Netanyahu says human rights groups are turning a blind eye to alleged rapes by Hamas
Benjamin Netanyahu has accused human rights groups of turning a blind eye to rapes that Israel says were committed by Hamas during the 7 October massacre.
Speaking at a news conference on Tuesday, the Israeli prime minister accused the international community of playing down the attacks and even ignoring them.
He said he expects “all civilised leaders, governments, nations to speak up against this atrocity”.
“I say to the women’s rights organisations, to the human rights organisations, you’ve heard of the rape of Israeli women, horrible atrocities, sexual mutilation – where the hell are you?” Netanyahu told a news conference on Tuesday, speaking in English to emphasise his point.
US President Joe Biden called the reports of sexual violence “appalling” and urged the world to condemn “horrific accounts of unimaginable cruelty”.
Speaking at a campaign fundraiser in Boston, he called on the world to condemn the acts by Hamas “without equivocation” and “without exception”.
He also stressed that “Hamas’s refusal to release the remaining young women” is what ended a temporary truce and hostage agreement that the US helped broker.
Israel’s justice ministry says “victims were tortured, physically abused, raped, burned alive, and dismembered” however Hamas has rejected all allegations that its gunmen committed sexual assault.
‘Widespread’ sexual violence
A human rights group has reported that rape and sexual violence were “widespread” during Hamas’ 7 October attack on Israel.
A group named Physicians for Human Rights in Israel, which has a long record of advocating for Palestinian civilians in Gaza, published an initial assessment in November.
“What we know for sure is that it was more than just one case and it was widespread, in that this happened in more than one location and more than a handful of times,” Hadas Ziv, policy and ethics director for the organisation, said on Tuesday.
“It is becoming more apparent that the violence perpetrated against women, men and children also included widespread sexual and gender-based crimes.
“What we don’t know and what the police are investigating is whether it was ordered to be done and whether it was systematic.”
While investigators are still trying to determine the scope of the sexual assaults, many witnesses of the atrocities have spoken out, with some giving harrowing details of terrorists raping, mutilating and murdering women.
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A man hiding in a pit during the assault on a music festival said he heard someone nearby screaming she was being raped.
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An army reservist who was tasked with identifying those killed said some of the women were found wearing only bloodied underwear.
Others said they found women semi-naked, bound, eviscerated, stripped, bruised, shot in the head or torched.
Hamas and other Gaza militant groups killed about 1,200 people, most of them civilians, and took more than 240 hostages that day.
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Two months after the attack on farming communities and army posts in southern Israel, police are still trying to put together the pieces.
In the immediate aftermath, priority was given to identifying bodies, not to preserving evidence.
Police say they’re combing through 60,000 videos seized from the body cameras of Hamas attackers, from social media and from security cameras as well as 1,000 testimonies to bring the perpetrators to justice.
It has been difficult finding rape survivors, with many victims killed by their attackers.
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This was Emilia’s first day back at school following her release.
Last month, Israel’s police chief presented to the international news media videotaped testimony of a rape witness at the music festival.
Her face blurred, she said she watched militants gang-rape a woman as she lay on the ground.
The woman in the video described watching the militants as she pretended to be dead.
“I couldn’t understand what I saw,” she said.
‘Absolutely concerned’ about sexual violence against hostages
At the Shura military base where victims are being identified, Shari Mendes, a member of the army reserve unit that deals with the identification and religious burial preparation of female soldiers, said some of the women’s bodies came in with little clothing.
“Often women came in in just their underwear,” she said.
“Sometimes we had people who – we just had a torso, okay – or they were very decomposed or they were mutilated.
“I saw very bloody genitals on women.”
Based on open-source information and interviews, the Physicians for Human Rights in Israel report documents incidents at the music festival, homes around the Gaza Strip and an Israeli military base, all attacked by Hamas.
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Kibbutz survivor returns home for first time since October 7 attack
On Tuesday, Mr Netanyahu and members of his war cabinet held a meeting with recently released hostages and family members of hostages still held in Gaza.
Some of those former hostages shared testimonies of sexual abuse during their time in Gaza, participants said.
Separately, a doctor who treated some of the 110 released hostages said that at least 10 men and women among those freed were sexually assaulted or abused, but did not provide further details.
According to the Israeli military, 138 hostages, including 15 women, are still held by Hamas and other militant groups in Gaza.
Lt. Col. Richard Hecht, a military spokesman, said the army is “absolutely” concerned about sexual violence against female hostages.
Echoing these concerns earlier this week, US State Department spokesman Matthew Miller said: “It seems that one of the reasons they (Hamas) don’t want to turn women over that they’ve been holding hostage – and the reason this pause fell apart – is that they don’t want these women to be able to talk about what happened to them during their time in custody.”
World
Christmas market suspect may have been ‘dissatisfied with treatment of Saudi refugees in Germany’: Here’s what we know
The suspect in the attack on the Christmas market in Magdeburg appeared to be dissatisfied with the treatment of Saudi refugees in Germany, a prosecutor has said.
On Friday evening, a car was driven at speed into visiting crowds in the central German city.
Five people have died so far – including a nine-year-old child and four adults – with at least 200 more injured, according to authorities. Of those injured, 41 are said to be seriously hurt.
The suspect – who was arrested at the scene – was a 50-year-old Saudi citizen who worked as a doctor and arrived in Germany in 2006, premier of Saxony-Anhalt state Reiner Haseloff said.
He has been named as Taleb A in German media.
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Magdeburg attack: A timeline of what happened
Police director Tom-Oliver Langhans told a news conference on Saturday the attack had left the city “very alarmed”.
He added that officers arrested the suspect three minutes after the first emergency calls were made from the market.
Prosecutor Horst Walter Nopens said the motive behind the attack appeared to be “dissatisfaction with the treatment of refugees from Saudi Arabia and how they are being treated in Germany”.
German interior minister Nancy Faeser has said the suspect was Islamophobic.
The suspect has described himself as an “ex-Muslim” who sought asylum after receiving death threats for denouncing his faith.
His social media pages, which he posted on in the hours leading up to the attack, promote anti-Islam views – and claim Germany is allowing the “Islamisation of Europe”.
Map
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What we know about the attack so far
Video shows suspect being arrested
The suspect, who says he works as a psychiatrist at a government hospital, has appeared in various media reports about his efforts to help other former Muslims flee Saudi Arabia and other Gulf nations.
Tamara Zieschang, the state’s interior minister, told reporters the suspect had been practising medicine in Bernburg, around 25 miles south of Magdeburg.
He has a website that he told the BBC in 2019 has helped “hundreds of people” seek asylum overseas.
The homepage reads: “My advice: do not seek asylum in Germany.”
In videos with voiceovers in English, he claims he is being pursued by German police, who “sent someone carrying a knife to steal a USB stick from my mailbox”.
Special police forces at the incident.
Pic: AP
Tweets supporting Elon Musk and Tommy Robinson
Another tweet criticises a commentator for saying X owner Elon Musk and far-right activist Tommy Robinson should be arrested.
He claims they “cited Germany as a shining example of media censorship”, and adds: “My experience in Germany leaves no doubt – they actually censor victims.”
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German terrorist expert Professor Peter Neumann described the suspect’s profile as unusual.
He says he “loves the AfD [Alternative for Germany] and wants to punish Germany for tolerance towards Islamists”, the director of King’s College London’s International Centre for the Study of Radicalisation wrote on X.
Professor Neumann said: “After 25 years in this ‘business’ you think nothing could surprise you anymore… that really wasn’t on my radar.”
The doors of the white van are thrown open. Dozens of armed French police jump on board, their colleagues on the ground form a human chain and get to work.
The van is carrying precious cargo. Water. Small plastic bottles stacked roof high and van deep.
It’s chaotic.
Orders are being shouted in French and Chimaore, the language spoken by Mayotte’s African community.
Security is high. The gendarmes are backed up by armed local police.
Local residents are angry. That anger could easily turn to violence.
It’s why a 10pm curfew remains in place across the island. One resident described the situation as “volcanic”.
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Short supply of aid after Cyclone Chido
Cyclone Chido tore through Mayotte on Sunday, but this is the first water delivery Ouangani has received since Saturday.
Nobody understands why.
‘There’s no word and no one has water’
Arriving at the distribution centre just after the water is loaded on to another van for delivery to nearby villages is Ouangani’s mayor, a young, former English teacher who speaks multiple languages.
He is considered and thoughtful when describing the situation facing his country.
“It’s not sufficient,” he tells me. “There’s no word and no one has water.”
“The authorities weren’t prepared,” he adds. “There’s not only a water problem, it’s food, electricity. Nothing on the island has been done.”
He then delivers a dire warning of “people starving”.
The destruction caused by Cyclone Chido
Residents expressed their fury at the response to the cyclone
I ask him who he thinks is to blame? He says that everyone is responsible.
“I cannot imagine that with all the means we have with technology, that they couldn’t have seen this coming,” he says.
But this region is not remote. It’s only an hour-long drive south of the capital on one winding road.
That’s why there is so much fury.
The man who challenged French President Emmanuel Macron is from here.
“Where is our water?!’, he demanded of the leader on his visit to the Indian Ocean island.
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This van load of water is supposed to serve between three to five villages in the area.
That’s a population of anywhere between six and 12,000 people. Nobody knows for sure because of the problem with undocumented migrants.
We follow the van to the first drop-off.
The vehicle pulls up and drops off 10 to 20 crates of half-litre plastic bottles. Each crate has 12 small bottles. People have been waiting. They’re mostly women. Each one grabs a pack and disappears.
Within minutes it’s all gone.
Some more people show up seconds later. Their anger at missing out is obvious. “What’s the point?!” a man shouts.
‘It’ll only last about one or two hours’
Fundi has been lucky enough to get some water.
“We only just received aid now, I really don’t think that’s good enough,” she says.
Fundi has a family of seven and said the water given out would only last a couple of hours
They were just outside when they saw the van arrive with the water. Pure luck.
“Usually communication is good, but I don’t know why they came unannounced like that today,” she says.
But it’s not enough, Fundi explains: “Twelve bottles of water that are only 500ml, for a family? That’s really very little, it’ll only last about one to two hours.”
It’s no wonder, Fundi has a family of seven living under one roof.
The US says it has killed Islamic State (IS) leader Abu Yusif in Syria.
US Central Command Forces (Centcom) said it carried out an airstrike targeting Yusif – who also goes by Mahmud – in the eastern province of Deir ez Zor.
They said the area was previously controlled by the Syrian regime and Russian forces before the recent fall of Bashar al Assad.
Another IS operative was also killed in the strike, according to US officials.
A map showing Deir ez Zor province in Syria
Centcom commander, General Michael Erik Kurilla, said: “As stated before, the United States – working with allies and partners in the region – will not allow ISIS to take advantage of the current situation in Syria and reconstitute.
“IS has the intent to break out of detention the over 8,000 ISIS operatives currently being held in facilities in Syria.
“We will aggressively target these leaders and operatives, including those trying to conduct operations external to Syria.”
IS militants conquered parts of Iraq and Syria in 2014, taking advantage of the latter’s civil war to claim land before self-declaring a caliphate.
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At the height of its power, millions of people lived under the rule of IS, with the militants enforcing an extremist interpretation of Islamic law and carrying out mass killings of minority groups.
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However, they were pushed back by a coalition of forces and had lost control of all of their Middle East territory by 2019.
They have continued insurgency efforts in parts of Syria, Iraq, and Afghanistan, while their affiliates still have a presence in parts of Africa.
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