Orit Strock

The daughter of Israeli Minister of Settlements and National Missions Orit Strock was found dead this week, less than a year after she filed a compliant against Strock, her father and her brother complaining of ritualistic sexual abuse beginning at a young age.

Shoshana Strock, 34, filed a complaint with Israeli police last April alleging sexual abuse by her parents and brother. A publication ban was immediately imposed on the case, disallowing Israeli media to publish anything else about it. In January, Strock elaborated on the allegations on Facebook.

She alleged that her father and someone named Rabbi Tao began forcing her to participate in sadistic sex cult rituals as a child as a form of “conversion therapy” to erase her identity as a lesbian. “Starting from age two and a half, my parents took me to pedophile ceremonies in which I was programmed and trained using drugs, hypnosis, and sexual abuse,” said Strock in a video posted last month.

“They pimped me out starting at the age of 13 in Tel Aviv,” wrote Strock. “And in essence, they completely erased my ability to experience healthy sexuality with a woman and made me hate my sexual identity and myself at the most severe levels possible.” Strock wrote that she was threatened if she told anyone the truth.

Israeli journalist Sefi Rachlevsky said he spoke to a friend of Strock’s who claims she was not suicidal but had been very afraid someone might kill her after going public with her claims. Strock was found dead in her home in northern Israel. Police have said an investigation is ongoing, but no official cause of death has been announced yet.

Orit Strock is a member of the far-right Religious Zionist party and has 11 children and 12 grandchildren. In 2007 her son Zviki was convicted of kidnapping and torturing a Palestinian boy who was found unconscious, naked, handcuffed and severely injured. Strock was sentenced to 30 months in prison.

In the wake of Shoshana Strock’s death, Israeli women’s organizations have called for a more expansive investigation into her abuse claims and death. “We cannot give up on her demand; the duty of the state is now clear: to investigate, examine, and uncover the truth,” said women’s organization Bono Alternativa. “How is it possible that the horrifying accounts of severe ritual abuse did not shake the system and the entire country?!”