The UN continues to exceed expectations

The UN finally released a report, yesterday, compiled by a team of experts sent to Israel and the West Bank, led by Pramila Patten, the secretary general’s special representative on sexual violence in conflict. In their full report, the experts said they found “reasonable grounds” to believe that sexual violence occurred during the Hamas-led incursion into Israel, including rape and gang rape in at least three locations. But the experts could not determine who was responsible for the sexual assaults.

If you stop reading right here, you’re probably in a fit of rage at how the report minimizes the enormity and barbarity of the horrific sexual crimes committed against scores, if not hundreds, of innocent women, girls and young men by Hamas terrorists and their civilian supporters, many of whom were captured on their own video cams.

The report goes on to state that it found “clear and convincing information” based on firsthand accounts of released hostages that sexual violence, including rape, sexualized torture, and cruel, inhumane and degrading treatment, was inflicted against some women and children during their time in captivity, and that the abuse was still taking place against hostages still in Gaza.

Finally, perhaps a glimmer of hope that the UN is going to galvanize the nations of the world to demand, or even force, Hamas to release these hostages from their ordeal of rape and torture?

Not a chance.

But wait…there’s more.

The UN report that was supposed to expose and confirm the horrific sexual crimes against innocent civilians by Hamas also said that it heard accounts of sexual violence against Palestinians by Israeli security forces. Palestinian officials and civil society representatives told the UN team of “cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment of Palestinians in detention, including various forms of sexual violence in the form of invasive body searches, threats of rape, and prolonged forced nudity, as well as sexual harassment and threats of rape, during house raids and at checkpoints.”

Philippe Lazzarini, the head of UNRWA, told reporters yesterday that Palestinians interviewed by UNRWA reported a “broad range of ill-treatment” from the Israeli soldiers, including being forced to strip naked, verbal and psychological abuse, threats of electrocution, sleep deprivation, extreme noise and the use of dogs to intimidate people.

And there you have it – unsubstantiated threats of rape against Palestinian terrorists or terror suspects, based on unconfirmed allegations, is the equivalent of Israeli female corpses raped and mutilated, video footage of sexual atrocities and eyewitness testimony of rape and sexual assault by the actual victims. Verbal and psychological, sleep deprivation, extreme noise used against captured terrorists vs. rape and mutilation against innocent girls attending a music festival.

Not a single allegation of rape has been brought against even one IDF soldier in this war against Hamas. Stripping down terrorists to make sure they are not strapped with explosives, or in an effort to extract information of impending terror attacks might be traumatizing, but it certainly cannot be equated on any level with the brutal gang rapes, mutilations and barbaric tortures perpetrated against innocent civilians by Hamas. To cite them side by side in the same report is simply reprehensible.

Can the UN’s anti-Israel bias be any clearer?

Just as expected…and more.