When the body of Shani Louk, a 23-year-old German-Israeli woman present at the Nova electronic music festival, lifeless and largely naked, was loaded into the back of a pick-up and then paraded in the streets of Gaza, the The act was filmed and broadcast in the very first moments of the attack on October 7. It was perhaps, without Hamas yet imagining it, one of the first documents attesting to sexual violence committed that day. Her mother confirmed the young woman’s death on October 30. Shani Louk’s relatives are among the 56 families of victims and hostages represented by Israeli lawyer Yael Vias Gvirsman before the French and German courts and the International Criminal Court. For meme Vias Gvirsman, the atrocities of October 7 constitute a “systematic and deliberate attack against a civilian population, with acts of murder, torture, mutilation against vulnerable people, the elderly, young children, babies”.
The lawyer filed a report with the ICC for sexual violence against Shani Louk. “For the other victims, it is still too early. We know that living witnesses arise and will arise again. I receive indications from soldiers who want to speak out about what they know, including rape.”she adds.
These complaints could be part of the work carried out for years by the ICC to better understand the phenomenon of sexual abuse in times of war, which is not limited to rape: “It is crucial to understand all forms of sexual violence, such as forced nudity. We list all the cases that could be handled by the ICC. As for their documentation, it is difficult. For one known case, there are perhaps ten unknown ones, or even more”, explains Alix Vuillemin, executive director of the international organization Women’s Initiatives for Gender Justice, which cooperates with the legal institution. Sexual violence in times of war is not yet completely defined, but it can consist of mutilation of genitals, humiliation, desecration of corpses, photos distributed without consent, etc.
“Basin completely broken”
Israeli associations created in the aftermath of the October 7 attack, NGOs and the Israeli state are trying to collect as much information as possible. These are difficult to gather. The scale of the October 7 attack, the fighting that followed, and the hasty collection of bodies and their burial did not allow for proper documentation of all of the violence committed by Hamas. Forensic analyzes could not be carried out due to the emergency or the condition of the corpses, many of which were burned.
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