Sde Teiman detention camp is one of many Israeli outposts that are used to solidify the occupation of Palestinian land. One of the main ways Israel ensures this is by instilling as much humiliation and fear within the Palestinians who are dragged there.
In July 2024, widely circulated CCTV footage from inside the camp clearly showed a group of Israeli soldiers gang raping a Palestinian prisoner using a metal rod. This resulted in the prisoner sustaining heavy injuries.
Indeed, whilst the history of sexual assault in warfare is long standing, media coverage and attention has been less likely to focus on its impact on men.
Recent atrocities in Sudan’s Al-Fasher reminds us of the inhumane use of sexual violence that is still used as a weapon today. Beyond the soldiers’ own sickening intentions, such barbarity is also allowed by superiors as a way to scare any potential opposition.
The idea is to push men into thinking that laying down their weapons is better than being killed and having their family members and loved ones assaulted. Brutality, in this case, is a scare tactic for surrender.
Indiscriminate sexual violence
There are many examples of this violence throughout history, including during Bangladesh’s war of independence in 1971, when women from the land were systematically raped by members of the Pakistani army. Army personnel even admitted that this violence was used as a way to “purify” the lineage of the Bangladesh population through the injection of western Pakistani blood.
This idea is not uncommon, it is a way to forcefully subjugate a population by having the occupied women birthing the occupier’s children.
In a sense, Israel’s barbarity is unique in that it doesn’t discriminate when it comes to those it rapes in its captivity. To make matters worse, Israeli soldiers don’t just use their own body parts or inanimate objects to commit such atrocious acts, they also train animals to do their dirty work.
Numerous reports have come out of Israeli detention centres detailing the use of trained dogs. Palestinian hostages would be stripped and forced on their hands and knees and a dog would then urinate on them, and assault them. The aim here is clear: torture for information, unspeakable humiliation, and community-level psychosexual trauma if detainees are ever released.
There is a question about why – given that ethnic dilution through pregnancy is not possible with men and boys, and that there are other means of inflicting torture to achieve ‘results’ – does Israel choose such tactics.
It could be that recording Palestinians being humiliated on video provides blackmail ammunition for the Zionist entity. Israel already routinely uses internet histories and secretly recorded videos of extramarital sexual encounters to blackmail Palestinians into providing services to Israeli forces. It is therefore not illogical to assume that videos of sexual abuse in prison wouldn’t be used similarly.
Additionally, through the internalised shame that the sexual violence inflicts on detainees, the occupation seeks to strip Palestinians of their dignity. Israel ensures that they don’t feel like heroes in their communities. Rather, that they are left fearing that dishonour will also be brought upon their families.
Another particularly important factor that must be highlighted is the impact of the violations on Palestinian men’s own sexual health. The repeated assault on young boys and men is known in the field of psychology to result in problems in sexual performance later in life.
Destroying families and communities
The wider implications of assaulting men’s sexual health include emasculation. Given the societal pressures and ideas linked to masculinity and sexual performance, Israel’s violence doesn’t just attack ‘pride’ and their sexual health, it adds to the long list of trauma and mental health issues that detainees are left with. Those men will struggle to establish, maintain, and feel safe in relationships.
Abuse can also be circular, those abused have been noted in other countries to develop hypersexuality or a tendency to be sexually violent. The repeated cycle of violence naturally leads to the breakdown of families, and the hypersexuality they then battle with can also result in self-abuse.
The intentional destruction of the Palestinian family unit through the sexual assault of men and boys is a painful daily reality. It is also a happy by-product of Israel’s torture with many brutal aims, including the weakening of any nationalist movement for liberation.
Israel has repeatedly shown that they are aware of the psychological effects that their abuse has on Palestinians. And the torture is neither isolated, rare, nor simply inflicted by a few “rogue cops”. The fact that consistent reporting on Israel’s sexual abuse has been raised time and time again over the decades only demonstrates how deeply systemic and organised it truly is.
To add insult to injury, beyond just being accepted, the abuse is sometimes even supported and defended by Israeli society. When the CCTV footage of the gang rape in Sde Teiman prison was released, protests erupted; not to demand accountability from the rapists, but to protect them and to express anger over the footage being released in the first place.
There is certainly an increasing effort to bring to light the sexual violence inflicted by Israel on Palestinians, but more energy and resources must now be given to support Palestinian detainees. Pressuring all our institutions across the West to sever ties with an active genocidal nation is an effective way to achieve this. It is our collective, moral obligation to ensure that Israel is no longer allowed to continue this abuse.
Omar is an Egyptian-British PhD student at the University of Cambridge and a pro-Palestinian activist. Whilst his research focuses on immunology and disease, Omar has further interests in politics, religion, and sociology.
Have questions or comments? Email us at: editorial-english@newarab.com
Opinions expressed here are the author's own, and do not necessarily reflect those of their employer, or of The New Arab and its editorial board or staff.