Summary of complaint
We have received complaints querying the evidence on which our story听Israel Gaza: Hamas raped and mutilated women on 7 October, 大象传媒 hears听was based and suggesting the article is听not impartial.
Many of those complaining have also told us that they think the level of detail included in the article was too graphic.
Our response
It鈥檚 important to stress that the 大象传媒鈥檚 Editorial Guidelines refer to due impartiality, which is to say the impartiality must be adequate and appropriate to the output, taking account of the subject and nature of the content, the likely audience expectation and any signposting that may influence that expectation.
From the outset readers are told that 鈥渢he 大象传媒 has seen and heard evidence of rape, sexual violence and mutilation of women during the 7 October Hamas attacks鈥.
The article goes on to explore this evidence in detail and clearly sets out the strength of each element.
So for instance when we report having spoken to a man present at the festival site who said he heard the "noises and screams of people being murdered, raped, decapitated", we also report asking him how he could be sure that what he heard indicated sexual assault, and his response.
Similarly when reporting an account from one of the volunteer body-collectors that they had seen signs of mutilation and torture, and victims including a pregnant woman, readers are told that we had not been able to verify this account and that 鈥淚sraeli media reports have questioned some testimony from volunteers working in the traumatic aftermath of the Hamas attacks.鈥
Readers would therefore understand that the story involves different types of evidence, often from several different sources, but that the body of evidence we鈥檝e identified so far points to clear indications that sexual violence occurred during the attacks.听
We are also clear in the article that we cannot say how widespread or pre-planned this was.
The level of detail included in the story is something we also considered carefully, where the last moments of these women 鈥渁re being pieced together from survivors, body-collectors, morgue staff and footage from the attack sites鈥.
In particular the 大象传媒 has Editorial Guidelines on harm and offence which refer to generally accepted standards 鈥渢aking into account the content, the context in which it appears and editorial justification鈥 and also to 鈥audience expectation of the content鈥.
Given that the graphic nature of both the digital material and police witness testimony is such an important part of the investigation into what happened, and immediately conveys to readers the nature of that听investigation and the evidence uncovered to date, we believe the inclusion of these details was editorially justified.
However we also included a very strong warning and referred to rape and mutilation in the headline and 鈥渉orrific sexual violence"听in the summary to ensure that visitors to the article clearly understood the nature of the story and could exercise their own judgement on whether to read further.
We believe this is important journalism about an unfolding story and we are continuing to investigate the evidence already in the public domain, and will report on our findings.