Description

GAZA CITY (Ma'an) -- Hamas executed four alleged collaborators with Israel in the courtyard of a mosque in Jabaliya in the northern Gaza Strip on Saturday.

Witnesses told Ma'an that armed men brought the group of four into the court and opened fire at them while dozens of locals gathered.

The Hamas-affiliated Al-Majd website quoted security sources as saying that the four were executed in a "revolutionary" way after "legal measures were completed."

Hamas reportedly declined to release the names or pictures of the executed for the sake of social stability.

The reports come after the Palestinian Authority's presidential office denounced the 18 executions of alleged collaborators on Friday and three the day before, calling them "extrajudicial" and condemning Hamas for failing to abide by existing legal procedures for dealing with the cases.

Although collaboration with Israel is punishable by death in the Palestinian legal code, president Mahmoud Abbas has maintained a moratorium on the death penalty since 2005.

In Gaza, however, death sentences are still carried out as the legitimacy of president Abbas -- whose term officially ended in 2009 -- was not recognized, at least not until a national reconciliation deal in April that technically recognized him.

Israel maintains an extensive network of collaborators in both the Gaza Strip and the West Bank who help gather intelligence for Israeli strikes and raids.

______

Following Informant Executions, Several Surrender to Palestinian Resistance

by IMEMC News & Agencies

Amnesty International denounces corporal punishment by Hamas

A Palestinian revolutionary court, Friday morning, sentenced 18 people, who had been spying for Israel, to death by firing squad.

According to Al Ray Palestinian Media Agency, the deaths occurred with the help of collaborators, without any legal evidence of the victims committing even a simple misdemeanor.

11 of the executed informants were shot in the morning, in front of the garden, at Al-Azhar University, while the rest were executed in front of the Great Omari mosque in Gaza City, following Friday prayer.

The Palestinian News Network (PNN) has reported that this now brings the number of alleged informants executed in the past two days to 21, and includes several people who were arrested, yesterday, in connection with the killing of three senior Hamas commanders and a number of family members by Israeli forces.

Anne FitzGerald, Amnesty International’s Director of Research and Crisis Response, was quoted to say, in response: “This flurry of executions by Hamas is made even more shocking by the fact that the victims were sentenced to death after trials which, if they happened at all, were summary and grossly unfair... Hamas must immediately and totally cease its use of the death penalty.”

Under Palestinian law, all death sentences must be approved by the Palestinian Authority, but Hamas administration carries out executions without first obtaining the president's official consent.

Al Ray further reported that, following the executions, a number of other informants surrendered to Palestinian resistance, on Friday, announcing their repentance for collaborating with Israel.

One citizen commented: “The spies caused a lot of damage - deaths and destruction - in Gaza, before and during the ongoing Israeli offensive.”

The identities of the executed individuals are not yet known, according to the PNN, as their heads were covered before they were shot. The executioners were also masked.

Collaborators were called upon, by Palestinian resistance, to repent and save themselves by surrendering to the nearest security centers -- this in conjunction with the announcement of a "new phase" in dealing with a "dangerous and strange phenomenon" which has led to the deaths of more than 2,000, the injuries of over 10,000 and the internal displacement of over 100,000 Palestinians, as thousands of homes have been completely destroyed by Israel's relentless bombardament of the region.