as he presented the US leader with a nominating letter.

Mr Trump took credit for brokering a ceasefire in Iran and Israel’s “12-day war” last month, announcing it on Truth Social, and the truce appears to be holding.

The president also claimed US strikes had obliterated Iran’s purported nuclear weapons programme and that it now wants to restart talks.

“We have scheduled Iran talks, and they want to,” Mr Trump told reporters. “They want to talk.”

Iran hasn’t confirmed the move, but its president told American broadcaster Tucker Carlson his country would be willing to resume cooperation with the UN nuclear watchdog.

But Masoud Pezeshkian said full access to nuclear sites wasn’t yet possible as US strikes had damaged them “severely”.

Away from Iran, fighting continues in Gaza and Ukraine.

Mr Trump famously boasted before his second stint in the White House that he could end the Ukraine war in 24 hours.

The reality has been very different; with Russia last week launching what Ukraine said was the heaviest aerial attack of the war so far.

Critics also claiming President Putin is ‘playing’ his US counterpart and has no intention of stopping the fighting.

However, President Trump could try to take credit for progress in Gaza if – as he’s suggested – an agreement on a 60-day ceasefire is able to get across the line this week.

Indirect negotiations with Hamas are taking place that could lead to the release of some of the remaining 50 Israeli hostages and see a surge in aid to Gaza.

America’s Middle East envoy, Steve Witkoff, is to travel to Qatar this week to try to seal the agreement.

Whether it could open a path to a complete end to the war remains uncertain, with the two sides criteria for peace still far apart.

President Netanyahu has said Hamas must surrender, disarm and leave Gaza – something it refuses to do.

Mr Netanyahu also told reporters on Monday that the US and Israel were working with other countries who would give Palestinians “a better future” – and indicated those in Gaza could move elsewhere.

“If people want to stay, they can stay, but if they want to leave, they should be able to leave,” he added.