This is the position of some of the people/groups he's embarrassed. As if to say "Yes, I've been caught, but the person who helped catch me has it out for me, let's just ignore this".
Also, as the US Army intelligence service underscored a few years ago, Wikileaks is ripe for propaganda use, since information can be provided to WL to suit political goals, and with some information removed to create a specific impression.
The US Army Intelligence analysis also suggested that an effective strategy to harm WL would be to leak materials that would reflect poorly on it and and cause people to question Assange's motives. No doubt all powerful entities (governments, people) realize this. WL has many enemies and so likely many are using both of these strategies as situations permit.
Have you read the details of the rape accusations? Sweden has a particular definition of rape that is far more encompassing of conduct that in most jurisdictions constitutes fully consensual activity. Since the claims against Assange would be considered claims of consensual sex in the US, it's hard for me to take them entirely seriously, yet the label of "Rapist" persists. This phenomenon is truly bizarre.
The question to ask is, what qualities do we most hope something like Wikileaks has, so that it can aid the process of truth, transparency, and careful investigative journalism. I'd suggest the following:
- Strong willingness to work with mainstream news outlets to create high production quality investigative journalism (Assange has done all he possibly could).
- Resilience to meddling by the many enemies one makes (Assange has done well with this).
- Reinforcing the strength and bias-free nature of the institution (Assange has made clear that he finds Trump and Hillary both despicable, yet this comment is ignored by many such as yourself).