Over the weekend, UN Women made news for speaking out in support of Israeli women following the October 7 terrorist attack perpetrated by Hamas, albeit in a post that also addressed concerns for Palestinian women. On Friday night, the entity's X account made a post indicating "We reiterate that all women, Israeli women, Palestinian women, as all others, are entitled to a life lived in safety and free from violence." The pinned post came nearly two months after the attack, though, and after much backpedaling.
It took the second paragraph of a statement, which began by lamenting the return of fighting between Israel and Hamas, to even reference Hamas.
"We unequivocally condemn the brutal attacks by Hamas on Israel on 7 October. We are alarmed by the numerous accounts of gender-based atrocities and sexual violence during those attacks. This is why we have called for all accounts of gender-based violence to be duly investigated and prosecuted, with the rights of the victim at the core," the second paragraph read.
Users were not not afraid to remind them how how much of it comes as too little too late. Our sister site of Twitchy has highlighted many of the best reactions. Many others also pointed to how the UN ties Israelis and Palestinians together.
Oh, Good morning @UN_Women !! After over 100 tweets and posts during the last 2 months about the poor Women in Gaza and ZERO mentions of the horrific attacks on Israeli women, you finally bothered to add the words "Israeli women" in a neutral post (which probably someone forced…
— Ed.T (@edantal) December 2, 2023
Israeli women can’t even get their own post? You’re a disgrace and a sham.
— Liberty Copula (@libertycopula) December 2, 2023
Too little, too late pic.twitter.com/uPzbDUYkZC
— Just Carmen (@Carmen50) December 2, 2023
Even more users responded to a subsequent post in the thread pointing to "gender-based violence."
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Yeah that ship sailed long ago. pic.twitter.com/VUNDwxCx6O
— The Mossad: Satirical, Yet Awesome (@TheMossadIL) December 2, 2023
Why are you only saying this now?
— TheFamousArtistBirdyRose (@TheFamousArtBR) December 2, 2023
At this point, why bother saying anything at all?
On October 7th @UN_Women was busy posting online about how apparently men are lesbians too because apparently men can be women if they say so.
Meanwhile videos were circulating from Hamas, of…
This tweet, 2 months later, is far more about trying to salvage some credibility than actual acknowledgement of the victims and crimes.
— AG (@AGHamilton29) December 2, 2023
This is a corrupt organization that is beyond reform. They can keep their meaningless tweet, cut their funding. https://t.co/y8ozVn4TbD
"gender-based atrocities" - you spelled "raped women" wrong.
— Alan Harvey - pretty fly (for a white guy) (@AlanHarvey67) December 2, 2023
Your need to push gender ideology over the interests of women is disturbing...
There's a deeper problem when it comes to UN Women's responses, or lack thereof. As we covered at the time, the UN Women X account prioritized International Lesbian Day, specifically to claim "trans lesbians are lesbians."
Recently, the UN Women's Instagram account made a post directly calling out Hamas. It was quickly deleted and replaced though. Then, the entity doubled down on dismissing why they didn't have a more unequivocal response calling out Hamas terrorists for raping women.
Last week, CNN Anchor Bianna Golodryga had asked Deputy U.N. Women Executive Director Sarah Hendriks why her entity wasn't doing more.
"Is there a reason, though, Sarah, that you can't specifically call out Hamas and the mounting evidence now over seven weeks that Israeli investigators have collected that we've shown our viewers about the atrocities they committed specifically on October 7th? Because I think that's the crux of the issue here," she mentioned. "It's not just condemning sexual violence against women and in any war in general, it's specifically what occurred on October 7th, perpetrated by Hamas?"
Hendriks stuck to the same non-answer she did earlier in the segment, and her answer focused on the reports from Israeli investigators. It was all just the same kind of rehearsed answer the UN Women has gone with since the conflict began nearly two months ago. Larry addressed Hendriks' shameful response in a video response of his own.
For the most part, especially when it comes to that Instagram account, the UN Women has been decidedly one-sided in calling attention to how Palestinians in Gaza are affected by the conflict. This is even after the conflict began by Hamas perpetrating that vicious attack that resulted in the death of 1,200 Israelis and the kidnapping of approximately 240 people. Hamas terrorists also engaged in rape and torture.
Hostages have just recently been released during temporary pauses in fighting, over the course of several rounds. As Katie covered, though, State Department Spokesperson Matt Miller earlier on Monday spoke to how Hamas is unwilling to release more female hostages because "they don’t want those women to talk about what happened to them."
White House National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan also spoke to the failure to release female hostages. "Right now Hamas is refusing to release civilian women who should have been part of the agreement and it is that refusal by Hamas that has caused the end of the hostage agreement and therefore an end to the pause in hostilities," he said during Monday's briefing.
Keep in mind that Friday's statement from UN Women began by noting they "deeply regret that military operations have resumed in Gaza," which is the result of Hamas' own actions.
Since then, the UN Women's account has gone back to posting about other topics, including and especially "climate action."
The lack of a timely response from UN Women comes as the UN overall is tainted for its position during the Israel-Hamas conflict, especially as they have called for a ceasefire from the start. The United Nations has long acted as an anti-Israel body. There's also the one-sided focus on Palestinians.
Particularly problematic, though, as Katie also higlighted, is that one of the hostages said he was held at the home of a United Nations Relief and Works Agency teacher, where he was also abused. Sen. Marsha Blackburn (R-TN) and Rep. Mike Waltz (R-FL) are calling for investigations in the UN.
Other users haver spoken out against the UN in general and the complicity of the body, including through some particularly strong language.
The UN was and is complicit. The NGOs were and are complicit. And sad to say, many media organizations that did deals with the devil for photos from Gaza ... they were complicit too.
— David Frum (@davidfrum) November 19, 2023
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