The Israeli government insists that Hamas formally sanctioned sexual assault on October 7, 2023. But investigators say the evidence does not stand up to scrutiny. Catherine Philp and Gabrielle Weiniger report on eight months of claim and counter-claim
“Specific survivors, the only reason they told their story was because they wanted some kind of political pressure on the Israeli government to work harder to release the hostages,” says Dr Sarai Aharoni, an academic at Ben-Gurion University who is helping to compile a historical archive of the events that will be closed for 50 years. “And that is a horrible decision to have to make.”
Meanwhile, the political establishment has opened a fresh battle with the UN over what the Patten report didn’t say: that sexual violence was beyond reasonable doubt, systematic, widespread and ordered and perpetrated by Hamas. Israeli advocates for the female survivors are now warning that the country’s refusal to co-operate with a full and legal investigation, which the carefully worded report was not, threatens the prospect of ever finding out the full truth about the sexual violence of October 7 and delivering justice for its victims.
It was not a legal investigation, Patten explained, as Israel had not allowed one: that mandate could only be fulfilled by the Independent International Commission of Inquiry on the Occupied Palestinian Territory, which Israel has refused to work with since its inception. She hoped that would change.
Patten made it clear there was sufficient evidence of acts of sexual violence to merit full and proper investigation and expressed her shock at the brutality of the violence. The report also confirmed Israeli authorities were unable to provide much of the evidence that political leaders had insisted existed. In all the Hamas video footage Patten’s team had watched and all the photographs they had seen, there were no depictions of rape. We hired a leading Israeli dark-web researcher to look for evidence of those images, including footage deleted from public sources. None could be found.
Well, when I say team sports I mean it as an aesthetic. There are plenty of noble and lofty revolutionary causes to attach onto these days and honestly it’s really laudable that young people are becoming more invested politically.
But there is a contingent that in my opinion is only tagging along the ride for the perceived social capital that is gained by joining a team. Right now, Palestinians are victims and targets of atrocities being perpetuated by the IDF. Right now the in-group is committing a sort of map and territory switch where the aesthetic of the cause supersedes the goals it is trying to achieve.
A good example to ground this is political streamer Hassan Piker: He lives in a multimillion dollar mansion, drives a Porsche, and touts himself as a socialist/communist. He has a sickle and hammer backdrop in a lot of his merchandise but he wouldn’t be the product of what he is without milking capitalism to its full extent.
That’s why when I call out Linkerbaan for larping, I mean it’s just an aesthetic or as a performative production. The map has become the territory.