The NYT reporting on Israel's systematic rape of Palestinians is belated good journalism, not 'blood libel'

The New York Times recently published Pulitzer Prize-winner Nicholas Kristof’s blockbuster account of IDF systematic rapes of Palestinian men and women detained at a notorious Gaza military prison camp, Sde Teiman (“fields of Yemen”). His account was based on 14 victims or eyewitnesses to the sexual torture, and an Israeli human rights lawyer representing some of the victims served as a key source.

Kristof also used investigative reports of Israel’s leading human rights NGO, B’Tselem. Its probe was entitled “Welcome to Hell.”

There was nothing new in his expose. The events described began in 2023, shortly following  Israel’s invasion of Gaza. Haaretz published the first account of torture there in December 2023, less than three months after 7 October.

CNN published the first Western news account in May 2024, over two years ago, followed by the B’Tselem report in August 2024. Haaretz followed up with scores of reports up to the present. 

The world knew, or should have known. The media knew, but ignored the horrifying accounts. Had they wished to do so, they could easily have accessed all the sources CNN and B’Tselem interviewed. But they didn’t, giving yet another pass to Israeli crimes.

Zionism and sexual violence

Zionist sexual violence did not begin on 7 October. There is a long history of such crimes going back even before the Nakba in 1948.

In an incident from the mid-1940s, a Palestinian allegedly attempted to rape a woman from a nearby kibbutz. A Zionist local militia led by a future IDF general, determined to exact revenge. After being tutored by a doctor on performing a human castration, the vigilantes hunted him down, took him out into a field and castrated him. A popular Zionist song was even written extolling the act of revenge. Its refrain was: “We castrated you, we castrated you, Mohammed.” The commander of the Haganah unit which perpetrated this crime later became, after serving in the IDF, the president of the Technion.

During the Nakba, soldiers of the Haganah forcibly expelled residents of 400 indigenous Palestinian villages. In the process, they engaged in serial acts of rape, which have been documented by Israeli historians and media accounts.

In one infamous Zionist militia attack in May 1948, just a week after Israel declared statehood, residents of a Palestinian seaside village, Tantura, were expelled. Victims and the Israeli soldiers confirmed that multiple women were raped. The spot is now a beachside public parking lot.

In 1949, a Bedouin woman suffered three days of rape by multiple military units in the Negev. She was later murdered along with a male relative to cover up the crime. The suspects received little more than a slap on the wrist.

In 2014, the IDF chief rabbi declared it was permissible to rape Palestinian women because doing so increased their fighting abilities.

Zionism, far from being an emblem of liberal democracy as its founders contended, has embraced sexual violence as a means of dehumanisation and control over the indigenous Palestinian population. It is an ideology that debases its victims’ humanity in order to render them powerless in the struggle for their rights. Zionism means domination by any and all means necessary.

Netanyahu’s “blood libel”

Despite the media reports about Sde Teiman mentioned above, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu reacted with outrage to Kristof’s reports of sexual torture. He called it “a blood libel.” This is ironic considering the amount of actual blood spilt both in Gaza and Sde Teiman, where prisoners were bludgeoned to death. 

A blood libel is an age-old Christian traditional claim that Jews murder children and use their blood to make Passover matzah.  The calumny has incited dreadful pogroms against European communities for centuries.

However, Zionists have exploited the term to defend against legitimate criticism, such as Kristof’s investigation. Whenever a critic points out Israeli crimes, it becomes an anti-Semitic blood libel. The term becomes a means of shutting down such criticism and shielding Israel from accountability.

Netanyahu has ordered his foreign ministry to file a defamation case against the Times.  Any potential suit would employ a dubious definition of defamation: any media account that damages Israel’s reputation constitutes libel.

An Israeli lawfare group, Shurat Hadin, joined in urging such a filing.

None of the counterattacks offer any evidence to rebut the torture charges. They merely state that the report is libel because it damages Israel. As any lawyer can tell you, you can’t prove libel based on not liking what someone says about you.

Truth is an absolute defence against such a claim. Kristof can produce reams of evidence to support his reporting. Further, his legal team can use discovery to demand all official communications (from the IDF and the government) regarding Sde Teiman. The result would likely be even more damaging than the original investigation.

Questionable claims of Hamas sexual violence

Israel employed another questionable method of distracting from the horror of the New York Times report. An Israeli woman was the first source to allege widespread Hamas sexual attacks on 7 October. When she first began making such claims, she provided accounts from supposed victims. But they offered no corroborating evidence, no identities of the victims, or details on where the incidents took place, etc.

The Electronic Intifada has debunked her campaign, calling it the “rape hoax”, explaining that the ‘Civil Commission – an initiative launched by Israeli legal scholar Cochav Elkayam-Levy soon after 7 October – was already severely discredited by Israeli media more than two years ago.’

Many of her numerous claims regarding purported victims have already been exposed as contradictory, unreliable or fabricated.

More recently, she formed what she called a “Civil Commission,” and filed the report mentioned above. This time, she offered more detailed accounts. But the claims still remained thinly sourced, and the testimony of the sexual violence recounted seemed florid and unbelievable. Yet the Israeli government and hasbara apparatus have brandished it, and Western media have similarly promoted its lurid contentions.

The report has been widely discounted, including by Mehdi Hasan and others, as based on hearsay. Hasan called the report's contents “repackaged” claims from prior reports circulated over the past three years.

I consulted a well-informed Israeli security source who told me there was no systematic sexual abuse on 7 October as Ekyakam-Levy alleges. Neither Hamas fighters nor Hamas itself engaged in such behaviour. He says that hundreds of Gaza civilians unaffiliated with Hamas entered Israel and may have perpetrated such acts on a random basis. Of course, any such behaviour is unpardonable. But it is far different from the claim made by Elkayam-Levy .

But even if the charges are true, that has no bearing on the validity of the Sde Teiman sexual crimes. You cannot credit the Israeli 7 October claims while discounting the claims of Palestinian torture. To do so is the height of hypocrisy, which seems in great supply as far as Israel is concerned.

Believe her, deny them

Several years ago, a movement based on the slogan Believe Her, swept the US based on reports of widespread rape of women by powerful Hollywood moguls and others. Victims pushed back against rape denialism and the campaign of intimidation orchestrated by perpetrators like Harvey Weinstein, which targeted them. They coined the phrase to legitimise their suffering and shame their abusers.

Today’s Zionist rape deniers argue that Palestinian victims don’t deserve such respect because, well, they’re Palestinian. Anything the victims say which attests to Israeli crimes must be discounted. 

Israelis no longer even bother to offer arguments in defence of genocide and mass torture. In their hubris, the reasons are self-evident and need no elaboration. Israeli TV features panel discussions in which members justify the horrifying acts performed at Sde Teiman.

Any Israeli who protests and says otherwise is labelled a traitor and hounded mercilessly. In fact, four demonstrators were recently arrested during a protest. Hundreds of right-wing protesters stormed and broke into the camp. None were arrested.

The IDF chief military prosecutor charged five prison guards with acts of rape and torture. In order to bolster her controversial case, l Maj. Gen. Yifat Tomer-Yerushalmi  was accused of releasing a videotape to the media which documented the acts of torture.

The public response was outrage, violent and immediate. Crowds stormed the court and disrupted the proceedings, demanding the release of the guards. Polls showed that 65% of Israelis opposed their prosecution.

The far-right extremist government dutifully freed them and commenced a process of vilification, along with threats of violence and death against the prosecutor, which forced her to resign. The guards were lionised in Israel and have since enjoyed media celebrity as national heroes.

Israel is a sick nation. It has perpetrated one of the worst genocides in the 21st century. It has done so under the nose of the very nations that profess allegiance to the body of international law designed to prevent such atrocities. It has singlehandedly exposed the weakness of this system and destroyed any credibility it ever had. Humanity will reap the whirlwind.

Richard Silverstein writes the Tikun Olam blog and is a freelance journalist specialising in exposing secrets of the Israeli national security state. He campaigns against opacity and the negative impact of Israeli military censorship.

Follow Richard on X: @richards1052

Have questions or comments? Email us at: editorial-english@newarab.com

Opinions expressed in this article remain those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of The New Arab, its editorial board or staff.