Israel is currently trying a group of Arabs from Silwan in East Jerusalem for mass murder and terrorism. These terrorists are responsible for a series of murders including the bombing of the cafeteria of the Hebrew University. Technically they could be given the death penalty, under a loophole in Israeli law. Ordinarily there is NO death penalty for anything in Israel, which has no doubt contributed enormously to the growth in terrorist atrocities. Be that as it may, the Israeli Left is already gearing up to make sure that no one who mass murders Jews should be given the death penalty (for example, radio interview this week with arch-leftist lawyer Moshe Negbi).



So maybe the time is right to take a deep breath and step back and re-examine the issue. Should Israel have a death penalty?



Opponents of the death penalty say it does not deter terrorism. But how do they know? How do they know how much terrorism would exist WITH a death penalty, compared to the amount WITHOUT one? They point to other countries where terrorism continued even when there was a death penalty (e.g., Moslem countries, esp. Pakistan).



But that hardly proves anything at all! Even in those places with death penalties, no one knows how much terrorism there would have been WITHOUT it, compared to the level with it. As far as we know, 90% of terrorism might have been deterred!



A similar argument is made regarding the death penalty for ordinary violent crime, namely, that it does not deter. Opponents insist that humans are the only organisms on the planet whose behavior is not altered by the threat of death. The proof? There is still violent crime when there is a death penalty. But crime also continues when countries have prisons, and no one is suggesting that is a reason to do away with imprisonment. Once again the proof in the pudding lies not in the continuation of crime in spite the existence of the death penalty (such as in the US), but in its actual level relative to the level of crime without a death penalty. Such a comparison is not simple and requires sophisticated statistical analysis, something bleeding hearts and moral posturers are far too lazy to do.



The bottom line is that those statisticians who have tackled the issue using serious methodologies generally conclude that, politically incorrect it may be, there is considerable empirical evidence that the death penalty does indeed deter violent crime.



(See for example "Does Capital Punishment Have a Deterrent Effect: New Evidence from Post-moratorium Panel Data", Dezhbakhsh, Rubin and Shepherd, January 2001. Located at userwww.service.emory.edu/~cozden/dezhbakhsh_01_01_paper.pdf also "Pardons, Executions and Homicide", H. Naci Mocan and R. Kaj Gottings, October 2001, located at http://econ.cudenver.edu/mocan/papers/deathpenalty1007.pdf )



How does anyone know what level of terrorism would prevail in Israel if there WERE a death penalty? Why don't we have an experiment and find out? But a more important argument is this: the death penalty should be implemented against terrorists EVEN IF IT TRULY DOES NOT DETER TERRORISM. It should be implemented because it represents a great moral statement. It is the moral and ethical thing to do. It makes a statement that terrorists are lowlifes with no legitimate claim to the right to live. It represents a moral and just vengeance. It represents a declaration of good and evil.



Opponents in Israel argue that the death penalty represents disdain and contempt for human life and that all people have a "right to live". Give me a break. This is just another proof of the damage done when Israeliness loses all its groundings in Judaism. Terrorists have forfeited any claim they might have to the right to live. A terrorist's life is indeed deserving of disdain and contempt. Judaism values life above everything else and has in many ways the world's most sophisticated moral code; and it unambiguously favors the death penalty for murderers (except in cases of inadvertent killings). And not just murderers - remember the treatment of the rapists of Dinah?



There is nothing in Judaism about showing mercy or sparing combatants who attack Jews. Indeed, in cases where such mercy was shown (Saul for the King of the Amalekites), the one showing the misplaced compassion was stripped of his kingdom as punishment and the old man Samuel slit the Amalekite king's throat with his own hand. Misplaced mercy leads to misplaced cruelty, to paraphrase the Mishnah.



Opponents of the death penalty argue that it would just represent capitulating to the populist demands and pressures of the public. Huh? That is the same as conceding that the general electorate favors it and so its implementation is democratic. Preventing adoption of the death penalty is elitist and anti-democratic.



Opponents of the death penalty in Israel argue that the Arab terrorists would retaliate by mistreating or killing Jews they capture. One does not know whether to laugh or cry at this claim. The PLO and its sister Nazi organizations already lynch, torture and murder every Jew they can lay their hands on, including children, all this while Israel has NO death penalty. So whom are these posturers kidding?



Opponents of the death penalty in Israel argue that the death penalty is dehumanizing. The Torah thinks otherwise, as does every Jewish traditional ethicist in history, and as do most other ethical and religious traditions on earth. The death penalty is in fact humanizing. That is because it sanctions human life through putting those who would take such lives on notice that they themselves will be executed, that they will pay for their crimes with their own lives. Opponents argue that it would be dehumanizing to ask an Israeli to act as an executioner, the one who would push the button or pull the switch.



I volunteer. No one else will have to be dehumanized.



But more seriously, my guess is that the number of volunteers for any such switch pulling would be so large that the Treasury could balance the national budget by auctioning off chances to pull the switch. I personally, however, would offer the family members of victims of terrorism the first dibs.



Opponents of the death penalty in Israel argue that errors in judgment might be made and innocent people might be executed. This is a fallacious argument even when discussing execution of criminals, since to my knowledge no innocent person was ever executed in the United States. There have been some cases where people sentenced to execution were found to be innocent, but their innocence was discovered in all cases BEFORE they were executed. That is a proof that the death penalty works well, not that it is a failure.



But more generally, everything we do and everything government does carries some risk that an innocent person might be killed as a result of those actions and policies. Should we shut down the post office because postal trucks sometimes run over innocent people? Should we ban all new medicines because there is a risk that some innocent people might die taking them? Should we ground all planes because sometimes-innocent people are killed? Even if there WAS a risk of such errors, that is no reason at all to refuse to have a death penalty.



Opponents of the death penalty in Israel argue that until now Israel only applied it to Eichmann. Killing Palestinian terrorists would make the statement that they are not morally better than German Nazis. In other words, that is just another reason to apply it to terrorists.



Opponents of the death penalty argue that it is expensive to implement. This is absurd. Room and board for terrorists for life in prison are exorbitant. The death penalty is "expensive" in the US only because of America's judicial system, which allows endless expensive appeals to proceed forever, with juries. Israel has no jury system at all. In any case, these costs can be contained be restricting the options of appeals of convicted terrorists. And let us not forget about the murderers who escape prison or kill again.



Opponents of the death penalty in Israel argue that it will serve as an incentive for more terrorism. But the opposite is the case. Holding terrorists as prisoners is a daily incentive for terrorists to kidnap hostages. The Israeli hostages held by the Hizbollah might have never been taken had the Shi'ite terrorists from Lebanon that Israel grabbed been executed earlier.



Opponents of the death penalty in Israel argue that terrorists might resist capture by fighting to the death and so harm police and soldiers. Suddenly Israeli leftists care about police and soldiers? The overwhelming majority of Israelis think we should take our chances. Better the soldiers than the children on the school buses or the mothers in the cafes. That is why we have soldiers. I am sure they will know how to cope. And suicide bombers are not exactly likely to turn more deadly because they face the death penalty if captured. On the other hand, their controllers and sponsors might think twice before sending them out if they knew they would face Mister Gallows.



Opposition to the death penalty for terrorists comes from the same leftists who always put the rights of guilty Arab murderers ahead of the rights of innocent Jews to live.



The death penalty is a moral, ethical and humane partial remedy to the problems of terrorism.

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Steve Plaut teaches at the University of Haifa