Israeli Lawmakers Approve Livestreamed Tribunal With Death Penalty for Hamas Oct. 7 Attackers

Israeli lawmakers approved a livestreamed special tribunal with the power to sentence to death Palestinians convicted of taking part in the Hamas attack on 7 October 2023 that triggered the war in Gaza, with the measure passed by 93 votes to none in the 120-seat Knesset.

The bill empowers a panel of judges to hand down the death penalty by a majority vote and requires trials to be conducted in a livestreamed Jerusalem courtroom, drawing comparisons to the 1962 trial of Nazi war criminal Adolf Eichmann broadcast live on television.

Actu-Juridique

The Guardian reported that the tribunal will be able to charge alleged assailants under Israel’s 1950 law for the prevention of genocide, which carries the death penalty, while NPR said the legislation was passed 93-0 and set the special legal framework for prosecuting those accused of direct involvement.

NPR said the war began when Hamas-led militants stormed into Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, killing some 1,200 people and taking 251 as hostages, and that Israel’s ensuing offensive has killed over 72,628 Palestinians, including at least 846 killed since a ceasefire took hold last October, according to the Gaza Health Ministry.

Ahead of the parliamentary votes, BBC reported that Yulia Malinovsky, a co-sponsor of the bill, told a news conference, "May everyone see how the victims and their families look into the whites of the eyes of those murderers, rapists and kidnappers," and that an opposition politician said, "May everyone see how the State of Israel is a sovereign state which knows how to hold those who harmed it to account,".

Rights groups and opponents warned that livestreaming could turn proceedings into a spectacle and that evidence could be extracted under harsh interrogation methods, with the BBC quoting Sari Bashi, executive director of the Public Committee Against Torture in Israel, saying, "Government coalition members have made it clear that they expect mass executions to result from this court".

Al Jazeera

The Guardian reported that Ya’ara Mordecai, an international law expert at Yale Law School, said the new law raised concerns about due process because of the military court setting and the risk of "show trials".

In response to the tribunal legislation, the Guardian said a Hamas spokesperson, Hazem Qassem, told reporters the new law "serves as a cover for the war crimes committed by Israel in Gaza".

A separate thread in the war’s legal and evidentiary landscape came as a report published Tuesday by The Civil Commission documented sexual and gender-based violence committed by Hamas fighters on October 7, and during the subsequent captivity of hostages held in Gaza.

Le Monde said the investigation was compiled into a 280-page report using more than 400 accounts from survivors, first responders, soldiers, former hostages and experts, and relied on more than 10,000 photos and videos taken during the terrorist attack launched by the Palestinian Islamist organization against Israel.

The Times of Israel quoted Dr. Cochav Elkayam-Levy, an international law expert and founding chair of the Civil Commission, saying, "What we have witnessed is deep hatred to humiliate us and terrorize us as a people, as a nation, as women, as vulnerable people who found themselves in captivity and in a prolonged hell," and said the study detailed 13 types of sexual violence including rape, gang rape, sexual torture and mutilation.

CNN reported that lead author and human rights expert Cochav Elkayam-Levy told CNN the report’s "most important finding" was that sexual violence on October 7 and against hostages in captivity was "a calculated strategy by Hamas," and described the report as a digital archive meant to ensure suffering could not be "denied, erased, or forgotten."