Two United Nations human rights experts called on Monday that the perpetrators of numerous alleged crimes, including sexual violence, committed during Hamas' Oct. 7 attack on Israeli soil be punished.
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They recalled that these alleged crimes constituted serious violations of international law and “could be classified as crimes against humanity,” involving people burned alive in their homes or shelters, as well as corpses, who were beheaded, mutilated or bore signs of execution.
“The growing evidence of reported sexual violence is particularly distressing,” UN Special Rapporteur on Torture Alice Jill Edwards and Special Rapporteur on Extrajudicial Executions Morris Tidball-Binz said in a statement.
They condemned “allegations of sexual torture (including) rape, gang rape, sexual assault, genital mutilation and shooting.”
“Bodies of women were found with their clothing pulled up to the waist, their underwear removed or torn or stained with blood,” they added.
These two officials are independent experts appointed by the UN Human Rights Council but do not speak on behalf of the United Nations.
The United Nations has been criticized for being slow to respond to rape and sexual violence allegedly committed during the unprecedented October 7 attack.
That attack, the deadliest against civilians on Israeli soil since the state's founding in 1948, left around 1,140 dead, mostly civilians, according to an AFP count based on the Israeli toll.
About 250 people were kidnapped, including about 100 who were released in late November in exchange for Palestinian prisoners.
Israel vowed to destroy Hamas after the October 7 attack.
The Israeli offensive in Gaza, where Hamas seized power in 2007, has left more than 23,000 dead, mostly civilians, according to the Islamist movement's most recent health ministry report.
The bombings there destroyed entire neighborhoods, displaced 85% of the population and triggered a catastrophic humanitarian crisis, according to the United Nations.
In early December, Israeli UN Ambassador Gilad Erdan reiterated that Hamas had “used rape and sexual violence as weapons of war.”
Hamas rejected these accusations, calling them “baseless accusations” aimed at “demonizing” them.