Armed groups 'repeatedly used sexual violence in Lebanon's civil war'

Report says rape was utilised to persecute and humiliate communities

The Lebanese civil war, which lasted until 1990, was fought between a bewildering array of sectarian, ideological and foreign armed factions in continuously shifting alliances. Getty Images

Multiple actors in the Lebanese civil war “systematically” used sexually violence against women and girls, according to report by Legal Action Worldwide.

The report, which includes interviews with victims and witnesses, said it sets out for the first time the extent of gender-based crimes during the Lebanese civil war from 1975 to 1990.

The non-profit organisation said accountability over abuses committed during that period “has largely been absent and the use of transitional justice mechanisms in Lebanon has been limited”.

Commissioned by gender equality organisation UN Women, the report says multiple state and non-state actors and armed groups carried out sexual and gender-based violence against females, including rape, genital mutilation, sexualised torture and humiliation, and forced prostitution.

Rape via the use of foreign objects, for instance glass bottles, was reportedly common.

“Rape was used as a method of war to persecute persons from particular communities, to humiliate them, to break their resistance and to emasculate members of the family,” the report said.

“During sieges and massacres, women and girls were divided according to their nationality. In many cases, perpetrators killed women and girls after raping them. Women and girls were raped in their homes and in the streets and in front of their family members, after which they were killed.”

Researchers spoke to a 75-year-old woman who witnessed 19 girls aged from 9 to 15 being taken to a camp.

“They were in an indescribable state. They had blood stains all over their clothes and legs. They were raped with bottles,” she told LAW.

Smoke rises in a Beirut street during clashes between Palestinians and members of Christian militia the Lebanese Forces, backed by Lebanon's Christian Kataeb Phalangist party, on April 15, 1975. AFP

Guerrilla fighters on a tank in a street in Beirut during Lebanon's civil war, in December 1975. Getty Images

A Katyusha rocket is fired from the back of an army lorry into an apartment complex during the first year of the Lebanese civil war, in 1975. Getty Images

A mass of burnt vehicles in the harbour area of Beirut after the outbreak of civil war in 1975. Getty Images

A Red Cross nurse from Sweden takes care of a boy shot in the heel by a sniper, on September 9, 1976, at a hospital in the Coral Beach Hotel, on the road between Beirut and Saida. AFP

Israeli shelling on west Beirut on August 2, 1982. AFP

A man sits on rubble in a desolated area of west Beirut on August 20, 1982. AFP

The US embassy in Beirut on April 18, 1983, after a bomb destroyed part of the building. AFP

French soldiers watch the skyline in Beirut on September 26, 1983. The troops were part of the Beirut security multinational force sent to keep security after the Israeli invasion of 1982. AFP

General Francois Cann, commander of the French troops of the multinational forces, on October 23, 1983, as rescuers search for survivors in Beirut through the rubble of a building that was destroyed by a suicide lorry bomber overnight. Fifty-eight French soldiers and five Lebanese were killed in the attack. AFP

Rescuers continue to search on October 31, 1983, for corpses and identify the victims of the attack on October 23 on the headquarters of US troops from the multinational force in Beirut. AFP

Rescuers search for victims on March 8, 1985, 15 minutes after a car, packed with an estimated 250kg of TNT, exploded in a crowded street of the southern Bir Al Aabed district in mainly Shiite southern suburb of Beirut. At least 75 people were killed and 256 injured in the explosion. AFP

Israeli Defence Force soldiers on March 19, 1985, confront a civilian at Kasmyah bridge after troops the month before evacuated about 500 sq km around Saida. AFP

Tripoli, in northern Lebanon, on October 4, 1985, after a ceasefire between pro-Palestine and pro-Syrian militias was agreed to in Damascus. AFP

A woman cries in shock, minutes after a car bomb exploded in a crowded neighbourhood of mainly-Muslim west Beirut on August 8, 1986, killing 13 people, including three children, and wounding at least 92. AFP

A nun inspects a damaged room in the Hotel Dieu Hospital in east Beirut on February 25, 1990, after a break in the battle between rival Christian factions. AFP

“I saw a man who was crying. He told me that two of them were his daughters and that the younger one was not among them, because she had died. She was raped with a bottle and the bottle broke inside her.”

Women and girls were sometimes forced to have sexual relations with militiamen in return for food and protection.

“Sexualised torture was perpetrated in detention centres, at checkpoints, and in the streets during sieges and massacres. In detention, male officers electrocuted victims’ nipples, breasts, and genital areas, and intensified physical assaults when victims were menstruating,” the report said.

“Women and girls as young as 12 years old had their legs tied to two cars, which were driven in opposite directions, wrenching the victim in two from the crotch up, and resulting in death. Women were also killed in this way, but with militiamen holding the legs of the victim and wrenching them apart.”

Women and girls were killed and abducted in front of family members in retribution, with pregnant women and new mothers also murdered, it said.

LAW also reported an increase in violence from male family members towards their relatives, often amid stress, trauma and poor living conditions.

“With this report, we are seeking to contribute to the body of work produced in Lebanon that shines a spotlight on the gendered impact of Lebanon’s civil war, and its long lasting legacy — which includes today’s heightened levels of violence against women and continued stigma for those who survived these crimes,” said Rachel Dore-Weeks, the head of UN Women Lebanon.

“Without acknowledging and understand the past, we cannot build a peace and stable future,” she said.