Gazan terrorists engaged in systematic rape, targeting of civilians, and atrocities during the October 7 massacre, according to the details and testimony compiled in an All Party United Kingdom-Israel Parliamentary Group report published Tuesday on what it said was the largest UK loss in a Middle Eastern terrorist attack.
Eighteen British nationals were murdered and two taken hostage, one being slain in captivity and another released after being held almost 500 days in Gaza.
Lord Andrew Roberts, a historian and chair of the report, explained in the foreword that the document was vital as denial of the brutalities emerged only hours after the pogrom unfolded, comparing such claims to Holocaust denial.
“I believe that it is vital to prevent the emergence of another, more modern version of Holocaust denial, namely 7 October denial,” said Roberts.
Roberts said the denial of the events was ironic considering the volumes of evidence gathered from footage filmed by the perpetrators, much of which was removed from social media due to guideline violations or deleted when official terrorist accounts were banned.
By compiling, integrating, and analyzing the survivor, eyewitness, and first responder accounts, as well as open-source information such as photographic and video evidence, body cameras, CCTV footage, and reports by outlets of note and reputable organizations, the report explained that it sought to serve as an “authoritative historical record.” The researchers created their own list of victims for their analysis and classifications.
"The atrocities committed by Hamas and allied groups on 7 October marked a day of unprecedented violence," read the report. "There are numerous accounts of deliberate killings, hostage abuse, sexual violence, and desecration of both the living and the dead."
The compiled testimonies made it clear that the attack led by 3,000 Hamas commandos and backed by 2,000 other terrorists and Gazan civilians, deliberately targeted civilians with shootings, incendiary attacks, grenades, rocket attacks, and more.
“Civilians were targeted with calculated and unreserved precision,” read the report. “Victims, spanning all ages from infants to the elderly, were often shot at point-blank range, burned alive, or killed by grenades.”
A total of 863 civilians were killed on October 7, according to the report’s classification metrics, accounting for 73% of the 1,182 fatalities in the two-day period reviewed by the group. Nine in 10 of the 4,000 wounded suffered from gunshot wounds, with another 19% wounded by grenades and other explosive weapons.
Terrorists shouted their intentions
While Hamas leadership and supporters have often denied the deliberate targeting of civilians, testimonies about the attacks and ambushes included in the report highlighted the irrefutability of the intent.
At Kfar Aza, at least five residents testified hearing terrorists shout “Massacre the Jews!” and “Everyone out, Jews, everyone out!”
In Kibbutz Sufa, the death of British-born immigrant Bernard Cowan was documented by the Hamas terrorists who shot him to death. The youngest victim, 14-hours-old Bedouin-Israeli Naama Abu Rashed, died due to a bullet that had hit her in utero. Her mother, in labor, was being rushed to the hospital when 10 terrorists ambushed and shot at the car, striking the woman in the stomach. Though the baby was delivered alive, she succumbed to her wounds, survived by her mother.
Nine-month-old Mila Cohen was the second-youngest October 7 victim, shot while in her mother’s arms by terrorists who broke into the safe room in her Be’eri home. Her mother and older siblings survived, but her father and grandmother were murdered. A total of 37 victims under 17 died on October 7.
The report detailed how there was significant testimony and forensic evidence to demonstrate how civilians were targeted with arson attacks, particularly those hiding in safe rooms. In Kfar Aza, the Golan family, which included an 18-month-old, suffered second- and third-degree burns on 30-60% of their body when terrorists set the house alight using a gas cylinder after they failed to smoke the family out using a burning tire. In Nir Oz, the Siman-Tov family was killed after their home was set on fire.
”They’re here. They’re burning us. We’re suffocating,” Yonatan Siman-Tov reportedly texted his sister.
When the family opened the metal screen on the window the Siman-Tov parents were shot to death by terrorists. Five-year-old twins Shahar and Arbel and two-year-old Omer died from being burned alive and asphyxiated.
The number of fires in southern Israel on October 7 was the second-highest in the last decade, according to the NASA satellite FIRMS system, surpassed only by the 2020 wildfires. Twelve civilians and four soldiers were hospitalized due to burns they suffered during the attacks.
Hamas terrorists also targeted civilian safe rooms and bomb shelters with grenade attacks, as made evident in testimonies and in footage. Many of those murdered at the Nova music festival massacre were killed when grenades were tossed into shelters.During a Netiv Ha’asara home invasion, terrorists threw a grenade at the safe room of the Ta’asa family. CCTV cameras captured how Gil Ta’asa leaped onto the grenade to protect his 12-year-old and nine-year-old sons, who were wounded by the explosive device’s shrapnel. The gunmen shot him in the head to ensure that he was dead, then posted documentation of the murder on the older boy’s Facebook page using his phone.
UK-Israeli citizen and off-duty soldier Aner Shapira was attending the Nova festival when it was attacked. When grenades were thrown into his shelter, he threw them back at the assailants, saving lives, but was killed by an eighth explosive.To demonstrate the sexual violence and gang rapes of October 7, the report cited and built on the 2024 UN Office of the Special Representative of Secretary-General on Sexual Violence in Conflict report, which acknowledged a pattern of “fully naked or partially naked bodies from the waist down” with “hands tied and shot multiple time” in a manner that “may be indicative of some forms of sexual violence.”The UK report shared the testimony of a survivor who identified themselves as Sapir, who observed a terrorist stabbing a victim in the back while he raped her. The witness also saw another victim raped and her breast removed with a box cutter. Yoni Saadon told the Sunday Times that he saw a woman begging to be killed while around 10 terrorists beat and raped her.“When they finished, they were laughing and the last one shot her in the head,” Saadon told the Times.Rami Davidian recounted in ex-Meta CEO Sheryl Sandberg’s Screams Before Silence documentary how he found girls bound in the Re’im forest.“Their legs were spread. Everyone who sees this, knows right away that the girls were abused. Someone stripped them, someone raped them. They inserted all kinds of things into their intimate organs, like wooden boards, iron rods. Over 30 girls were murdered and raped here. I had to close their legs and cover their bodies, so no one else would see what I saw. No one. No one can see those kinds of things,” said Davidian.The report noted how the full extent of what befell such victims would never be known because many of those raped and sexually assaulted were murdered. There were also issues of collecting forensic evidence for rape victims in an active combat zone, as well as military and volunteer first responders who didn’t know how to address the issue and accidentally damaged such evidence.Some testimonies detailed how corpses were raped. Other desecrations of the deceased occurred, including decapitations. Due to the state of some of the bodies, it was unclear if some of the decapitations were due to explosives or bladed weapons.Some of the decapitations may have occurred while the victim was alive. It is unknown if Aviad Edri was decapitated before or after his death, but he had also been shot. Thai agricultural worker Somkuan Pansard was alive when terrorists used a garden hoe to decapitate him.The report also documented torture and beatings of murder victims, as well as of some of the 210 live hostages that were taken to Gaza along with another 41 bodies. Most infamously, footage was captured of now-released hostage Yarden Bibas being beaten by unarmed Gazan civilians as he was taken from Nir Oz.“Based on the testimony and medical assessments of hostages who have been released, the abuse of hostages also continued during their time in captivity,” read the report. “This abuse has included sunlight deprivation, starvation, binding, beatings, sexual abuse, and other degrading and humiliating treatment.”Released hostage Amit Soussana testified before the UN Security Council in October 2024 how she was sexually assaulted while in captivity.The report was dedicated in part to British-Israeli citizen Emily Damari, who was shot in the hand and lost two fingers when she was abducted in Kfar Aza. Released in a ransom deal after 15 months of captivity, Damari’s wounds were improperly treated by her captors.While Damari survived, other British victims eulogized in the report did not. Nadav Popplewell died in captivity, his body later recovered by IDF troops. His brother Roi was shot in the back of his head outside his home. Their mother, Channah Peri, was taken hostage and released in a hostage deal.Andrew Fox, who contributed to the report, said on X that it was the “most comprehensive report yet written about the 7th October rape, mutilation and murder onslaught in Israel. A remarkable piece of scholarship and highly evidenced truth-telling.”Disclaimer: The writer is cited in the report based on a first-person experience written for The Jerusalem Post earlier during the war.