The ongoing conflicts in Palestine and Sudan have witnessed harrowing reports of sexual violence, underscoring humanitarian concerns.

As this year’s International Day for the Elimination of Sexual Violence in Conflict is observed worldwide, particular attention is directed towards the ongoing atrocities in Palestine and Sudan, where conflict persists unabated without signs of intervention.

According to the United Nations, widespread sexual violence has been documented in both Palestine and Sudan, amounting to crimes against humanity. 

A first-of-its-kind investigation by an independent UN commission has revealed that Israeli forces used sexual violence as a weapon of war against Palestinian men, women and children. 

The incidents occurred amidst the ongoing Israeli war on the Gaza Strip, which has reached a staggering death toll of 37,372 Palestinians killed. 

Published this month, the investigation details how Palestinians are subject to forced public nudity, public stripping, physical torture and abuse, and sexual humiliation and harassment.

“The report found that specific forms of sexual and gender-based violence constitute part of Israeli Security Forces’ operating procedures,” the report said. “It made the finding due to the frequency, prevalence and severity of the violations, which include public stripping and nudity intended to humiliate the community at large and accentuate the subordination of an occupied people.”

Palestinian men were repeatedly filmed and photographed by Israeli soldiers while subjected to forced public stripping and nudity, the report said. 

In targeting Palestinian women, victims were subjected to psychological violence and sexual harassment online, including shaming and doxing female detainees and drawing gendered and sexualised graffiti, including at a women’s shelter in Gaza.

The commission’s report is based on interviews with victims and witnesses conducted remotely as Israeli authorities obstructed the UN’s investigations and prevented its access to the Gaza Strip.

Thousands of open-source items were verified through advanced forensic analysis, and hundreds of submissions, satellite imagery, and forensic medical reports were used to operate the report. 

On social media feeds, Israeli soldiers have been posting photos and videos of themselves toying and dressing up in lingerie found in the homes of Palestinians that they either killed or displaced.

Weapon of war

In Sudan, UN officials have voiced that acts of rape by the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) armed group were perpetrated in several provinces. 

In their 47-page report, the experts conveyed that the RSF had targeted sites where displaced people had found shelter, civilian neighbourhoods, and medical facilities.

UN experts stated that credible sources from Geneina reported rapes of women and girls as young as 14 by the RSF. These assaults occurred in a UN World Food Program storage facility under their control, as well as in homes and during return trips to retrieve belongings after displacement due to the violence.

Additionally, 16 girls were reportedly kidnapped by RSF soldiers and raped in an RSF house. 

In his address at the 55th Session of the Human Rights Council, Volker Turk, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, said that the crisis in Sudan continues to be marked by an insidious disregard for human life.

“Sexual violence as a weapon of war, including rape, has been a defining – and despicable – characteristic of this crisis since the beginning,” Turk said. 

“Since the start of the conflict last April, my Office has documented 60 incidents of conflict-related sexual violence, involving at least 120 victims across the country, the vast majority women and girls.”

“These figures are sadly a vast underrepresentation of the reality. Men in RSF uniform and armed men affiliated with the RSF, were reported to be responsible for 81 percent of the documented incidents,” he added. 

Attacks on healthcare facilities

Observed annually on June 19, the International Day for Elimination of Sexual Violence this year focuses on threats to healthcare.

Antonio Guterres, the Secretary-General of the United Nations (UN), has condemned attacks on hospitals and healthcare facilities.  

“Hospitals and other healthcare facilities should be beacons of safety and healing for all those injured in conflict, including the survivors of sexual violence. These are fundamental tenets of international humanitarian law,” Guterres stated. 

Guterres emphasised that attacks on healthcare facilities and workers restrict medical and psychosocial support for survivors of sexual violence. It also affects access to urgent reproductive healthcare for women and girls, and potentially isolates men and boys from necessary care.

“Women and girls who experience sexual violence may become pregnant from rape and require immediate sexual and reproductive healthcare,” he said. “Men and boys may be at risk of increased isolation if they cannot access appropriate care.”

Earlier this month, RSF soldiers attacked the South Hospital, the only facility with surgical capacity in El Fasher, Darfur, causing the building to shut down over the weekend. 

The NGO that helps to run the hospital, Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF), said that the RSF fighters stole equipment and an ambulance.

The WHO condemned the attack, and denounced a separate targeting of a health facility in Wad Al-Nura in Al-Jazirah state, south of Khartoum, which resulted in the death of a nurse.

Insecurity Insight, an outlet that examines threats facing people living and working in dangerous environments, published a report that identified at least 284 attacks on Sudan’s healthcare system since the war started in April of 2023. 

“At least 61 health workers have been killed, 30 kidnapped and 63 injured. In addition, health facilities have been damaged at least 62 times,” the report highlighted.

Medical facilities have also been a central target of Israel’s assault on the Gaza Strip.

The healthcare system in the besieged territory has neared total collapse after months of intense bombing and a total blockade on fuel, water, and aid.

Last month, the European Union said 31 out of 36 hospitals in Gaza have been damaged or destroyed since October 7, calling for an end to attacks on health facilities. 

Among the destroyed facilities is Al-Shifa Hospital, the largest medical complex in the Gaza Strip, which remains entirely out of service after a two-week-long invasion and siege by Israeli forces.