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Israeli academic: raping Palestinian women would deter attacks

Published on 21 July 2014 Written by Connie Hackbarth

Dr. Mordechai Kedar, an Israeli scholar of Arabic literature and lecturer at Bar-Ilan University, declaredMonday that raping the wives and mothers of Palestinian combatants would deter attacks.

“The only thing that could deter a suicide bomber is knowing that if caught, his sister or his mother would be raped,” said Kedar during a radio talk show.

Listen to Hebrew-language radio show ; Kedar’s comment begins at 1:35:00:

Kedar, who is an academic expert on the Palestinian population within Israel, served for twenty-five years in the military intelligence, where he specialized in Islamic groups.

He is a researcher at the right-wing Begin-Sadat Center for Strategic Studies of Bar Ilan University, as well as the founder and current director of the Israel Academia Monitor, a neo-McCarthyst website that follows alleged “anti-Israel activities of Israeli academics”.

During the interview on the Hakol Diburim national daily talk programme of Israel Radio Bet,  the interviewer, Yossi Hadar, responded that Kedar’s proposal “sounds bad […] We can not of course take such measures.”

These remarks did not deter Kedar, who responded that “it is culture…” and “this is the Middle East”, before adding that “I did not speak about what we are doing or not doing. I am speaking about the reality: the only thing that will deter a suicide bomber – if he knew that if he pulls the trigger, his sister will be raped.”

Bar Ilan University is a Jewish religious university situated in a Tel Aviv suburb. In November 1995, Yigal Amir, a student at the institution, assassinated Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin.