The United Nations on Friday added Israeli and Russian security forces for the first time to an annual report documenting sexual violence in conflicts, including allegations of rape and sexual abuse against Palestinian detainees and Ukrainian prisoners of war.
The report lists dozens of countries and nonstate groups “credibly suspected” of patterns of rape and sexual violence. The list includes Hamas, which led the October 2023 attack against Israel that started the war in Gaza; the Rapid Support Forces, the paramilitary troops accused of atrocities in Sudan; and rebel groups in the Democratic Republic of Congo, where fighting has displaced thousands.
The list was released a day after Israel’s ambassador to the United Nations called his country’s inclusion on it “disconnected from the facts and reality.” The ambassador, Danny Danon, said on Thursday that Israel would cut ties with the U.N. secretary general over the report.
The Russian mission to the United Nations did not immediately comment. Russian officials have repeatedly denied accusations of human rights abuses and dismissed evidence collected by international investigators since Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022.
The U.N. investigators documented nearly 10,000 cases of conflict-related sexual violence around the world in 2025, more than double the number they verified the year before.
That figure “represents the very tip of the iceberg,” a U.N. special representative, Pramila Patten, told reporters on Friday. She attributed the increase to the large number of global conflicts “and the fact that perpetrators are feeling emboldened by a context of impunity where this crime is almost cost free.”
U.N. investigators, the report said, verified “multiple incidents of conflict-related sexual violence, including as a form of torture, inflicted against 14 men, seven women, nine boys and one girl from the Gaza Strip and the West Bank.”
Thirteen cases took place in 2025, the report said, and 18 others in the two preceding years.
“Rape and gang rape, in some cases repeated, were perpetrated against nine victims, the majority from Gaza,” the report said, adding that the cases took place primarily during detention and interrogation. The report said the violence had occurred at military camps, checkpoints, prisons and a police station. The perpetrators included members of the Israeli military, prison service and police counterterrorism unit, it said.
“Violations consisted of rape, including with objects, gang rape, attempted rape, physical violence to the genitals, instances of targeted shooting of the genitals, touching of breasts and genitals, strip and cavity searches conducted without apparent security justification, forced nudity and threats of rape,” the report said.
Israel’s foreign ministry on Thursday said it had “comprehensively, thoroughly and unequivocally refuted these allegations.” It called this report “another example of the U.N.’s longstanding, institutionalized hostility toward Israel.”
At least six people held hostage by Hamas and other Palestinian armed groups have described sexual violence in captivity, the report noted, adding that the United Nations “was not able to verify any of these reports given the continued denial of access” by Israel to U.N. investigators. A U.N. report released in 2024 found signs that sexual violence had been committed in multiple locations during the 2023 Hamas-led attacks, accusations that Hamas leaders have denied.
Israel’s break with the U.N. secretary general this week followed years of growing tensions, and recent pushback against accusations of abuse of Palestinian prisoners.
In March, the Israeli military dropped a highly politicized case against five reserve soldiers charged with brutalizing a Palestinian detainee, citing difficulties with the evidence. The military’s former chief legal officer resigned over her role in leaking surveillance footage of the alleged abuse to local news media.
This month, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel threatened to sue The New York Times for defamation over an opinion column describing the use of sexual violence against Palestinians by some soldiers, settlers and prison guards. The Times said in a statement that the threat “aims to undermine independent reporting” and that “any such legal claim would be without merit.”
Ms. Patten, the U.N. representative, said investigators had faced severe obstacles in their efforts to speak with people once held hostage in Gaza, Palestinians in the territory and Ukrainians in combat zones.
The report said the Russian authorities had denied U.N. monitors access to occupied territory and prisoners of war.
Still, investigators were able to verify 310 cases of conflict-related sexual violence in Russia and Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine, the report said. Most victims were male prisoners of war and civilian detainees, it added.
Those cases included “rape, gang rape, genital mutilation, electric shocks and beatings to the genitals, affecting 280 men, 26 women and four girls,” the report said.
The report also documented 31 cases of conflict-related sexual violence implicating Ukrainian forces. Those victims included prisoners of war and civilian detainees, the report said, with most of the cases occurring before 2025.
Ukraine was not included on the list, which the U.N. has been releasing for 17 years. And the report said its government had taken steps to address sexual violence. Its mission to the United Nations did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The post U.N. Adds Israeli and Russian Forces to Sexual Violence List appeared first on New York Times.
