Biden: World cannot look away from horrific Hamas atrocities against women’s bodies
US President Joe Biden says at a fundraiser in Boston that the world must condemn sexual violence perpetrated by Hamas terrorists, recounting testimony of horrific rape and mutilation carried out against Israeli women on and after October 7.
“Reports of women raped — repeatedly raped — and their bodies being mutilated while still alive — of women corpses being desecrated, Hamas terrorists inflicting as much pain and suffering on women and girls as possible and then murdering them. It is appalling,” he says.
“The world can’t just look away at what’s going on. It’s on all of us — government, international organizations, civil society and businesses — to forcefully condemn the sexual violence of Hamas terrorists without equivocation. Without equivocation, without exception,” he adds.
He says Hamas breached a truce he helped broker by refusing to release civilian women between 20 and 39 it is holding.
“These women and everyone still being held hostage by Hamas need to be returned to their families immediately,” he says. “We’re not going to stop — we’re not going to stop until we bring every one of them home and it’s going to be a long process.”