No problem, not knowledgeable on Palestinian legal system but i will research and respond by the end of today.
Seriously..take your time, but please do more than research how it is supposed to work. Please research how it actually works.
I answer your call. You ask whether I support the hanging of suspected Israeli collaborators, and then assume that this is the Palestinian concept of justice. Firstly let me answer the first part. NO. That was easy. However: 1. What you should remember is that the hanging of suspected collaborators without trial is done by those OUTSIDE the Palestinian legal system (such as the paramilitaries and private citizens). There are examples of this throughout US history, such as the lynchings of blacks in the deep South, a recent example of which is the brutal lynching of James Byrd Junior in Texas in 1999, which is as bad as anything done in the Palestinian territories: http://www.dfa.gov.za/docs/2006/isra0630.htm The Palestinian Authority cannot be blamed for this, just as the US government cannot be blamed for the above murder. One might say they could do more to prevent it, but this requires a lot more resources than the Palestinian Authority has. Also the few resources it does have are often destroyed by Israeli attacks: 2002: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/1979358.stm 2003 debate in the UK’s House of Lords on the same issue: http://www.theyworkforyou.com/lords/?id=2003-06-04a.1313.2 2006 South African Department of Foreign Affairs views: http://www.dfa.gov.za/docs/2006/isra0630.htm 2006 http://jurist.law.pitt.edu/paperchase/2006/07/un-rights-panel-urges-end-to-israel.php There are many more examples of the destruction of the Palestinian Organs which might exercise full control over its jurisdiction. 2. The Palestinian Authority is a relatively young body. It will take time to develop its legal, political and other systems even if Israeli attacks on its infrastructure subsided. The Palestinian legal system is imperfect, but it needs time, space and peace to develop (something which isn’t happening at the moment). I assume you are American so perhaps a few examples of US history might help you to “look beyond”: “Vigilantism, or summary justice, has a long history, but the term lynch law originated during the American Revolution with Col. Charles Lynch and his Virginia associates, who responded to unsettled times by making their own rules for confronting Tories and criminal elements. "Lynching" found an easy acceptance as the nation expanded. Raw frontier conditions encouraged swift punishment for real, imagined, or anticipated criminal behavior” (emphasis is mine, source: http://www.english.uiuc.edu/maps/poets/g_l/lynching/lynching.htm) There are also more recent examples of executions in cold blood from the US, such as the killing in cold blood of the suspected double agent Thai Khac Chuyen by Green Berets in Vietnam after seeking CIA approval in the 1960’s. They were protected by many US state organs and acquitted at a sham trial in the US: (the article as printed in Time magazine on October 10 1969: http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,839031,00.html How history judged them: http://time-proxy.yaga.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,976813,00.html http://www3.iath.virginia.edu/sixties/HTML_docs/Texts/Narrative/Stein_Lovely_War.html) 3. The execution of collaborators even after trial is still unpalatable in my own view, but can be legitimised. The following is an account of a “trial” and subsequent execution by Islamic Jihad paramilitaries: http://fromoccupiedpalestine.org/node.php?id=944 The reason this is unacceptable is because Islamic Jihad held a trial and execution instead of the Palestinian Authority (due to the power vacuum). However if the Palestinian Authority held the trial and established the same facts, would you say that it was unacceptable to execute the collaborators? Again, the US Government has parallels in the way it killed the Rosenbergs for spying (but they did not divulge information that lead to anyone’s death, unlike those accused here). To summarise, the Palestinians have a lot to do to meet the needs of justice in their territories (as Human rights Watch and others have mentioned during Arafat’s time), but so did other societies at similar stages in the evolution of their governments. But to hold them responsible for extrajudicial killings and mob lynchings is not a fair parallel. If you have anything further please raise it. But I answered your rhetorical device, now answer mine: Is it better to execute someone after holding a trial (no matter how basic) or to assassinate them from the air without any sort of trial, killing civilians in the process? Please answer.
blah, blah, blah....apologist.. If you think the hangings are not carried out by or with the acquiesence of the PA, you are more than naiive.
Not sure where I fall on capital punishment. I have thought about it a lot. I have no problem with Israel killing terrorists. They are in their own words engaged in a war with the zionist entity. Israel has every right to defend itself.
http://fromoccupiedpalestine.org/node.php?id=944 Palestinian collaborators executed index: Sa'id Ghazali | al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades | assassination | Islamic Jihad | Justin Huggler Palestinians cheer militant executions of 'collaborators' JUSTIN HUGGLER and SA'ID GHAZALI Independent, 24 October 2003 At dawn in the Tulkarem refugee camp yesterday, two Palestinians were led out into a side alley where the executioners, their faces covered with hoods, shot them at point- blank range. Then their bullet-filled bodies were dragged into the main square, where they were propped up and displayed to the crowd for 15 minutes. The alleged crime of the two men was collaborating with Israeli intelligence. Eighty-six Palestinians have now been lynched or summarily executed by militants for collaborating with Israeli security forces since the start of the intifada three years ago, including the two men killed yesterday. Israeli security forces frequently use Palestinian informers, who tell them the whereabouts of wanted militants or warn of planned attacks. The two men killed yesterday, Suleiman Faraj, 23, and Samer Goma Ofeh, 19, had allegedly confessed to betraying Sirhan Sirhan, a local leader of the militant group Islamic Jihad, who was shot dead by the Israeli army earlier this month. A videotape of the two men confessing was shown in the refugee camp's main square the night before they were killed. About 2,000 people watched as Faraj and Ofeh, visibly scared, listed the names of the militants who were assassinated by Israel after they had informed on them. In return, they said on the tape, the Israeli authorities made payments to their bank accounts after each successful assassination. Faraj and Ofeh admitted on the tape they had been linked with the Israeli intelligence for more than two years. The crowd reacted angrily, calling for the militants to execute them, according to sources in Tulkarem. Only 10 members of their families took part in the two men's funeral. Some people shouted during the burial that their bodies should not be allowed to rest in the refugee camp's cemetery. Anguished family members of the two victims hurled stones at the house of one of the militants they believe was involved in their execution. The two men disappeared three weeks ago. Their families went to the Palestinian police but nothing was done about it, according to sources in Tulkarem. It now transpires they were kidnapped by Islamic Jihad, who interrogated them and then filmed their "confessions". Al-Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades, another militant faction, said that Islamic Jihad had kidnapped them but that both groups had taken part in the executions "to share in the honour". In past cases in which Palestinians have confessed to collaborating with Israel, they have told how they were blackmailed by Israeli intelligence officers. Even so, there is widespread support for the killing of collaborators among Palestinians. A Palestinian security official, who insisted on anonymity, said the Palestinian Authority was against the killing of people without trial. Several Palestinians have been tried and sentenced to death by Palestinian courts for collaboration with Israel but only two of those executions have ever taken place. Others have been lynched after crowds "mysteriously" got into the jails where they were being held. The official claimed that Palestinian police were unable to prevent the killings because the local police headquarters had been destroyed by the Israeli army. But the source in Tulkarem disagreed. "There is a security apparatus in Tulkarem," he said. "They receive salaries. But they do nothing." Meanwhile, the Israeli government announced tenders for 323 new houses in Jewish settlements in the West Bank yesterday , in direct defiance of the road-map peace plan backed by President George Bush, which calls for a freeze on settlement building. The Israeli government has announced tenders for 1,627 new houses in settlements since the beginning of the year.
http://edition.cnn.com/2002/WORLD/meast/09/04/palestinian.collaborators/ Palestinians grapple with collaborators Accused face near certain death From Walter Rodgers CNN WEST BANK (CNN) --Akram al Zahtma, a 22-year-old Palestinian, is accused of collaborating with Israel. Human rights activists say he is doomed. About 1,500 Palestinians have been killed as collaborators since the first Palestinian intifada in 1987, nearly 70 of them in the past two years, according to the Palestinian Human Rights Monitoring Group. Arrested by Palestinian police, Zahtma confessed to being a collaborator who helped the Israeli military locate and kill Salah Shehade, head of the military wing of Hamas. The Israeli bombing of Shehade's home in Gaza in July killed 17 people, including 10 children. In the presence of a police guard, Zahtma was asked if he was beaten while in custody. He was contrite. "This mistake's my own mistake," he said. "I'm the person who should be [punished] -- not my family." His face and neck were bruised. Palestinian human rights activists say beatings are routine when Palestinian police arrest suspected collaborators. Zahtma said he was tricked into becoming an Israeli spy in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict when an Israeli undercover agent offered to help him study in Canada. His story is a common one, said Saeb Erakat, chief negotiator of the Palestinian Authority. "I know students who come to my office who are supposed to go to Amman or America in their fifth year or sixth year ... ," said Erakat. "The Israelis are telling them, 'You're not going to be allowed to leave unless you accept to collaborate with us.'" Eventually, Zahtma said he helped Israel locate and kill Shehade, whom the Israelis held responsible for numerous deadly terrorist attacks on Israeli civilians in recent years. Hamas, a Palestinian Islamic fundamentalist organization, is labeled a terrorist organization by the U.S. State Department. Though Shehade's house was situated in a densely populated Gaza neighborhood, the Israelis said they thought using a precision missile, fired by an F-16, would raze just the home and none of the adjacent structures, a source told CNN. Israeli officials later apologized for the civilians' deaths. Program 'quite successful' Gideon Ezra, former deputy director of Shin Bet, Israel's internal security service, acknowledged Israel's recruitment of Palestinian collaborators, saying the program was "quite successful." "We don't force anyone to work with us," he said. Many Palestinians blame accused collaborators for Israeli attacks that have killed Palestinian civilians. In Zahtma's case, prosecutors say the penalty will be harsh. "How can I give him a sentence or penalty less than death?" asked prosecutor Khaled al-Kidra, the Palestinian attorney general for security matters. Still, some Palestinian officials express a degree of sympathy for accused collaborators. "We look at them ultimately as the victims of the occupation, but they betrayed their people," said Youssuf Issa, Palestinian Authority military intelligence chief for Gaza. Innocent of charges? By contrast, one Palestinian human rights activist says most accused collaborators are innocent. "We ask not only the families. We ask also the neighborhood. We ask friends. We ask people who know them. And most of these people are completely innocent," said Bassem Eid of the Palestinian Human Rights Monitoring Group. Eid said Zhatma's family -- like the families of other accused collaborators -- also will be punished for his alleged activities. Human rights activists say many impoverished Palestinians are innocently blackmailed into becoming collaborators after unwittingly being photographed with Israeli undercover agents. Others are allegedly coerced in other ways. "We know about workers [with permits] to work inside Israel, and one day these people [have] their work permit confiscated because they refuse to collaborate with the Israelis," Eid said. Ezra denied the allegation. "Nobody is blackmailing no one," he said. "We are a democratic country and we use only democratic ways. But we are doing it as good as possible and all the time." An expert says the situation breeds paranoia that is corrosive to Palestinian society. "Society is very harsh," said Dr. Eyad Sarraj, a noted Palestinian psychologist and human rights activist. "First, it does not accept betrayal or to be betrayed. Second, because it is Arab, it is tribal. For a long time living under Israeli occupation has led to a feeling of communal paranoia. Everyone is suspecting everyone else." The collaborator situation has prompted Palestinian Human Rights Monitoring Group to call for help against both sides. "The international community should interfere here," Eid said. "Not only to put pressure on the Palestinian Authority, but also to pressure the Israelis to stop this kind of phenomenon."
I could go on and on and on....my point....your focus on the terms used by Israel in sentencing someone to 4 life sentences seems silly and politically and/or racially motivated as you make excuses for the lack of justice in the palestinian areas, or in arab countries in general. Silly...just silly.
Moreover, to execute "someone" from the air usually means executing scum terrorists who are about to committ heinous crimes. More of those assasinations need to be done.
Unfortunately Israel is not compensating these victims they way they compensate Jewish victims of Arab terror. Israel needs to classify this individual as a terrorist so these 4 Israeli citizens can get the proper monies from the state that any other citizen would receive. Although, Jersey's points that this conviction shows Israel's ability to deal with its own extremists is a good thing. There is an entire Shin Bet section that deals with Jewish terrorists. So there is some good here, but some definite room for improvement.