The Palestinian Authority (PA) has made formal assurances that it will not carry out a planned execution of a suspected Israeli agent handed down by a military tribunal in Hevron. The Arab defendant, Imaad Sa'ad 25,
was sentenced to death last month.
The Israel Law Center (Shurat HaDin) had led a public campaign and petitioned the High Court of Justice on May 20 to compel the Prime Minister and Minister of Defense of Israel to take immediate action to rescue the convicted agent. In its response to the Israel Law Center's petition, the State's Attorney has now declared that Israel has received assurances from the PA that Sa'ad will not be executed.
"We have been informed that the Palestinian Authority has assured the Government State of Israel, that there is no intention to follow-through with the death sentence for convicted collaborator Imad Sa'ad," thus reads the letter dispatched by Israel's High Court of Justice to former Soviet Prisoner of Zion Ida Nudel and her Attorney, Nitsana Darshan-Leitner, Director of the Israel-based human rights organization Israel Law Center.
Sa'ad, 25, is a Palestinian Police officer who became world famous after being sentenced to death by a PA military court in Hebron on allegations that his assistance to Israel's security forces led to the killing of four
fugitive Arab terrorists.
"Based on similar cases in the past, the Palestinian Authority is usually quick to carry out death sentences against accused Israeli agents," said Darshan-Leitner upon receiving the letter indicating that Sa'ad's life was saved. "The swift actions of Ms. Nudel and the Israel Law Center to save his life were therefore critical."
During the campaign to stave off the execution, the Israel Law Center dispatched urgent appeals on behalf of Ms. Nudel to Pope Benedict XVI, United States President George W. Bush, Israeli Prime Minister Olmert, the United
Nations and the European Union and filed a request for action with Israel's High Court of Justice while attempting to engage world media support.
Ms. Nudel, 74, has been represented by Darshan-Leitner in a number of similar cases involving accused Arabs of the PA in the past. The two have repeatedly succeeded in asserting sufficient pressure via diplomatic, legal and public means to bring the PA to stay executions of alleged Israeli agents and have had the condemned individual's sentences commuted from death to a life sentence.
Attorney Darshan-Leitner said, "We call upon all involved, from the government of Israel, through the courts and the international religious, diplomatic and human rights community, to remain vigilant, alert and active to make sure these inhuman and unjust sentences are not being imposed by PA kangaroo courts in similar cases in the future."