The Israeli government announced Thursday it will file a defamation lawsuit against The New York Times over a meticulously-reported story from earlier this week on the alleged systematic rape and sexual abuse of Palestinian men, women and children held in Israeli prisons.
In a joint statement, both Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar said they ordered the lawsuit “following the publication by Nicholas Kristof in The New York Times of one of the most hideous and distorted lies ever published against the State of Israel in the modern press, which also received the backing of the newspaper.”
The journalist published his sex abuse investigation in the Times’ Opinion section on Monday. Citing graphic, firsthand testimony from 14 survivors, Kristof lays out how Israeli settlers and members of security forces would engage in the sexual assault, rape and torture of Palestinian civilians being held in Israel’s many documented camps.
“I’m appalled by this pattern of abuse, partly because our American tax dollars subsidize the Israeli security forces. I fear that leaves us complicit,” the longtime columnist said in a Times video for the story. “Look, whether you consider yourself pro-Israeli or pro-Palestinian, here’s one thing we should be able to agree on: We’re anti-rape.”
