Rape and Hamas and the denial of rape.

My late DH was a denier. But he eventually realised what had happened and changed his mind. He died in January fully aware of the horror perpetrated on 7th October. I miss him. I am glad he saw reason. A pity others continue in the lie that these horrors did not happen.

Many have forgotten the horror of the attack on East Pakistan (now Bangladesh) in 1971. Rape was industrialised, women and girls as young as 12, were kept in sheds and houses to be raped at will by Pakistani soldiers. Such is the shame of rape, and pregnancy from rape, that it was difficult to reintegrate these women into their societies. They had been defiled and no-one wanted them. It was intended genocide, btw, the intention being to get (West) Pakistan children on (East) Pakistan women. Rape is one of the ways to commit genocide. But it is the war crime that is ignored.

On that base, 7 were abducted alive, one killed in captivity (Noa Marciano), and one rescued early on (Ori Magadish).
The footage censors the bodies of these girls friends, who were murdered in front of them, and the violence that was done to them.

"Eli Albag, Liri’s father, told Channel 12 News that the original footage is over 13 minutes long. The IDF Spokesman’s Office is understood to have made the full footage available to the families and allowed them to decide what to show to the public.
“This is the most sensitive version… and still terribly harsh,” said Albag. “We are exposing ourselves and our daughters. We went back and forth over and over about whether to release it. Three of the mothers have not seen the footage, are not prepared to see the footage, cannot bear to see the girls [in the footage].”
“It’s been 229 days since then,” he said, “and we are living it minute by minute… I have no words to describe the horrors: At that base, 54 male and female soldiers were murdered. Those girls sat for two hours with 11 bodies of female soldiers and one male soldier in their line of sight.”
He asked: “What else can we say? Where else can we shout? What else can we do to wake the nation up?”"

(Times of Israel)

As upsetting us this was to watch we have only been shows a edited three minutes, the whole thing last about fifteen minutes, it appallingly, these men are animals, sorry that unfair to animals they are devils . They families have asked that the whole video should not be shown as it just horrific .

Aggressively denying

In the days and weeks following the attack.

There were posters on here aggressive denying that the rapes had happened.

People are protesting this? It's insane. Jews must not talk about what they've suffered? Women mustn't talk about the rape they've experienced?

Obscene. Absolutely obscene. Shame on anyone who protests this. Absolute shame.

This.

I don’t know if anyone upthread has mentioned Christina Lamb’s book Our Bodies, Their War. That deals with the general situation but that is merely to amplify rather than deny the particularity of what was done specifically to women on October 7.
Playing the some women in some places/times/cultures deserve more or less than other women in different circumstances is just whataboutery

Those poor young women. I watched the footage. I'm not going to say I wish I hadn't, but it was upsetting. I think about them often, and hope they're still alive and they get to come home soon.

I said it in October under another username, but I went on pro-Palestine protests as a very left-wing teenager and settled into a comfortably ignorant position of both sides being bad and the conflict being impossible to solve. October 7th changed all of that.

This wasn't a tiny number of violent men. There were all the men doing the killing and kidnapping and raping. And then the far greater number lining the streets and cheering it on - which we then saw later with every hostage release. Crowds of aggressive men gleeful about what was being done to women and children. (No, not all Palestinian men, obviously, before anyone objects on those grounds - but an amount that really shocked me.)

The lack of response from big feminist organisations is telling, and I say that as someone who isn't Jewish and never really considered the issue of anti-Semitism in depth before. Now I see it.

I can understand all the criticisms of Netanyahu and the way the war has been waged. There are some awful things happening in Gaza now. But hearing Western university students chanting 'resistance is justified' about October 7th is absolutely chilling. Nothing justifies rape and torture.

"A screening tonight at Phoenix Cinema in North London (my lovely local indie) of a documentary about Nova music festival massacre on October 7th is desecrated.
How can a film about innocent young people butchered, raped and abducted be “Art Washing”?"

https://x.com/JonnyGeller/status/1793566038665376000

In addition to the graffiti at the Phoenix there's a protest organised for this evening when this film is due to be shown at the Phoenix in E. Finchley, one of the biggest Jewish neighbourhoods in London. A film which includes "extensive testimony of rape at a music festival". People that live in this area will have family or friends whose daughters or sisters were kidnapped, raped, mutilated or murdered on 7/10. Women that think of themselves as feminists will be among the protestors.

Me too. Unless you are a Jew.

I don’t think there are any Hamas supporter marches so not entirely sure why you wrote that last bit.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-67422556

'Two men are being sought over an allegation of antisemitic chanting on Armistice Day.
Two are wanted over alleged pro-Hamas chanting in Trafalgar Square on 4 November.
Officers want to question a further six men after a demonstration in King Charles Street on 14 October.
The final person the force wants to identify is a man seen waving a placard bearing the words "I fully support Hamas" during a protest on Bond Street on 21 October.'

What would Boko Harem protestors be protesting?

I agree that there has been a distinct lack of outrage about the events of October 7 generally.

I cannot imagine how it must be feel to be Jewish right now but frightening and depressing at the very least I’d imagine.

Well no example is going to be a perfect match to another example on every tiny detail.

Yes they are being ignored. Yes they are being excused. Yes the girls that do escape are being blamed and ostracised. They have no chance of marriage or a family. No the only marches are by family trying to get the governments to do something.

I don’t think there are any Hamas supporter marches so not entirely sure why you wrote that last bit.

This is a big a big issue. One that has caused many a fall out between feminist groups.

I don’t think that is a reason for it not to be comparable to the weaponisation of rape in conflicts everywhere else.

The Israeli government were not giving the plight of these women taken hostage any attention- the footage was released by the families to make the Israeli government go back to the negotiating table they had walked away from because tens of thousands of Israeli protesters feel that the hostages are being forgotten about by their own government and military.

I’d like to think the world cares more now and is less misogynistic

Sadly this isn’t true. It seems the world is becoming more and more misogynistic.

Are the kidnapping and rapes by Boko Haram being excused or outright denied? Are the girls being blamed for what is happening to them? Are there marches and protests by Boko Haram supporters going on in major cities across the west?

Sorry arrest warrant requests…I didn’t mean to imply warrants had been issued yet.

It's not comparable because October 7th triggered a war. That war is being fought to finish Hamas forever. It does not surprise me that the abuse of women and girls might be ongoing. Those poor beaten bloody girls are at the mercy of sexual psychopaths turned on by their helplessness and that is being given full attention by the Israelis. I don't blame them.

I’d like to think the world cares more now and is less misogynistic, but I am weary and disillusioned. I certainly have always cared and been angry, but it doesn’t make a difference.

I do recall the denial of rape of Muslim women during the Bosnian genocide. The focus was on the thousands of boys and men hauled off into the forest, shot, and their bodies broken into pieces and then scattered between different mass graves to conceal the scale of the atrocity. The attitude was very much that the women were “lucky” compared to the boys and men as they’d kept their lives.

The news was all focussed on the attacks on men and boys. There was some news on the siege of Sarajevo and snipers shooting people in the streets just trying to get water or food.

I think because 7/10 is fresh that some don’t remember how it was then for these other cases and remember only post outcry, post investigation, post trials. Acknowledgement can take years in most cases.

Yes the denial of rape on 7/10 and all 230 days after is still going on in some quarters. It is sick and wrong, but not unprecedented.

There is a great book called Our Bodies, their Battlefield and it starkly shows how many years it take for women to get any acknowledgment as to being raped and held captive in wars, and how elusive justice has been from the ICC.

I don’t think the ICC arrest warrants for the Hamas leaders even lists the war crime of rape. They should.

“Someone upthread mentioned Boko Haram. When the mass kidnapping happened there was a media campaign in the US and UK, "Bring Back Our Girls". Michelle Obama was the face of it for a while.”

That was me. But did you know that it was not one mass kidnapping? But has been going on regularly, ever since with no one caring. Did you know after that first mass kidnapping that the CIA found where the girls were being held in the jungle, but decided not to disclose that information or to set up any rescue attempts? Videos were issued where the terrorists paraded naked, pregnant girls by the bodies of dead girls and warned the world not to try and rescue any because they’d kill them all. So they didn’t rescue them. A few have escaped on their own years afterwards…

But you are mistaken if you think it was one mass kidnapping, it has been many and is still ongoing and no one has or is going after any of them to rescue them.