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Israeli legal center Adalah filed an urgent complaint Sunday demanding an immediate criminal investigation into the rape and sexual assault of a German journalist who participated in the 2025 Global Sumud Flotilla humanitarian mission to Gaza after the activist provided detailed testimony describing abuse by Israeli female prison guards at Givon Prison in Ramla, central Israel.
Adalah warned the incident may not be isolated, saying other flotilla participants had come forward with accounts of similar treatment and cited the U.N.'s recent listing of Israel among countries involved in conflict-related sexual violence.
The rights group called on authorities to investigate what the center described as a potentially systematic pattern of sexual assault against detainees in Israeli custody.
Adalah filed its complaint with Israel's Attorney General, the legal adviser of the Prison Service, the unit for investigating prison guards, and the commander of Givon Prison, demanding immediate criminal proceedings.
According to the journalist's detailed testimony cited in the complaint, Israeli female prison guards at Givon Prison ordered her to strip completely naked while male guards observed from behind a curtain.
"When she refused, the guards forcibly removed her clothing. While she stood fully naked, a female guard inserted her fingers into the journalist's genitals and then her anus."
The journalist testified she heard male guards laughing during the assault.
"The severity of the acts described and their unlawfulness are clear and leave no room for doubt. These constitute acts of rape, sexual violence, and serious assault, which require the immediate opening of a criminal investigation against all those involved and their prosecution," Adalah stated.
Before arriving at Givon Prison, the journalist and other flotilla participants were subjected to physical and verbal violence by security forces and prison service employees during their transfer from the port to Ketziot Prison in the Negev Desert, according to the complaint.
"The treatment described included prolonged restraint using plastic handcuffs; blindfolding; screaming; physical attacks; and threats, including threats of rape," Adalah said.
Adalah said other female flotilla participants had contacted the German journalist after she gave public testimony and described experiencing similar incidents, some of which also constituted sexual assault.
"These events raise serious concern that serious sexual assaults against female detainees by Israeli forces are a systematic pattern that has not been investigated at all," the center stated.
Adalah linked the case to a broader pattern, noting it had received other serious testimonies in recent weeks from participants in the Global Sumud Flotilla, which departed from Türkiye in May before being intercepted by Israeli forces.
Those testimonies also included reports of sexual violence, physical abuse, humiliation, and mistreatment during detention.
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The center further noted that the U.N. had recently included Israel on its list of countries and actors involved in sexual violence in conflict contexts, relating to acts attributed to the Prison Service and security forces against Palestinian detainees, and said that failure to investigate had created conditions enabling the escalation of such conduct.
"The responsibility of the authorities today does not end with achieving justice for the victim in the current case but also requires examining the conditions and policies that allowed such grave acts to occur within an official detention facility," Adalah said.
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