Israeli court on October 7: Show Palestinian crimes or justice? | | Israel-Palestine War News

Israel approved the establishment of a special court martial to try Palestinians accused of participating in the Hamas-led terrorist attack in Israel on October 7, 2023 earlier this month, and will give the agency the power to impose the death penalty.

But researchers, campaigners, and international organizations – including the United Nations – all doubt whether there will be real justice delivered by the court, and instead see it as a way to get revenge on Palestinian prisoners.

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The consequences of the attack on October 7, where 1,139 were killed and 250 were taken hostage, were amplified in Israel by repeatedly showing the videos of the attack.

Al Jazeera’s investigative team has found that reports of the atrocities that took place on October 7 – some of them false – were used to justify the massacre that began in Gaza after the attack, which has killed more than 72,600 Palestinians.

Some members of Israel’s parliament have made it clear what they hope will happen as a result of the election television tests about 300 Palestinian prisoners.

Most of those arrested are civilians, human rights groups say, including well-known hospital administrators. Dr. Hussam Abu Safiya. Palestinian prisoners were also subjected to physical abuse and rape, and dozens are dead in Israeli prisons.

According to Justice Minister Yariv Levin, one of the co-sponsors of the bill that established the court, the law was “one of the most important moments in the Knesset (parliament)”.

“One can feel that we are doing the right thing by finding a compromise at this point, even though we are in the final days of the election and despite the disagreements that exist,” Levin added, referring to bipartisan support for the bill.

Victor’s Justice

The head of the United Nations organization for human rights, Volker Turk, publicly requested that the law establishing the court be removed, saying that justice cannot be achieved by any method that fails to meet international standards.

The International Bar Association (IBA) raised concerns that the case may not be given a fair hearing. “This risk (of injustice) is exacerbated by reports of coercive practices in security-related cases, which may amount to torture or other torture and lead to unreliable information, false confessions, false convictions, and serious miscarriages of justice,” the IBA said.

Rights groups, such as Amnesty, Human Rights Watch, and the Israeli rights organization B’tselem, have also criticized the legislation behind the law.

“The people of Israel need justice, but I don’t know if this is the case, or if the state of Israel as it is now can provide it,” Yossi Mekelberg, a senior adviser at Chatham House, said, recorded violence International defenders of the Gaza flotilla and the Minister of National Security Itamar Ben-Gvir that went with impunity inside Israel. “I don’t agree with the Nukhba (members of the Hamas militant group that allegedly led the October 7 attack), but justice should be as much about us and our humanity as they are about what they did. I’m worried that this could be revenge.”

Palestine? Guilty

Israeli politicians have been blaming all Palestinians for the October 7 attacks.

Speaking to the media a few days after the attack, Israeli President Isaac Herzog condemned all the men, women, and children of Gaza, to the press: “It is the whole country that is responsible. It is not true that ordinary people do not know, are not affected. It is not true at all”.

In the years since then, comparing Palestinians to “terrorists” by government ministers such as Ben-Gvir, or his fellow politician, Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, has become the norm.

Even the efforts of Palestinian politicians in the Israeli parliament to speak in Arabic to pass the court’s order was enough to bring “shame” from the public gallery, which seemed to equate speaking Arabic with supporting “terrorism”.

“We know that the Israeli authorities condemn all of Gaza on October 7,” Hassan Jabareen, founder of the Palestinian rights organization Adalah, told Al Jazeera.

“Their president, who thinks he’s calm, said it again. Gaza is Israel’s enemy. This is not new,” he said, referring to the laws that existed before October 7 allowing the Israeli army to shoot people in Gaza without trial.

“Now we have a military court that is allowed to impose the death penalty on the basis of secret evidence, where the accused are not present in all cases, and not all justice methods are used, and who voted for this?

To avoid guilt

Support among Jewish Israelis for the court, and any kind of punishment imposed on Palestinians from Gaza, is overwhelming.

But this does not mean that the Israeli government will be able to escape scrutiny because of its role in failing to stop the October 7 attack, and the public pressure to investigate what the government did that day continues.

Speaking earlier this month, Rom Bralavski, who was imprisoned in Gaza, called on all parliamentarians to resign over the October 7 attack. “Take responsibility, and get out of our lives,” he said.

“The blood of everyone who was killed on October 7 is on your hands,” he added. “And before you go, set up a government commission of inquiry that can investigate what happened here, so it doesn’t happen again.”

Will the televised trials of those accused of the October 7 attack, and their executions, be enough to stop such calls?

Possible. But even if he doesn’t, says political analyst Ori Goldberg, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu isn’t particularly worried about getting revenge on his enemies.

“Netanyahu is past the point where he cares,” Goldberg said. That’s how he does things, and it seems that’s how we let him work.