The terrorist group Hamas is still denying that its members committed rape and sexual assault against civilian women during the Oct. 7 attack in southern Israel.
Hamas official Basem Naim sounded off this week on a Thursday report in The New York Times detailing the group's atrocities against women and children.
Western media and news agencies are "biased to what the Israeli propaganda says [in terms of] lies and slanders against the Palestinians and their resistance," argued Naim, according to a translation by The Times of Israel.
He also falsely claimed that the Times report was based on accounts given indirectly by "women who said they heard other women repeating these allegations" and that "no conclusive evidence" of the rapes existed.
However, the report actually included evidence from interviews with over 150 witnesses, medical personnel, first responders, soldiers, rape counselors, and government officials.
Actual video footage, photographs, and GPS data from cellphones were also examined.
"The Times identified at least seven locations where Israeli women and girls appear to have been sexually assaulted or mutilated," the paper wrote.
"Many of the accounts are difficult to bear, and the visual evidence is disturbing to see," it added.
Later in Naim's statement, he claimed that the report contradicts testimonies given by Israeli women of "good treatment they had experienced from the Palestinian fighters" during the attack and while in custody.
But an Israeli TV interview of one of those Israeli women forced to appear in Hamas' propaganda videos while being held hostage, Mia Shem, revealed a different story.
"I felt like an animal in a zoo ... I was choking on my own tears," Shem said, recalling stories of abuse during her abduction.
Shem was released by Hamas in a November prisoner exchange.
Luca Cacciatore ✉
Luca Cacciatore, a Newsmax general assignment writer, is based in Arlington, Virginia, reporting on news and politics.
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