An Associated Press report published on Wednesday debunked allegations of sexual violence perpetrated by Palestinian militant fighters on October 7. The report explored the testimony of a ZAKA volunteer, Chaim Otmazgin, which was used to document purported allegations of violence by Palestinian fighters, including Hamas militants. Most of that testimony of the Israeli search and rescue organisation volunteer was later debunked, which Hamas claimed was a “new slap’’ in the face of the “promoters’’ of such allegations.
The ZAKA volunteer, Chaim Otmazgin, was working in a settlement that was raided by Hamas on October 7. He saw the body of a teenager, shot dead and separated from her family in a different room, which he “thought” was an evidence of sexual violence following which he informed the journalists of what he witnessed, the report said.
Chaim Otmazgin also recounted the details in a nationally televised appearance in the Knesset, which was then picked up by the Western media claiming that Palestinian fighters sexually assaulted women during the “Operation Al-Aqsa Flood’’ on October 7, 2023. But it later turned out that Otmazgin’s testament was false as what Otmazgin “thought” occurred, never happened, similar to many other accounts from that day which were later proved untrue.
"It’s not that I invented a story, I couldn't think of any other option other than the teen having been sexually assaulted," Otmazgin claimed while detailing the origins of his allegation to The Associated Press. "At the end, it turned out to be different, so I corrected myself," she said.
Meanwhile, Hamas welcomed the report by the news agency, which shed light on the fabricated allegations against the militant group. Hamas said the report ''proved that they (sexual assault allegations) are pure lies and blatant fabrications''. The Palestinian resistance group also called on US President Joe Biden and European Union member states to apologise and stop falsely accusing the resistance and the Palestinian people.
''The report published by the American Associated Press agency, in which it confirmed that the allegations of the Zionist entity that the Palestinian resistance committed sexual violence on 7 October are not true and that they were deliberately fabricated, is a new slap in the face of the promoters of these baseless allegations,'' Hamas said in a statement.