UN did not find Israel lied about sexual violence in October 7 attack

Context

A fake graphic purportedly made by the United Nations is circulating on social media. It contains what is allegedly a summary of a U.N. Human Rights report, stating, among other things, that "Israel lied about sexual violence" and that there was "no evidence of sexual violence by Palestinians against settlers." 

"There it is! Almost everything Israel said about October 7 was a lie," says an X post from June 13, 2024, sharing the graphic. 

However, the graphic was not produced by the U.N., and a recent U.N. report, published around the time of the misleading graphic, found Palestinian militants had committed sexual violence against Israelis during the October 7 attack.

In fact

Logically Facts could not find the graphic on any of the U.N. or U.N. Human Rights Office's social media.

"The graphic was not produced by the U.N. Human Rights Office," a spokesperson from the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights told Logically Facts. 

The spokesperson also linked a U.N. press release in which Volker Türk, the U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights, condemned sexual violations allegedly carried out by Hamas militants during the October 7 attack. 

On June 12, the U.N. Independent International Commission of Inquiry on the Occupied Palestinian Territory published a report on war crimes and other violations of international law during the ongoing conflict. It was the only U.N. Human Rights report on sexual violence in the Israel-Hamas conflict released in the days surrounding the publishing of the social media posts.

The report found that in relation to the 7 October attack, "members of Palestinian armed groups, in some instances aided by Palestinians in civilian clothing," had "committed sexual and gender-based violence" against civilians. 

The report also found that specific forms of sexual and gender-based violence were part of Israeli Security Forces' operating procedures and that Israeli forces had committed acts of sexual violence in the West Bank. 

Nowhere does the report state that Israel had "lied" about sexual violence committed on October 7. 

The verdict

The graphic shared online was not produced by the U.N. A recent U.N. report found sexual violence conducted by both Palestinian militants and Israeli military forces. The report didn't say Israel "lied." Therefore, we have marked this claim as false.