My computer has a file labeled “Gazette Column,” in which I keep articles about possible subjects for future columns. Since last November, I have been saving stories about the rapes, torture, mutilations, and murders of Israeli women by Hamas on Oct. 7, with the intention of writing a column bearing witness to the deafening silence of organizations charged with protecting women’s human rights, giving rise to Eve Barlow’s slogan, #MeTooUnlessYou’reaJew.

Barlow asks on Instagram “why women around the world continue to be silent about the atrocities of October 7.”

For five months, while I wrote columns calling for Israel, Palestine, and the rest of the world to stand together against the war in Gaza and advocated for the Easthampton City Council to pass a cease-fire resolution, I too stayed publicly silent about Hamas’ use of rape as a weapon of terrorism against Israel.

The Washington Post’s article, “Israel investigates an elusive, horrific enemy: Rape as a weapon of war,” began with: “Warning: The following report includes graphic descriptions of sexual violence.” As a Jewish woman, with a deep connection to Israel, I dreaded reading the horrific, truly “unspeakable” descriptions. Rape in war dehumanizes not only the victim, but also anyone with a connection to those who are targeted. It instills fear that increases when we witness the denial of such horror.

In a phone conversation, my Israeli friend confessed her fear that she might also one day be a victim of Hamas. For her, like so many traumatized Israelis, it is still Oct. 8.

Professor Cochav Elkayam-Levy, an expert on International Law and Human Rights, established and heads The Civil Commission on Oct. 7th Crimes by Hamas against Women and Children. The commission collected medical and forensic reports, interviewed eyewitnesses, watched videos, including images of women, some naked, being paraded by Hamas into Gaza as trophies of war. The commission’s emphasis was on compiling reports based on credible information, to be sent to every U.N. agency charged with protecting the rights of women and children.

The commission had hoped for a condemnation of the atrocities committed by Hamas, offers of assistance, and expressions of solidarity with the victims. Instead they received a deafening silence from the very same non-governmental feminist and human rights organizations that have advocated on behalf of women victims of rape as a weapon of war in places such as Bosnia, Rwanda, Syria, and Myanmar.

It took 114 days for a U.N. report from the U.N. Special Representative of the Secretary-General on Sexual Violence in Conflict, Pramila Patten. According to the report, Patten “led an official visit to Israel, supported by a team of technical experts, from 29 January to 14 February 2024 ... to gather, analyze and verify allegations of conflict-related sexual violence reportedly committed during the brutal, Hamas-led terror attacks of 7 October 2023 … the mission team found clear and convincing information that sexual violence, including rape, sexualized torture, cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment has been committed against hostages and has reasonable grounds to believe that such violence may be ongoing against those still held in captivity.”

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“The mission team found that there are reasonable grounds to believe that conflict-related sexual violence occurred in multiple locations during the 7 October attacks, including rape and gang-rape in at least three locations, namely: the Nova music festival site and its surroundings, Road 232, and Kibbutz Re’im. In most of these incidents, victims first subjected to rape were then killed, and at least two incidents relate to the rape of women’s corpses.”

“The mission team also found a pattern of victims, mostly women, found fully or partially naked, bound, and shot across multiple locations. In other locations … while circumstantial information may indicate some forms of sexual violence, the mission could not verify reported incidents of rape” (www.un.org/sexualviolenceinconflict/press-release/israel-west-bank-mission/).

The Israeli government’s determination to destroy Hamas, which led to the continuing war in Gaza, has led to increased global denial of the horrors of Oct. 7. Feminists, human rights NGOs, gender studies academics, and “progressive” media continue to turn a blind eye to the atrocities, instead isolating the victims, rendering their pain invisible.

Victims of sexual violence can only heal in the presence of those who acknowledge their suffering. The “othering” of Israeli women in the context of increased antisemitism deprives them of the compassion, as well as justice that victims of gender violence anywhere deserve. Ultimately, it retraumatizes and silences them, leaving no escape from their anguish, allowing unhealed trauma to fester for generations.

The brutality of Israel’s 57-year occupation of Palestinian territories should never be used to justify the sadistic and murderous violence inflicted by Hamas on Oct. 7. Nor should the violence of Oct. 7 be used as justification for the genocidal collective punishment of civilian Palestinians in Gaza.

Gender-based violence should never be weaponized by governments, nor by non-governmental organizations, like U.N. Women, whose duty is to safeguard the human rights of victims everywhere. In Elkayam Levy’s words, “The failure to condemn these hideous crimes weakens global institutions … provides fertile ground for weaponizing women’s and girls’ bodies in warfare.”

Sara Weinberger of Easthampton is a professor emerita of social work. She can be reached at columnists@gazettenet.com.