30% of sex crimes in Israel target minors

ynet 

The Knesset’s Committee on the Status of Women is set to debate a new report on how the school system deals with sexual violence, Ynet learned Monday.

The report states that 30% out of the crisis centers’ 40,000 reports of sexual assaults in 2011 involved children under the age of 12. Almost half of the reports were of rape or attempted rape, some 25% were reports of incest and 20% were of sexual harassment.

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The report also includes police statistics about sexual violence: In 2011, 4,563 sexual assault complaints were filed, 47% of them by minors.

In 20% of the cases, the suspect was a minor. In 18% of the cases, the assaults allegedly took place on school grounds.

“It splits your life to the ‘before’ and ‘after,’” Anat Eldar, a rape survivor who now works as an educator, said.

The school system, she added, plays a crucial rule in detecting such cases by giving victims the necessary assistance and breaking through the wall of silence.

Michal Rozin, executive director of the Association of Rape Crisis Centers in Israel, said that the report was “proof that despite the growing number of complaints and the scope of the crisis centers’ activities, not enough resources are allocated to preventing such crimes and to assist in the rehabilitation of the victims.

“In light of these disconcerting figures, we urged authorities to recognize sex crimes as acute national problem that must be fought.”