At European Parliament, Urgent Call for Action on Women’s Rights a Year After Hamas Sexual Violence

Global silence and inaction in the face of gender-based violence by Hamas were condemned at the European Parliament this week, where a panel of experts warned that the denial and rationalization of the rape of Israeli women during the Palestinian terrorist group’s Oct. 7 attack last year legitimized gender-based violence as a weapon of war and enabled other regimes, such as Afghanistan’s Taliban-led government, to continue their oppression of women.

“If the world continues to turn a blind eye, we embolden these regimes and open the door to more atrocities,” said Dr. Charles Asher Small, executive director of the Institute for the Study of Global Antisemitism and Policy (ISGAP), which hosted the event.

“Antisemitism, as history shows, begins with Jews but never ends there. Today, the forces attacking Jewish people are the same ones oppressing women across the Middle East,” Small said.

The event, co-hosted by MEP Fulvio Martusciello and ISGAP, highlighted the deteriorating state of women’s rights in the region since the brutal Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas-led assault on Israel, and came one year after the attack, in which women were subjected to widespread sexual violence, including rape, torture, and mutilation.

Numerous eyewitness accounts, video evidence, and investigations by the United Nations confirmed that these acts were committed systematically, targeting women as part of the broader assault. Victims were found naked or partially clothed, and survivors have since provided harrowing testimonies of the brutal attacks, most recently last week, on the first anniversary of the Oct. 7 massacre.

Dr. Small and other panelists, including Claude Moniquet and Prof. Firouzeh Nahavandi, explored how extremism and political instability have compounded the suffering of women, who are often targeted both for their gender and their identity.

“The Oct. 7 attack was not just an assault on Israel but on the core values we claim to uphold — human rights, equality, and dignity,” Small said. He criticized the international community’s tepid response, noting, “The brutal murders and abductions of Israeli women by Hamas should have sparked global outrage, yet we faced silence, or worse, justifications disguised as resistance.”

The discussion also drew attention to the wider repression of women’s rights across the Middle East, with Qatar and Afghanistan cited as examples of regimes that suppress women’s freedoms while gaining international legitimacy. “Qatar funds radical movements while suppressing women’s rights,” Small noted, adding that the ongoing silence only emboldens such regimes.

“In Afghanistan, women can no longer speak publicly, let alone access education, and the world remains silent,” he said.

Manel Msalmi, president of the European Association for the Defense of Minorities, highlighted the “gendered nature of the violence” in the Oct. 7 attacks, stressing that women were specifically targeted for their gender with “unspeakable brutality designed to dehumanize and terrorize.” She urged the global community to respond with the urgency the atrocities demand.

“Whether in Iran, Afghanistan, or Gaza, women are systematically silenced, subjugated, and stripped of their most basic rights. It is disheartening that the international community has largely failed to respond with the urgency and outrage these atrocities demand,” Msalmi said.

“We cannot claim to stand for women’s rights, equality, or human dignity if we turn a blind eye to such barbarism,” she added.

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