How the Dinah Project Builds the Case for October 7 Victims

On October 7, Hamas filmed its massacre of Israeli civilians—violence that included systematic sexual assaults. In response, the Dinah Project was formed by volunteer experts from criminal and international law, the military, and gender studies.

We spoke with Att. Col. (res.) Sharon Zagagi-Pinchas, the project’s director and former IDF Chief Prosecutor, who explained how conflict-related sexual violence (CRSV) differs from “everyday” cases: many victims were killed or too traumatized to testify, and crimes were often committed publicly to terrorize communities. The team therefore built an evidentiary framework that leans on eyewitness and first-responder accounts, real-time statements, and open-source media rather than victim testimony alone.

By mapping recurring patterns across six separate arenas, including distinctive methods of restraint and killing, public commission, and deliberate amplification via social media, the Dinah Project argues these acts were premeditated and that sexual violence was used as a weapon of war. Sharon emphasized that this conclusion doesn’t lower legal standards; it applies established doctrines to a war-zone context where linking a specific perpetrator to a specific victim is unusually hard. The name “Dinah” evokes the biblical Dinah (the first recorded rape in the Bible) and, in Hebrew, din (“justice”), underscoring the project’s aim to give voice to silenced victims.

The report calls for concrete action: public recognition of CRSV, domestic indictments that hold all participants in the attack responsible under existing legal theories, and use of universal jurisdiction abroad. It also urges updates to international protocols and notes the UN Secretary-General’s decision to place Hamas on the annex listing parties that commit grave violations, bolstering the case for accountability. Reception has been broad and largely positive across global media and policymakers, and survivors have expressed that recognition itself matters. For Sharon and her team, justice begins with naming the crimes clearly—and continues with prosecutions that end impunity.