Thursday, March 28

Hamas executes five Palestinians in Gaza for the first time in five years, two of them for “collaborating” with Israel


For the first time in five years, the armed Islamist movement Hamas, in the power on the Gaza Stripexecuted five Palestinians this Sunday, two of them for “collaboration” with Israel.

“On Sunday morning the sentence of death penalty against two convicted of collaborating with the occupation (Israel) and another three for criminal cases,” Hamas announced in a statement, in which it assured that the five “had had the full right to defend themselves” before local justice. An extreme that could not be confirmed by Reuters

The Ministry of the Interior of the Gaza Strip, a Palestinian territory of 2.3 million people under Hamas control since 2007, revealed the year of birth and other details of each case, but not the identity of those executed.

The two convicted of “collaboration” with Israel are two men born in 1968 and 1978. The older of the two is an inhabitant of Khan Yunis (south) who was “hanged”. He was convicted by local justice for providing Israel, since 1991, “information about members of the resistance, their places of residence” and “the location of rocket manufacturing and launch sites,” Hamas said.

The second was “shot” for providing Israel with information since 2001 that led “to the attack and to the martyrdom of citizens“by Israeli forces,” Hamas added. The other three people executed had previous convictions for murder, the Hamas Interior Ministry said in the statement.

In recent years, the Gaza authorities have sentenced a number of people to death for various crimes or for “collaboration” with the State of Israel, although these death sentences have not been carried out. The last known executions date back to 2017.

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Then three Palestinians -Ashraf Abu Leila, Hisham al Alul and Abdalá al Nashar- were executed in public after being sentenced in a quick trial before the local military justice, for having participated in the assassination of a Hamas commander, Mazen Faqha, “for account of Israel.

As this Sunday in the case of the two executed for “collaboration” with Israel, Hamas justified the 2017 executions under the revolutionary code of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO).

Hamas, however, is not part of the PLO, whose revolutionary code is outdated on the issue of capital punishment regarding the Palestinian Basic Law of 2003. The Palestinian Authority, led by Mahmud Abas, also adhered in 2019 to the UN treaty that seeks to abolish the death penalty.

Since Hamas Islamists seized power in the Gaza Strip in 2007 by force of arms, to the detriment of supporters of Mahmoud Abbas’s predominantly secular Fatah party, the Palestinian territories have been deeply divided politically.

Mahmoud Abbas’s Palestinian Authority, based in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, has no control over the Gaza Strip, a meager Palestinian territory dominated by Hamas and under strict Israeli blockade for 15 years.

Palestinian and international human rights groups have condemned the death penalty and urged Hamas and the Palestinian Authority, which exercises limited self-government in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, to end the practice.

Since Hamas wrested control of Gaza from Abbas in 2007, its courts have executed 27 people so far.

Palestinian law states that President Mahmoud Abbas has the final say on whether executions can be carried out. However, he does not enjoy an effective government in Gaza.

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Since the Islamist Hamas wrested control of Gaza from Abbas in 2007, its courts have sentenced dozens of Palestinians to death and executed at 27 so faraccording to human rights groups.


www.abc.es

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