As in other countries around the world, survivors of sexual violence in Syria and Lebanon often face stigma and rejection by family and community members. Gay and bisexual men and transgender individuals are especially vulnerable to sexual violence during conflict.

This includes strengthening policies that offer appropriate responses to male survivors, challenging cultural assumptions about male vulnerability to such violence, and focusing more consistently on the gender specific nature of sexual violence in conflict and post-conflict situations while monitoring, analyzing and reporting such violence and providing non-discriminatory access to medical and psychosocial services to survivors of sexual violence. Some survivors interviewed by Human Rights Watch said they did not seek any medical or psychological treatment in Syria because they did not trust the healthcare system and they feared to talk about what happened. Cases that Human Rights Watch documented show that although men and boys are stopped at checkpoints regardless of their sexual orientation and gender identity, gay and bisexual men and transgender individuals were often sexually and verbally harassed and sexually abused on the basis that they were “soft looking.A case worker at Helem told Human Rights Watch that mental health services in Lebanon that male survivors of sexual violence could benefit from are scarce.

Sexual violence response should include referral and access to psychosocial and mental health services.Naila said that then she was taken to an individual cell where she was raped by other prisoners, guards, and people she thought were high-ranking officials. Since the Syrian conflict began in March 2011, men and boys and transgender women have been subjected to rape and other forms of sexual violence by the Syrian government and non-state armed groups, including the extremist armed group Islamic State (also known as ISIS). Gender stereotypes, and accordingly the social roles assigned to men, feed many myths that exist around sexual violence against men and boys. Some GBT survivors said that officers in the Sednaya military prison forced those detained because of their sexual orientation and gender identity to stand naked in the middle of the soldiers so that they could humiliate them and spit on them.

If someone is labeled “male” at birth but identifies as a woman she is a transgender woman (or transwoman).

Case workers told Human Rights Watch that there are cases where health care providers and staff in hospitals and police breach confidentiality. When my heart stops, my body will get cold and stiff, and once I hit the ground I will break into pieces.