Unit 1012 Cover Photo

Unit 1012 Cover Photo

Thursday, July 27, 2017

BENJAMIN NETANYAHU CHANGED FROM A DEATH PENALTY OPPONENT TO SUPPORTER



            

“Terrorists are inciting, and want to kick us out of here. I promise they won’t be successful.” – Benjamin Netanyahu
 
          Unit 1012 awards the Rayner Goddard Act of Courage Award to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for changing his position from a death penalty opponent to a supporter. Philosopher Von Goethe was right when he said:


If we could do away with death, we wouldn’t object; to do away with capital punishment will be more difficult. Were that to happen, we would reinstate it from time to time.
[Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Wilhelm Meister’s Travels, from Makarie’s Archive (1829).]
 
            We are also grateful that he showed support to the victims’ families, instead of the killers.

 

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu speaks to the family members of the three people killed by a Palestinian terrorist in Halamish. (photo credit:AMOS BEN-GERSHOM/GPO)

Netanyahu Says Palestinian Killer of Three Israelis Should Be Executed
In condolence visit to Salomon family, who lost three members in attack in their settlement home, PM says 'time has come' for 'death penalty for terrorists'

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Thursday (July 27, 2017) that the Palestinian who killed three Israelis last week should be executed. Netanyahu was speaking during a condolence visit with the Salomon family, who lost three family members in an attack in their West Bank home of Halamish.


"The death penalty for terrorists is something that the time has come to do," the prime minister told the family.

"It's enshrined in the law. You need to have the judges reach unanimity, but they also want to know the government's position. My position as prime minister, in such a case, of a murderer as lowly as this, is that he must be put to death. We simply need him not to smile anymore."


Last Friday, 19-year-old Omar al-Abed of the nearby village of Khobar infiltrated Halamish and stabbed Yosef Salomon, 70, and his adult children, Chaya, a 46-year-old teacher, and Elad, 36. Yosef's wife Tova, 68, was wounded in the attack.

  

Benjamin Netanyahu against Hamas

Netanyahu favors capital punishment for Halamish terrorist

July 27, 2017 18:40
Israeli prime minister echoes ministers who called for the death penalty to be put to use against terrorist who murdered family in Halamish.

The terrorist who killed Yosef, Chaya and Elad Salomon in Halamish last Shabbat “should simply never smile again,” Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Thursday, advocating the death penalty in this case.


“It is time for the death penalty for terrorists,” Netanyahu said during a shiva call he and his wife, Sara, made to the Solomon home in El’ad.


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Netanyahu said the death penalty was anchored in law, but that a ruling on this matter needs the consent of judges trying the case, and they want to know the government’s position.


“My position as the prime minister is that in this case, with such a lowly murderer, he has to be taken out to die. He should simply never smile again,” he said.


The terrorist, Omar al-Abed al-Jalil, 19, from Kobar, was “neutralized” when shot in the stomach by a soldier from the IDF’s Oketz canine unit, on leave at the time – a neighbor of the Solomons in Halamish – who ran to the home when he heard the screams.


Netanyahu expresses public support for death penalty to terrorists
After opposing capital punishment over the years, PM tells Salomon family, who lost three members in terror attack in Halamish, that it's time 'to wipe the smile off the terrorist's face'; while military law allows it, the government needs to change its policy on the matter to enable judges to hand down such a sentence.
Yoav Zitun, Itamar Eichner|Published:  29.07.17 , 20:05

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu declared earlier this week that terrorist Omar al-Abed, who murdered three members of the Salomon family, should be sentenced to death, echoing calls repeatedly made in the past by Defense Ministry Avigdor Lieberman.  

Netanyahu paid his respects to al-Abed's victims—Yosef Salomon, 70, and his children Haya, 46, and Elad, 35—on Thursday during a visit to the family home in the West Bank settlement of Halamish.


"It's time we start giving death sentences to terrorists," the prime minister told the mourning family. "It's enshrined in law, it requires a unanimous decision by the judges, but they also want to know the government's position. And my position as the prime minister, in this instance of such a heinous murderer—he needs to be executed. We need to wipe the smile off his face."


The Security Provisions Order in the West Bank allows to hand down the death sentence to a terrorist convicted of murder, but sparingly. The decision must be unanimous, a trial must be conducted even if the terrorist pleads guilty to the charges, and the death penalty must be appealed even if the terrorist does not choose to appeal it. 


Change in policy required

For such a sentence to be handed out, however, Netanyahu and Lieberman need to change the government's policy and instruct the military prosecution to ask the military courts for such a punishment.

The defense establishment has opposed implementing the law, because of the concern it would lead to abductions of Israeli soldiers and civilians as bargaining chips to release terrorists on death row.

Netanyahu has also been against changing the government policy on capital punishment. Two years ago, Netanyahu shelved a bill on capital punishment to terrorists, which was proposed by then-MK Sharon Gal (Yisrael Beytenu). The prime minister instructed the seven Likud ministers in the Ministerial Committee for Legislation to vote against the bill and ordered the formation of a team headed by Minister Yariv Levin to examine the issue.

Last year, Lieberman demanded the move as his condition to joining the government, but eventually relinquished the demand.

Earlier this week, when the Cabinet discussed the murder of the Salomon family, Minister Yisrael Katz demanded the death penalty for the terrorist and the expulsion of Sheikh Raed Salah, the leader of the outlawed northern branch of the Islamic Movement, to Syria or to Gaza. The ministers decided to discuss the issue again after the Temple Mount crisis is resolved.

But unlike Lieberman, and Bayit Yehudi Ministers Naftali Bennett and Ayelet Shaked, Netanyahu did not express support for capital punishment during the Cabinet discussion—only at the Salomon family home later in the week.

Lieberman, as the defense minister, and Netanyahu, as the prime minister, are the only two who can lead such a change in policy.

Such a move is not expected to face any bureaucratic or procedural delays. The Cabinet will likely seek the positions of the Shin Bet, the IDF, the Justice Ministry and the military judicial system on the matter, but eventually the decision will be down to the prime minister, who enjoys the support of his defense minister and right-wing Cabinet.

A woman holds up a sign with ‘Too many terrorists in prison’ written on one side and ‘Kill them all’ written on the other during a rally in Tel Aviv on April 19, 2016 to support Elor Azaria. (Photo: Jack Guez/AFP)
[PHOTO SOURCE: http://mondoweiss.net/2017/08/israelis-palestinian-attackers/]

Terrorist asks for death sentence

Only several military judges in IDF history sentenced terrorists to death as an act of deterrence, but the verdicts were eventually not carried out over a minority opinion or an appeal that overruled it.

In July 1997, a military judge "undermined" the policy of the government (which was also led by Netanyahu) and sentenced Hamas arch-terrorist Hassan Salameh to death—but his was the minority opinion. Salameh was convicted of the murder of 46 Israelis.

Salameh himself, who showed no remorse for his actions, asked the judges to sentence him to death.

The judges noted this was an "all-time record" of people killed in a terror attack by one terrorist, and the minority opinion judge, Col. (res.) Ilan Katz wrote, "The defendant said he intended to kill as many Jews as possible. He was aware of the results of the first two attacks and yet did not cease and carried out the third attack regardless. With that, he has lost his humanity and made himself an exception to the rule. He carried out these attacks while there is an ongoing peace process in our region in an effort to foil it."

Katz went on to note that "Even the judicial sources in Judaism, from the Sanhedrin to the Rambam, supported handing down the death sentence sparingly."

The judge further criticized "the way in which courts determine they are not handing down the death sentence because it was not asked for by the prosecution is not appropriate and undermines the duty of the courts to exercise independent judgment."

  

Hamas is responsible and Hamas will pay. - Benjamin Netanyahu

Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu calls for a Palestinian man who killed three Israelis to get the death penalty – 55 years after the last state execution of Nazi war criminal Adolf Eichmann

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