Israeli Officials Denounce NYT Report on Systemic Sexual Abuse of Palestinians 

Israel’s Foreign Ministry denounced The New York Times for publishing an op-ed on Israel’s systemic sexual abuse of Palestinians.

The New York Times “chose to publish one of the worst blood libels ever to appear in the modern press,” the Israeli Foreign Ministry posted on X late on Monday. It went on to claim that the Times has an “agenda” and that the op-ed is “part of a false and well-orchestrated anti-Israel campaign.”

The article in question, “The Silence That Meets the Rape of Palestinians,” by Nicholas Kristof, recounts the stories of 14 Palestinians who experienced sexual violence at the hands of Israeli soldiers and settlers. A majority of the interviews discuss sexual violence inflicted by soldiers and interrogators on Palestinians in Israeli detention, but others speak of attacks by Israeli settlers in the occupied West Bank — attacks that are “increasingly protect[ed]” by the Israeli military, according to Kristof. The interviews are reinforced by testimony from Israeli and international human rights organizations, and demonstrate that sexual violence is systemic, used on a daily basis against Palestinians, and effectively Israeli state policy.

Israel’s ambassador to the U.S., Yechiel Leiter, also condemned the piece, saying that The New York Times and Kristof “count on you not pulling the curtain back on their lies.” He warned readers not to “buy into their blood libels.”

“I’ve spent some time reporting on widespread rape and other sexual violence of Palestinian male and female prisoners by Israeli authorities, and the article is now published,” Kristof said on X on Monday. “The assault victims were warned not to speak of what they endured — they were sometimes told they would be killed or raped if they gave interviews — but they found the courage to do so,” he added.

“One man described being raped three times in a single day in Israeli prison, the third time after he tried to protest. A young woman said the guards would come in at the beginning of each shift and strip her naked and abuse her. Another reported that she was shown photos of herself being raped and warned they would be released unless she cooperated with Israeli intelligence. Even three children who had been detained told me they had been sexually abused,” Kristof continued.

In December 2023, the Times published “Screams Without Words,” a piece alleging that Hamas “weaponized sexual violence” on October 7, 2023. The article received intense criticism and calls for review and retraction due to gaps in evidence, a lack of identified victims of sexual violence, flawed reporting methods, and questions surrounding its authors. The family of the main individual discussed as a victim of sexual violence, for example, rejected the accusation that she was raped. The article, which was featured on the front page of the Times, aimed to bolster Israel’s genocidal response to October 7. Despite even internal controversy within the Times, the article was not retracted, leading many to accuse the outlet of aiding Israel and providing cover for its genocidal war crimes in Gaza.

In a social media post on Monday, journalist Sana Saeed said of Kristof’s piece: “None of this is new. Sexual violence against Palestinians — men, boys, women, girls — has been an intimate part of the Israeli occupation for eight decades.”

Saeed continued, saying that this article “allows the NYT to once again wash its hands of even the accusations that it was directly culpable in war crimes against Palestinians,” referencing “Screams Without Words.”

On X, Noura Erakat wrote that Kristof’s piece, while important and deserving of coverage, “takes for granted how unsubstantiated mass rape allegation is part of racializing Palestinians as sexual predators who must be restrained by [the] full weight of state violence.”

“State-sanctioned sexual assault,” Erakat continued, “is inseparable” from racist constructs of Palestinians.