I'm confused about putting him on trial in a civil court. Israeli
politicians, especially those on the right, have rushed to characterize the current conflict with the Palestinians as "war." Doing so helps to justify certain actions against "the enemy," which might be considered too brutal in the case of an uprising or too demanding, in the case of calling on the Israeli public to make certain sacrifices, such as more time doing reserve military duty.
But if we are in a state of war, is it correct to put Barghouti on trial in a civil court and punish him according to such standards? If we are in war, then it seems Barghouti must be considered a military commander. Did he commit war crimes?
The Tel Aviv Court ruled Thursday that Barghouti was directly responsible for three attacks: the January 2002 terror attack on a gas station in Givat Ze'ev in which Israeli Yoela Chen was murdered; the June 2001 attack in which a Greek monk was murdered in the West Bank settlement of Ma'aleh Adumim; and the March 2002 attack at Tel Aviv's Seafood Market restaurant in which three people were murdered, as well as a car bomb attack in Jerusalem.
Is a soldier who intentionally targets and kills civilians during a state of war guilty of commiting war crimes? (One could argue that Ma'aleh Adumim and Givat Ze'ev, because they are both located in territory Israel captured in the 1967 Six Day War, are disputed areas, but does this justify targeting civilians there? In any case, the other attack took place in Tel Aviv.) If so, then what is the proper forum to put Barghouti on trial?
Barghouti was also convicted Thursday of membership in a terror
organization. This seems strange to me considering that he's a
Palestinian and was living in the West Bank. If the defendant was an Arab citizen of Israel, then I could understand this charge. But using the reasoning Israel applied to Barghouti, couldn't a soldier in the Israel Defense Forces who drove a bulldozer that demolished a Palestinian home be charged in a Ramallah court with belonging to a terror organization? Not because the IDF is a terror organization, but rather that the Palestinian court could define it as such and therefore convict the soldier.
Again, I feel I must repeat that I deplore Barghouti's actions. But it seems that there is a legal dilemma here. The trial also points out the difficulty in characterizing the conflict and the implications of doing so.
