Romi Gonen, just 23 years old, endured 471 days of unimaginable horror. Kidnapped from the Nova music festival on October 7th, she was held hostage by Hamas, a period marked by brutal captivity and systematic abuse.
Gonen recently broke her silence, courageously detailing the sexual violence she suffered during her ordeal. In an interview with Israel Channel 12, she recounted the repeated rapes and tortures inflicted upon her, a testament to the depravity of her captors.
A haunting fear consumed her – the dread of becoming a permanent sex slave, trapped in a lifetime of abuse. She repeatedly questioned her attackers, pleading for understanding with a simple, desperate cry: “Why? It’s just not fair.”
During one particularly horrific moment, while enduring an assault, Gonen wept uncontrollably. Yet, her attacker wasn’t deterred; he was, in her words, “having the time of his life,” reveling in her suffering and viewing her as a prize.
The brutality wasn’t isolated. Captured Palestinian Islamic Jihad terrorists have confessed to raping Israeli women during the October 7th attacks, confirming the deliberate use of sexual violence as a weapon of terror.
Israel’s national police unit, Lahav 433, has been meticulously collecting evidence of these crimes. Survivors have offered harrowing testimonies, witnessing unspeakable acts committed against others.
One survivor recounted seeing another woman repeatedly raped before being brutally murdered. The sheer horror of the event, the transfer of the victim between attackers, remains etched in her memory.
A comprehensive two-month investigation by The New York Times corroborated these accounts, interviewing 150 individuals – witnesses, medical professionals, soldiers, and counselors – to document the widespread sexual violence.
The Association of Rape Crisis Centers in Israel (AARCC) published an extensive report detailing the systematic and sadistic nature of the sex crimes committed by Hamas. The report, translated into English, was sent to the United Nations.
The AARCC report underscores the premeditated and deliberate use of rape as a tool of war, extending beyond the expected victims to include underage girls, boys, men, and women. It leaves no room for doubt or denial of the atrocities committed.