"The word ‘slut’ is not just degrading to women, but it is also used by society and the system to justify rape,"said Bracha Barad of the Kulan group, which organized Saturday’s SlutWalk through central Tel Aviv, explaining the provocative name and outfits of the participants. “There is no connection whatsoever between sex and sexual violence and there is no connection between the victim's clothing or her sexual past and the attack she has undergone.”

The mostly female crowd, estimated at between 2,000 and 5,000 by Israeli media outlets, brandished posters of public figures implicated in sexual assault allegations, such as ex-president Moshe Katsav, and chanted slogans like “No means no”, “Silence doesn’t mean consent”, “Not your toy” and “Polite women don’t make history.”

The movement began in 2011, after a Toronto police official urged women not to “dress like sluts” in order to lessen the risk of sexual assaults, which many interpreted as victim-blaming, before resolving to reclaim the word 'slut' by making it a centerpiece of their protest.

Since then, dozens of similar walks have taken place all over the world, but the movement has been reinvigorated by the #MeToo scandal, which has once again brought focus not only on stories of abuse, but also how they were subsequently dealt with by those in power.

“We demand justice and radical and systematic change,” Barad explained. “The law-enforcement authorities are quick to give a pass to rapists, but for the victims an impossible criminal bar is set by the establishment. Women are overwhelmingly abandoned by the establishment, and it starts in the police and continues up to the State Attorney’s office and the courts.”

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