00:00thank you for joining us here on around the world the headlines this hour French police raid the
00:06headquarters of the far-right National Valley party documents linked to a probe into alleged
00:11illegal campaign financing were seized Donald Trump appears to have a change of heart over
00:18Ukraine a day after saying he'd resume weapons shipments to Kiev he's now complaining of Vladimir
00:23Putin's quote bullshit and a new report out this week that Hamas to use sexual violence as a
00:30tactical weapon of war during the October 7th attacks we'll be speaking to the reports co-author
00:35in this edition
00:37this Tuesday a new report came out which establishes that Hamas use sexual violence
00:54as a tactical weapon of war during the October 7th attacks the DINA project which was launched
01:00following those horrid events deems this was part of a genocidal strategy by the militant group
01:05the report which offers a legal roadmap based on international law ran into challenges including
01:10the scarcity of direct testimony from victims it's now calling for a shift in how conflict
01:15related sexual violence is prosecuted the DINA report builds on several others by international
01:23and Israeli rights groups and concludes that Hamas used sexual violence as a tactical weapon of war
01:28motivated by genocidal intent during its October 7th attacks on Israel
01:33the legal team's goal is to pursue justice for its victims we carry here a universal message that
01:41that sexual violence cannot be accepted as a tool of war victims like Ilana Brzyzewski who was kidnapped from
01:50her home on kibbutz near Oz and held hostage for 55 days in Gaza I remember guns were pointed at me I remember
01:59hands which did not belong to me touching me I remember I yelled and then blacked out when I woke up
02:07I was half naked surrounded by terrorists they were beating me they were touching me I don't know what
02:14happened to my body during those last minutes but my soul already knew nothing will ever be the same
02:21the report said witness accounts indicated at least 15 separate cases of sexual assault
02:27with verbal and physical harassment and threats of forced marriage
02:31as well as evidence of gang rape followed by killing genital mutilation and public humiliation
02:37we formed a evidentiary framework that proves that Hamas used sexual violence in a systematic manner
02:47as a weapon of war the report calls for wartime sexual violence to be treated differently from regular
02:54sex crimes because it said Hamas had silenced most of its victims by killing them it also said joint
03:00criminal responsibility should be applied to all participants in the attack rather than trying to
03:05link individual perpetrators to specific victims this it said would create a pathway to justice for
03:12victims of the October 7th attack and potentially for those in other conflict zones Hamas has denied its
03:19forces committed sexual violence against women but a UN mission concluded last year that there
03:24were reasonable grounds to believe that conflict-related sexual violence occurred on October 7th
03:29it was really scary we can now bring in Ruth Halperin Kadri who co-authored the report and founded the DINAP project
03:38thank you so much for joining us on the program today what prompted you to launch this investigation
03:42thank you for having me uh well it's a question that we were being asked constantly and I can just reflect
03:51back on those um horrible days after the most fateful day of October 7th of 2023 and the day after that
04:00not only myself but those of us who had had experience professional experience uh not personal experience
04:08with sexual violence and with and and knew about sexual violence and conflict we understood that this
04:16was possibly what also took place on October 7th by Hamas against Israel we at that time had no idea of the
04:24extent and the scope but we also immediately understood that there needs to be recognition and justice
04:33sought for those victims of the sexual violence of October 7th primarily in the face of the silence
04:40which afterwards turned into denialism by many of international human rights organizations and
04:48international women's rights and we also knew that there is a huge challenge which is
04:55which I'm sorry uh there's some disturbance in in the oh I'm sorry that uh because I can hear you perfectly
05:05fine we can hear you perfectly fine you mentioned this denialism do you think Israeli women have had
05:11a tougher time getting their voices heard than victims of sexual violence elsewhere I'm sorry there is
05:17some disturbance and I cannot hear you oh we're gonna try and and uh speak to our audio team and
05:24can you hear me now um Ruth I'm I'm afraid there was somebody who got online oh okay okay can you hear me
05:35now yes okay you you were talking about this denialism and I think that's important because it goes to my
05:42next question do you think Israeli women have had a tougher time getting their voices heard than
05:46victims of sexual violence elsewhere in the west maybe so I think it's a combination I think that
05:54sexual violence in conflict always presents challenges and we know from international law we know from
06:01experience that there are very very few indictments indictments let alone convictions on conflict related
06:08sexual violence it takes a long time the challenges of lack of victims victims who are silenced forever
06:15and the inability to point out to specific perpetrators this is something that occurs in almost every
06:23context when sexual violence is used as a weapon of war and this was the reason for us developing the legal
06:30theory and actually a blueprint that allows for prosecuting all those who took part in such an attack
06:38where sexual violence was used as a weapon of war so this is number one number two sexual violence in
06:44conflict is always politicized by different sides to conflict having said that I do believe that the silence
06:55violence on the part of other sisters women's rights organizations those who do stand out in other cases of
07:03conflict related sexual violence and I'm thinking primarily about UN women whose role is to defend and to stand for
07:12women's rights everywhere in all times no matter what their nationality is I think that when this is examined
07:20very very very meticulously we do see a double standard there now you reviewed a large volume of social media
07:30posts visual and forensic evidence as well can you give us some examples and what challenges did you face
07:37gathering all this evidence so the challenges as I said were that most of the victims had been murdered
07:46immediately during or after they were assaulted so they were silenced forever and then there is no availability
07:54to have the witnesses of first-hand witnesses of those who were in fact assaulted on October 7 however we do have
08:04one survivor who did speak about the attempted rape but the other the very few other survivors who really survived
08:14in Israel are too traumatized to to speak so the key was to find other evidence and find other indications and
08:24information that can serve as evidence in criminal trials and for further investigations and that that is why we point to
08:33those 17 eyewitnesses and earwitnesses in real time who themselves are survivors and for them as well it took time to
08:42step out and to speak about what they had went through and what they had seen
08:47were men also subjected to this sexual violence
08:51to the best of our knowledge there were also cases of men who were subjected to sexual violence
08:59and we also have to bear in mind that sexual violence in conflict
09:03very often does not bear the same form of what we refer to for lack of a better word everyday sexual violence so for instance you and i'm sorry for going into details but mutilations of sexual organs shots into the genitalia is a recurring pattern of the use of sexual violence as a weapon of war and we have we have we have a
09:33indications that this was also indications that this was also the case on october 7 we also have the testimonies of the returned hostages including male returning hostages who do report about various forms of physical
09:49sexual and verbal and verbal sexual abuse which again do not always conform to what we might have in our perception as what is sexual abuse but sexual violence in conflict is not directed against the individual per se and and and as i said it very often does not involve rape it involves other means of destroying the the the the identity the sexual
10:17sexual identity destroying the sexual identity destroying the personhood destroying the sexual capacities of the particular individual as he or she symbolizes the whole nation the body of the whole nation i i want to talk about that in just a second
10:32because you're calling for a shift in how a conflict related sexual violence is prosecuted what would you like to see changed
10:40so first of all in the case of october 7 we call upon the secretary general to include hamas in the list of those countries and entities and organizations that condone and that use sexual violence as a weapon of war
10:59and in terms of achieving justice the legal system broadly speaking including the israeli prosecutorial authorities we call for a paradigm shift in understanding that different means of according responsibility
11:20a criminal responsibility and accountability must be employed in the case of conflict related sexual violence
11:27otherwise there is complete impunity and there cannot be accountability for the perpetrators of these crimes and the message is terrible the message is that any terror organization can employ this worst form of crime against humanity and and walk away with it because they cannot be prosecuted for lack of victims and for lack of the conventional forensic evidence which are unavailable in
11:57these cases ruth ruth ruth ruth are you optimistic these crimes could potentially be prosecuted by bodies like the international criminal court one day and i only ask because as you know authorities officials where you are denounce bodies like the international criminal court
12:12so i i don't want to go into the political question of where israel stands vis-a-vis the icc
12:20i am calling for the israeli authorities the prosecutorial authorities in israel and we are also speaking on various other levels of justice including historical justice setting the record straight this is also a form of justice and recognition and also a form of accountability and this is what we attempted to do in our work in in in in in the book that we just handed over yesterday to the first lady of israel michael
12:50herzog as was put in the uh herzog as was put in the uh preview um story now you suggested uh to this uh ruth that uh the report by the dina projects uh states that sexual violence was part of hamas's genocidal strategy i'm curious your legal expert why did you zero in on that word
13:09well when reading hamas charter and when going through their writings some of them were found within the vessels of the hamas terrorists who were captured in israel following or in gaza following october 7
13:30it is clear that the intention in the attack when they entered israel on october 7 and stormed into civilian places into civilian population they had a genocidal intent the intent was to destroy to completely dehumanize
13:51and to completely destroy the israelis and to completely destroy the israeli people it is clear in their agenda in their writings in their teachings and this is the indoctrination with which each and every hamas terrorist came in on october 7 equipped with various weapons including the sorry for saying this but the cheapest weapon available their own bodies
14:21were not to be threatened and this is the intent and this is the context in which it has to be prosecuted
14:28i thank you so much for joining us on the program today
