Raheel Raza: The New York Times weaponizes questionable rape story about Israel

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In the immediate aftermath of October 7, there was silence and denial about the sexual violence perpetrated by Hamas against innocent Israeli civilians. Feminist groups, women’s rights groups, the United Nations and many in the media would not touch the issue, with some going as far as claiming that the rapes, mutilations and other horrors inflicted on innocent women had not happened at all, or that there was not enough evidence to substantiate such claims.

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Members of the Council of Muslims Against Antisemitism (CMAA), where I serve as president, recognized the truth early on. As Muslims who are well-versed in Islamist ideology, we understood that weaponizing sexual violence as a tool of war was not outside the realm of possibility for Hamas.

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On March 3, 2024, five months after the Hamas attack, CMAA and Secure Canada hosted an event in Toronto titled, “Women on the Frontlines: Muslim Leaders Speak Out Against the Sexual Violence of October 7.”

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The focus of the event was to recognize the impact of sexual violence. It featured seven Muslim speakers, along with Ruth Halperin-Kaddari, a prominent Israeli legal scholar and founding member of the Dinah Project, an organization committed to seeking justice for the victims of conflict-related sexual violence.

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Despite having diverse backgrounds and ethnicities, they all had one thing in common: they felt the need to speak truth to power. And they did this very effectively.

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Kaddari described the horrific, sadistic actions of the Hamas attackers and how they revelled in their evil. Since then, the Dinah Project published a book, “A Quest for Justice: October 7 and Beyond,” which is described as, “The first comprehensive legal and evidentiary framework to analyze the systematic use of sexual violence as a weapon of war during the October 7 Hamas attacks on Israel.”

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Asra Nomani — a Muslim investigative journalist and founder of the Pearl Project, which was setup to investigate the murder of her Wall Street Journal colleague Daniel Pearl — said she was inspired by the event and the panel filled with the “brave voices” of her fellow Muslims

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Zuhdi Jasser, a former U.S. Navy commander and expert on terrorism who co-founded the Muslim Reform Movement, pointed out that no matter what people may think, this battle is not simply one of Israel versus Hamas, but of radical Islam launching an assault on the western values of freedom, women’s rights, free speech and democracy.

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Soraya Deen, a lawyer and founder of the Muslim Women Speakers Movement, said that, “Hamas desecrated Islam by taking women, children and the elderly as hostages. The mass rape and murder of Jewish women was an affront to humanity.”

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All the other speakers clearly condemned the brutal attack by Hamas and its use of sexual violence.

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Their voices are just as important now as they were back then. As Cochav Elkayam-Levy, who co-authored the civil commission report, wrote,  “For victims of sexual crimes, recognition is inseparable from the possibility of justice. It is never merely symbolic: it forms a necessary step in the process of healing and the restoration of dignity.”

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We should not allow people like Kristof to hijack the narrative and prevent the victims of Hamas’s brutality from having their stories heard and seeking the justice they so rightly deserve.

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National Post

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Raheel Raza is president of the Council for Muslims Against Antisemitism.

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