A new Israeli report has concluded that sexual violence was widespread and systematic during the Hamas-led incursion into Israel on October 7, 2023.
The Dinah Project, aiming to ‘achieve recognition and justice’ for the victims and survivors, published a major report on Tuesday, compiling testimonies and evidence on alleged sexual violence on October 7 and against those in Hamas captivity.
The report, part-funded by the British government and Israeli groups working in Israel and the U.S., identified ‘clear patterns’ in how alleged sexual violence was reported during the assault and according to hostages returning from Gaza.
It assessed that ‘Hamas used sexual violence as a tactical weapon, as part of a genocidal scheme and with the goal of terrorising and dehumanising Israeli society, a finding with significant implications for international justice mechanisms.’
Hamas has denied that its forces committed sexual violence against women or mistreated female hostages.
The report references three separate reports of mutilation, including two survivors from the IDF military base at Nahal Oz, who ‘described [the] cutting off [of] victims’ breasts’.
They also cite a senior ZAKA employee (voluntary post-disaster response team), who told Dinah Project Members last year that a female body had been found in Kibbutz Be’eri with a metal object inserted in her vagina.
A male body was also said to have been found in one of the kibbutzim, tied and naked with a metal object inserted in his groin, according to a ZAKA volunteer. A third case of a body of a male with an object inserted into his anus was described in the report.
The report cited a file released by Israel’s military which purported to show ‘an astounding call between a Hamas terrorist (an UNRWA worker) and his officer’, in which the former described a ‘sabaya’ (captive or sex slave), referring to her as a ‘pedigree mare’.
Hundreds fled in horror as Hamas closed in on the music festival
Abandoned and torched vehicles at the site of the October 7 attack on the Supernova desert music Festival by Palestinian militants near Kibbutz Reim in the Negev desert in southern Israel
A car dashcam caught what appeared to show a man armed with a Kalashnikov-style assault rifle, purportedly of Hamas, taking an Israeli citizen hostage at the festival on October 7
Dashcam footage shows an armed man during the incursion into Israel
A car destroyed in an attack by Hamas is seen in Sderot, Israel, on Saturday, October 7, 2023, amid the first strikes into Israel
According to the report, five witnesses reported at least four separate cases of gang-rape, and seven reported at least eight other separate cases of rape or severe sexual assaults, some of them in captivity.
Five witnesses also reported at least three cases of sexual assaults, some in captivity, and three reported three cases of mutilation.
Nine of those cases related to the Nova music festival, an open-air music festival during the Jewish holiday of Shemini Atzeret near kibbutz Re’im which was attacked by more operatives of Hamas’ Al Qassam Brigades.
One survivor of the festival told members of the Dinah project that she was subjected to an attempted rape and sexual assault, the report says.
The Israeli military said earlier this year that Hamas had killed 378 people at the Nova festival alone during the attack that sparked the Gaza war. Around 1,200 people were killed in total on October 7.
First responders described ‘clear signs of sexual violence across six locations’, identified in the report as the Nova music festival near the border with Gaza, on the Israeli highway Route 232, at the military base at Nahal Oz, and the Re’im, Nir Oz and Kfar Aza kibbutzim.
One former hostage also said she was forced to perform a sexual act, according to the report. Testimonies also referenced forced nudity.
Hostages described verbal and physical harassment, as well as threats of forced marriage.
Bodycam footage shared by the IDF purports to show Hamas on motorcycles on October 7
Qassam rockets fly over destroyed buildings following Israeli airstrikes on Gaza City, on October 19, 2023
A picture taken on November 5, 2023, shows strewn debris is situ nearly a month after an attack on the Supernova Music Festival
Cars and belongings left at the Supernova Festival site where hundreds were killed and dozens taken by Hamas militants near the border with Gaza on October 12, 2023 in Kibbutz Re’im
The Dinah report claims to ‘go beyond’ previous reports, including the UN’s findings last year that concluded Hamas had employed sexual violence on October 7 and against those in captivity.
Pramila Patten, the UN special representative on sexual violence in conflict, said at the time that her team of experts witnessed ‘unspeakable violence perpetrated with shocking brutality’, but were unable to establish the prevalence of sexual violence.
The authors of the Dinah report note that the mission could not ascertain ‘whether sexual violence was used as a tactic of war or in a widespread and/or systematic manner’.
They argue that Hamas did, in fact, employ sexual violence ‘as a tactical weapon of war’, and urge the UN to include potential designation of Hamas on the UN Secretary-General’s blacklist of groups that use sexual violence as a weapon.
It argues: ‘When individuals join a coordinated, ideologically-driven assault aimed at destruction and dehumanisation, they bear responsibility for the full range of atrocities committed as part of that assault—even if they did not personally commit each specific act or were not aware of its commission by a co-perpetrator.’
The report’s methodology notes that there is no formal legal definition of ‘tactical weaponisation of sexual violence’, but reference ‘the accepted scholarly description’ as ‘sexual assaults committed as part of an attack for the purpose of instilling fear and terror within the enemy’.
‘Since in most cases it would be impossible to find evidence of orders to use sexual assault as part of the attack, and since it can be assumed that most perpetrators would deny any prior planning of these acts, it is necessary to seek other means to indicate the premeditated usage of sexual violence,’ the report continues.
‘Thus, when a number of sexual assaults that were committed as part of an attack exhibit similarities or common elements indicative of a pattern, they are taken as demonstration of the systematic and intentional usage of sexual violence as a weapon of war.’
Palestinians stand atop of a Israeli military vehicle after breaking down a border fence in Gaza on October 7 2023
Palestinians break into the Israeli side of Israel-Gaza border fence on October 7 2023
A photo hangs on a fridge next to bullets holes in a house at Kibbutz Kissufim in southern Israel, October 21, 2023. The Kibbutz was overrun by Hamas militants from the nearby Gaza Strip on October 7, when they killed and captured many Israelis
Compiling information on the attack has been challenging. Critics of Israel’s government, including self-described feminist groups, have pushed back on media reports describing testimonies of victims as being unfounded and relying on non-credible witnesses.
The Times of Israel, a ‘non-partisan’ newspaper in Israel, published a story in May 2024 arguing that two debunked accounts of sexual violence from ZAKA workers had fuelled global skepticism of October 7 rape.
A volunteer commander with the Israeli search and rescue mission had found a teenager shot dead in her own home with her pants pulled down below her waist. He thought that was evidence of sexual violence, TOI reports.
The inference was ultimately discredited, after being widely reported in international media. He told the Associated Press: ‘I couldn’t think of any other option other than the teen having been sexually assault. At the end it turned out to be different, so I corrected myself.’
The article warned that debunked accounts had ‘encouraged skepticism and fueled a highly charged debate about the scope of what happened on October 7 – one that is still playing out on social media and in college campus protests’.
The UN, which did criticise how authorities had gathered evidence, conducted interviews, visited attack sites and reviewed more than 5,000 photographic images and some 50 hours of the attacks before asserting that it had found credible evidence of sexual violence against both October 7 victims and hostages.
The Dinah report notes it is not ‘engaged in the independent collection of testimonies’, led instead by a police investigation.
The report intends to serve as a ‘global legal blueprint’ to explain ‘how to prosecute sexual violence as a weapon of war – even when evidence is messy, survivors are gone, and individual perpetrators can’t be tied to individual acts’.
Military vehicles carrying Israeli soldiers manoeuvre in Gaza, as seen from the Israeli side of the border, July 5, 2025
Smoke rises in Gaza following an explosion, as seen from the Israeli side of the border, July 5, 2025
Palestinians who lost their lives, including a 5 month-old baby are transferred to Al-Shifa Hospital’s morgue following an Israeli airstrike Gaza Strip, on July 7, 2025
This picture taken from a position at Israel’s border with the Gaza Strip shows the sun setting behind destroyed buildings in the besieged Palestinian territory on July 3, 2025
Negotiators met today in the hopes of finding an end to the war after 21 months of conflict.
Families on both sides of the border have been torn apart by the conflict between Israel and Hamas.
Scores of people were taken back into Gaza as hostages on October 7 and still it is believed there are 20 living captives still in the Palestinian enclave.
The death toll in Gaza passed 57,000 in recent days, according to the Hamas-run Palestinian Health Ministry
The Israeli government has been accused of ‘deliberately’ imposing a famine on the civilian population by the UN.
Commenting on today’s report, an FCDO spokesperson told MailOnline: ‘We welcome The Dinah Project’s work in drawing attention to reports of sexual violence perpetrated on October 7. Civil society organisations play a critical role in strengthening the international response to conflict-related sexual violence.
‘The reports of sexual violence on and since 7th October are horrifying. The UK has consistently called for these reports to be fully investigated to ensure justice for victims, holistic support for survivors, and for all parties to take a survivor-centred approach.’
Views expressed in funded external reports do not necessarily reflect UK government policy.
This article was originally published by a www.dailymail.co.uk . Read the Original article here. .