On Monday, the Knesset passed a bill that would establish a special military tribunal empowered to impose the death penalty on those accused of carrying out the October 7, 2023, attacks. T’ruah: The Rabbinic Call for Human Rights responded by insisting that the perpetrators of these heinous attacks must be brought to justice, while warning that the bill would strip defendants of the most basic guarantees of a fair trial and advocating against the death penalty.
Rabbi Jill Jacobs, CEO of T’ruah, said:
“On October 7, 2023, Hamas committed atrocities of staggering magnitude — murdering 1,200 people, taking hundreds hostage, and shattering families and communities whose grief continues today. Those families deserve justice, and the perpetrators of those crimes must be held responsible. At the same time, we must demand that each and every person who is charged with these crimes receives due process and a fair and impartial trial, and we must refuse to use the death penalty — now and always — with the knowledge that more death will not bring back those who were killed. We must refuse to allow our commitment to a fair and humane justice system to be yet another casualty of Hamas’s cruel attacks.
“For these reasons, T’ruah is alarmed by the Prosecution of Participants in the October 7 Massacre Events Law, which passed in the Knesset on Monday. The law would make it possible for courts to proceed without the safeguards of normal criminal procedures, including the usual guarantees of judicial independence, impartiality, and legal standards for evidence-gathering, and would grant the courts sweeping discretion to bypass those essential safeguards entirely. We are disturbed by the prospect of mass trials of suspects and courts permitting the use of evidence obtained through torture. In addition, the accused would only be allowed to attend the trial virtually, and the entire trial would be livestreamed, creating an atmosphere of spectacle and collective retribution.The law also imposes the death sentence on those found guilty, a grotesque and outdated punishment fundamentally at odds with our values.
“T’ruah’s opposition to the death penalty is not new. We have consistently opposed capital punishment even when the defendant was accused of horrific crimes, such as the September 11 attacks. Our response to this bill should not be read as in any way diminishing the pain of those whose loved ones were injured, assaulted, or killed on October 7. Elie Wiesel, who survived the Holocaust and later became an advocate against the death penalty and Nobel Peace Laureate, spoke at Wesleyan University in 2010, saying: ‘I know the pain of those who survive. Believe me, I know… Your wound is open. It will remain. You are mourning, and how can I not feel the pain of your mourning? But death is not the answer.’ He went on to say: ‘Society should not be the Angel of Death…We should not be servants of death. The law should celebrate, glorify, sanctify life, always life.’
“Even following the most horrific of tragedies, our tradition calls us to fight the urge for revenge, which will not return those lost, and only lead to more violence. In the words of Rabbi Jonathan Sacks, ‘One who seeks revenge is allowing himself to be governed by someone else’s behaviour, to be dragged down to his level…holiness is the ability to stand above instinct and not allow our actions to become reactions…The alternative is revenge, and revenge is forbidden.’ In the face of the unspeakable violence of October 7, we must stand above instinct and seek true justice.”
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About T’ruah: The Rabbinic Call for Human Rights:
T’ruah: The Rabbinic Call for Human Rights brings the Torah’s ideals of human dignity, equality, and justice to life by empowering our network of over 2,300 rabbis and cantors to be moral voices and to lead Jewish communities in advancing democracy and human rights for all people in the United States, Israel, and the occupied Palestinian territories.