Israeli officer secretly convicted of raping Palestinian woman, as gag order is partially lifted

An Israeli officer has been convicted of two counts of rape of a Palestinian woman, sexual harassment, and receiving a sexual bribe by the military court in 2016.

The officer has been in prison since 2017 and the case was placed under a gag order that meant local and national publications were unable to report on it.

That gag order was partially lifted after a military appeal's court found that details of the case impacted national security, according to the Ynet news website.

The man’s identity remains unknown under that order but the crimes took place in 2013 and 2014 and the case was seen in 2016.

According to the court, the case had "serious aspects, and everyone agrees that there is a significant public interest in publishing the details to the general public", Haaretz reported.

A woman, who the court identified as 'M', said the officer had forced her to have sex with him after she requested a permit. Later, he returned her permit and threatened to revoke it if she reported the rape.

'M' was told to continue to see him and called her on several occasions asking for sexual favours, and asked her to bring her daughter to him, the court said.

The woman did not return to him and the court found that 'M' did not consent to the sex, and the power imbalance between the Israeli officer, and the Palestinian woman may be seen as coercion. 

The officer, who worked at the army's civil administration, which oversees the daily communication with Palestinians in the occupied West Bank, was also convicted of taking bribes, and the court convicted him for sexually exploiting a woman identified as 'F' three times in return for approving permits.

According to local reports, the man had faced dismissal from the military months before his attacks on Palestinian women, over his sexual harassment of female officers.