The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), the nation’s largest Muslim civil rights and advocacy organization, today called on Congress and the Trump administration to take immediate action after a New York Times report detailed horrifying allegations of widespread sexual abuse, rape, torture, and humiliation of Palestinians held in Israeli detention facilities.
Archiv: Nicholas Kristof
This is a hard article to read, but I hope you‘ll do so.
(May 11, 2026)
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. The assault victims were warned not to give 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. 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. Look, whatever our position on the Middle East, we should be able to agree on being anti-rape. Sexual assaults were horrific when Israeli women were targeted on Oct. 7, and they‘re equally horrific when Israeli authorities use them against Palestinians day after day after day. We should be able to find common ground in opposing rape. Here‘s a gift link to the article:
The Horror of Sexual Assault in Israeli Prisons
(transcript)
I’m appalled by this pattern of abuse, partly because our American tax dollars subsidize the Israeli security forces. I fear that leaves us complicit. The United States has leverage, and we could use it to insist on an end to the impunity and to demand that Red Cross visits be restored for Palestinian detainees. Look, whether you consider yourself pro-Israeli or pro-Palestinian, here’s one thing we should be able to agree on: We’re anti-rape. The horrific abuse inflicted on Israeli women on Oct. 7 now happens to Palestinians day after day after day.
The Silence That Meets the Rape of Palestinians
It’s a simple proposition: Whatever our views of the Middle East conflict, we should be able to unite in condemning rape.
Supporters of Israel made that point after the brutal sexual assaults against Israeli women during the Hamas-led attack on Israel on Oct. 7, 2023. Donald Trump, Joe Biden, Benjamin Netanyahu and many U.S. senators, including Marco Rubio, condemned that sexual violence, and Netanyahu rightly called on “all civilized leaders” to “speak up.”
And yet in wrenching interviews, Palestinians have recounted to me a pattern of widespread Israeli sexual violence against men, women and even children — by soldiers, settlers, interrogators in the Shin Bet internal security agency and, above all, prison guards.