Reem Alsalem, UN Special Rapporteur on VAWAG is a fucking disgrace

No worries, I get that. I don’t usually post a lot on Mumsnet - I mostly come here to read up on things (like the BFF/Sara Morrison tribunal) where other people know a lot more than me, but I do, or did, post on other websites so I get when someone “new” suddenly rocks up to post on a controversial subject.

The only person I actually know in Israel is a former colleague (Jewish) who moved there about 15 years ago. I only got back in touch with them because of the attack in 2023, to make sure they were ok, so they aren’t best friends or anything. And in fact they were so happy that I was so clear in my support for them that now they do talk to me like best friends! The husband lost someone he thought was one of his best friends from here when he saw what he’d posted on Facebook in the days straight after the attack. He was really crushed by it. Anyway my point is that this family can’t stand Netanyahu, and are (always were and AFAIK still are) strong supporters of the two state solution.

While I don’t know how they’d vote in an election tomorrow, I do know that after the Hamas attack, they told me they had a lot of confidence in Benny Gantz so they were happy when he joined the original National Unity government (I’d never heard of him before that.)

Obviously Gantz has since left that coalition, but I don’t know if my friends would ever vote for Netanyahu. It’s not something we’ve discussed recently, as there’s no election planned and anyway I probably don’t know all the parties. But I imagine that a lot of people there are probably very unsure what the right direction is for the country.

But at no point did they ever say the sort of thing that I’ve seen people accuse Israelis of saying/thinking, expressing hate for Palestinians or anything like that. What they want is peace.

The report from the UK APPG included refs to witness statemnts and mention of forensic evidence. And yes, absence of victim statements is because most of them were murdered after being raped and/or tortured.

Because of course the Israelis did horrible things. But anything done by Palestinians is 'alleged' because they have victim status.

Most of the victims are dead. Sexual violence always happens in wars. Men who hated Jews invaded Israel and the mutilated bodies of women were found. What do you think happened to them?

"The videos were all just clever photoshop jobs? All made within hours of the atrocities?"

Thst is where the narrative falls down. The atrocities were livestreamed. Some of the livestreams were deleted post factum, but enough have been saved by various people all over the world.

Agreed. Sorry, my response was rather aggressive-sounding- I think discussing it online has made me over suspicious. It's scary how many people seem to justify anything against Palestinians in general (although not as scary as people who think Hamas are not terrorists). I can see you didn't mean that

I think if I were in Israel - well for one thing I don't think I'd be brave enough to stay, those who do are incredibly brave. If I were : I'd almost certainly vote Netanyahu just because I think it's incredibly dangerous to give up on the Hamas war, while hoping that civilians can be safely moved somewhere. As I've said, the Palestinians are a violently radicalised population (exactly why Egypt, Jordan etc will not take them). I don't know how they can be safely deradicalised but I hope beyond hope it can happen.

And yes, I agree that there have certainly been multiple war crimes by the IDF, and indeed before this war, some of the stuff that went on in the West Bank was completely wrong and immoral too. And the fact that Netanyahu is corrupt and completely unscrupulous, and has put in place a far right government make things worse.

Although OTOH, since Hamas, and Gazan civilians, attacked the kibbutzim and even actual peace activists like Vivian Silver, I think if I were Israeli I would probably conclude that Palestinians had no interest in negotiating with peace makers in Israel and I don't know who I would vote for.

I completely agree that the children are the victims - it also horrifies me to see clips of men, and sometimes women, who grab tiny children to shout at cameras, presumably for propaganda. Tiny children crying. It must be completely traumatising for the children. I have never seen anyone doing that in other disasters, not even in a war.

So yes, they need to be debrainwashed, like Germans were denazified after the war. But I don't think that's going to happen, because so many people in the west seem to think that it's Israel's fault "really", for existing. I'm not Jewish BTW.

I don't know what the solution is. I'm not sure I believe in two states any more. Not as things are now anyway.

Measured and conservative magazines like The Critic and Unherd are noting that the rhetoric on both Likud and UK sides from Israel supporters has sometimes dangerously veered to saying any kind of treatment of Palestinians is acceptable. This is extremely dangerous.

https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&opi=89978449&url=unherd.com/2024/04/what-thatcher-can-teach-the-pro-israel-right/&ved=2ahUKEwiq8Zel5fyQAxWoVkEAHUWmJXkQFnoECBsQAQ&usg=AOvVaw3jKlUged6ye1sjxXF8L5pB

https://thecritic.co.uk/against-the-neoconservative-case-for-israel/

https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&opi=89978449&url=thecritic.co.uk/issues/may-2024/time-for-realpolitik-in-israel/&ved=2ahUKEwj6mMrT5fyQAxWnRfEDHeQTE_wQFnoECCwQAQ&usg=AOvVaw2OMjOce46p6oBoNxYHs__q

https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&opi=89978449&url=thecritic.co.uk/the-organised-anger-of-israels-arab-citizens/&ved=2ahUKEwi09PD65fyQAxWiW0EAHVdIOaMQFnoECBwQAQ&usg=AOvVaw2Llys0QkkgjjU295IKdna3

Sadly, I expected that to be the case for the majority.

Re being 'pro Palestinian'. What do you mean by that? If you mean, thinking there should be a 2 state solution and that some of Israel's war tactics are immoral, I still think that. I just think it can never happen until they are debrainwashed, which will be a nightmare undertaking.

Every single adult in Gaza could be pure evil. I would still think that some of Israel's war tactics were immoral. You can't just say any tactic automatically becomes moral if the enemy civilians are all evil. Morality towards civilians HAS to apply no matter how bad and evil they may be in majority.

Not to mention that many of the Gazans are under-18s, including many under-10s. I don't view brainwashed under-10s as evil. They are not responsible for this horrendous situation at all.

And yes, I was horrified at Reem Alsalem's words. She was so brilliant about MVAWG and transgender women in female spaces, but she seems to have a blind spot about Jewish women.

That's what I thought at the beginning but polls carried out in Gaza and in the West Bank show that Hamas is actually more popular than the PA, and while there is more support in Gaza for negotiation than 2 years ago, in the WB "the armed struggle" is actually getting more popular.

Obviously there are Palestinians who are against Hamas, but the only way a terror group would be able to keep such tight control of the population while actually losing a war and fighting for their very survival is if they still have a very significant level of support in Gaza. If a lot of people were geniuinely against them, that's when there'd have been an uprising. There wasn't because too many people still support them.

Sadly - and I was also pro Palestinian before Oct 7 - I think the reality is that a lot of Gazans really did prefer their government to try to destroy Israel rather than build a proper economy. And some of them haven't changed their minds.

This is from October 2025:

"Palestinian opinion is polarized: the Trump Plan is widely known but support is split, with Gazans more favorable than West Bankers. Majorities back Hamas’s response yet reject disarming Hamas; most doubt the plan will end the war or deliver statehood. A leadership crisis endures—dissatisfaction with Abbas and the PA, Marwan Barghouti leading, and Hamas outpolling Fatah.
Since Oct 7, support for the attack persists even as expectations of Hamas victory wane. Gazans are more open to negotiated arrangements;` West Bankers favor armed struggle. Across both, skepticism of external plans coexists with demands for elections and self-defense."

https://www.pcpsr.org/en/node/1000

That was unspeakably horrible.

I view the Gazans the same way I would view people indoctrinated by dangerous cults like Manson or Jim Jones. Not everyone is indoctrinated, children are innocent, some may pretend to agree who don't to keep alive (as Hamas surely watch to see who didagrees). I disagree strongly with some of the Israeli government's tactics. What you describe does NOT mean that Israel can do literally anything to Gazans in general.

A 2 state solution is definitely unthinkable right now. Hamas are basically the Arab version of Nazis, and everyone in Gaza needs to be debrainwashed as far as possible before they can go back.

Plans like Trump's to make Gaza a beach resort are hopefully a joke, that would be a moral outrage for countless reasons.

I know what you mean...but that doesn't mean any treatment of the Palestnians is ethical
.I am still strongly opposed to several of the Likud gov's tactics. Whatever the adults have done, children are not responsible for that. And I doubt (I hope!) that all Palestinians support Hamas. I essentially view the majority as cult members, and on principle, such groups deserve as humane treatment as possible until we can punish those who have committed crimes.

The cheering crowds were abhorrent but I do wonder whether some may have been acting like that because Hamas were presumably scanning them for signs of disloyalty. Most probably were indoctrinated, but I'm thinking of accounts I read of people in Maoist China feigning worship of Mao and cheering atrocities because the slightest sign of disapproval could mean death.

"No evidence"??? "No evidence"????? The videos were all just clever photoshop jobs? All made within hours of the atrocities?

(Especially ridiculous because Netanyahu's sexist and misogynist leadership didn't even care much about what happened to women. As I recall, it took them weeks and huge shouting on the part of women to acknowledge that oh-yes-there-were-crimes-against-women-going-on. If it really had been some kind of frame up, they would have been at it from the start.)

Not sure your list of sources have reached the standard of proof either. Both sides are alleging rape. The problem about Oct 7th is that there are independent (not UN, not Israeli, not Gazan) reports of rape e.g. from the Dinah Project.
Besides which Israeli soldiers who have been accused of rape have ended up in court. Where are the Gazans in court for what happened to women on Oct 7th?

It also seems bizarre to suggest there was no evidence found. Surely a Rapporteur on VAWG read the Roberts Report? Not only does it clearly and in detail lay out (horrific) details of what evidence was found, but it lays out why evidence is hard to find in such a situation - not least because almost all of the women involved were murdered.

I will stop there because any further discussion involves graphic detail I don't want to post on here.

It was written by a UK APPG, so about as independent as one can get.

This. Denying it just looks callous, tribal and dishonest to most people.

I wonder if then a rapporteur can only be someone who has independent income / wealth, how do you do it?
Expenses: Office staff, equipment, travel costs? And 40 hours a week without income?
If a charity supports them, are they then beholden to the charity with regards to their output?

I'm comparing this to when a company engages an "independent" expert or lawyers to look into a mistake they've made in the past - but these are still paid for by the company, even if the company claims no interference into the output (i.e. harassment on the premises, slavery background from the 18th century etc...).

Then everbody who is supposed to do independent / neutral work couldn't get paid by anyone.

Probably just theoretical musings, but I got into this thought regarding one of the other rapporteurs recently.

I have to say it is a strange hill to die on, simply because OF COURSE rape and sexual assault will have occurred. Huge numbers of violent men crossed the border that day - lots of them will have taken advantage of the situation to rape/sexually abuse women they encountered because that is what violent men do. I'd be straight up astonished if they hadn't, just as I would be astounded if the IDF weren't raping on a pretty grand scale also. Put a gun in a man's hand and tell him the people he is fighting are less than human and sexual violence is pretty well inevitable.

I can never forget the destruction of the Goma prison in the DRC. Rebel forces destroyed a prison wing containing male prisoners, enabling them to escape. The FIRST THING some of them did, in the midst of all the fighting, the fire and the confusion, was to nip next door to the women's wing and rape and murder on a massive scale.

That is what violent men do. So of COURSE the Hamas fighters did it too.

Horrible. Just horrible.

Rapporteurs are not paid but are appointed by the UN as independent experts and paid travel and expenses while on mission work for the UN

Assuming that there is a lot of political chess going on behind the scenes in such high-level organizations, I was wondering whether someone is blackmailing her with something?
I know the post is suppposed to be "independent" and I still haven't figured out whether the "rapporteurs" get paid or not - can't really imagine they'd put in so much work and are not paid, but maybe she'll want another job after this one and needs someone's support.

That doesn't negate the blind spot theory and tribal thinking suggestion, btw, rather to add another layer.
Given that some TRAs deploy very radical tactics, it would have to be some force that is much more powerful.

Utterly disgraceful.

My DS1's best friend's mother is Jewish. A little bit after October 7 she asked me out for coffee and asked me quietly to please not let anyone know she was. Apparently her son had been having repeated nightmares that someone would 'find out' and take her away to kill her. He did not want to go outside. He did not want to go to school. In Year 7 a year or so before, he had said in class when they were doing the religions that his mum was Jewish and this is what had scared him so much,. That someone would remember it.

Imagine that. In modern day Britain.