Sydney Jewish women mark International Women’s Day with renewed hostages plea

The event on Friday followed a UN report that found evidence of sexual violence, including rape, during the October 7 attacks, with nineteen women still held hostage by Hamas in Gaza.

Members of Sydney's Jewish Community hold #BringBackOurGirls event at Bondi Beach. Picture: Britta Campion/The Australian

More than 150 Jewish women gathered at Sydney’s Bondi Beach on Friday to call for the release of the remaining 130 hostages in Gaza, drawing attention to the near half-year imprisonment of 19 Israeli women to mark International Women’s Day.

It comes after the UN this week said it believed there were grounds to believe sexual violence, including rape, took place during the October 7 attacks on Israel by Hamas. It also said there was evidence female hostages were raped.

“It is beyond belief that it took the UN 150 days to come out this week to finally state that there was enough proof to believe that women were raped, gang raped, and corpses were raped on October 7 – wake up, world!” said Lauren Placks, one of the speakers and organisers of the rally.

“It is unimaginable knowing your loved ones are still being held by these monsters after 21 weeks and still being subjected to these inhumane acts. Every day feels so long as we wait. We wait and pray for the return of the remaining 134 hostages, including 19 women and two children.”

The Israeli government’s count says there are 130 hostages – dead or alive – who remain in captivity from the October 7 attacks, as well as two Israelis captured before those attacks, and two bodies of Israeli soldiers killed in the 2014 Gaza war, bringing it to a total 134. Ms Placks said that Bring Them Home Australia – the group she and eight other Sydney women organised following the October 7 attacks – notified people of Friday’s event at 6pm on Thursday yet attracted 150 people. “This is what we can do!” she had told the crowd.

The #BringBackOurGirls event marks International Women's Day and calls for the immediate release of 19 Israeli female hostages who are still being held captive in Gaza. Picture: Britta Campion / The Australian

Attendees wore yellow ribbons to signify solidarity with hostages –and each stuck a strip of masking tape on their shirt with “153” written on it, the number of days since the hostages were taken.

“For the past five months, the silence of the UN, feminist and human rights organisations has been deafening, and an appalling failure to the women they are meant to protect,” another speaker, Micaela Ezra, said.

“Today we send a message from Australia that we have not forgotten these women, these children, and these men, and we will not stop advocating, until every single one of them is home.”

In a statement, the former president of the Executive Council of Australian Jewry, Jillian Segal, said “the absence of condemnation of (October 7 attacks) by so many women’s and diversity-focused organisations is a shameful stain on our humanity that will never be erased”.

“This International Women’s Day should serve as an important wake-up call to the world about the Hamas atrocities of October 7, including gang rape and sexual torture of women and children,” she continued.,” she said.