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Israel Is Allowed to Target Hamas Terrorists; International Law Is Not a Suicide Pact
A home destroyed in Kibbutz Nir Oz in southern Israel during Hamas’ Oct. 7 terrorist attack that is featured in the film Kibbutz Nir Oz by “Uvda.” Photo: Screenshot
“Each state is expected to aid and enforce the law of nations, as part of the common law, by inflicting an adequate punishment upon the offenses against that universal law.” William Blackstone, Commentaries on the Law of England (1765)
Israel’s targeted killing of Hamas leader Marwan Issa in mid-March raises tactical and legal questions. Though it is unclear that such tactics can diminish tangible terror threats to Israel, there is also no reason to rule out their permissibility under international law. In the final analysis, such permissibility derives from the world legal system’s continuously anarchic structure and from the corresponding right of all nation-states states to protect their citizens from willful slaughter.
There are many clarifying details. By definition, world legal authority remains a fundamentally “self-help,” or vigilante system of justice. It is amid this perpetual global anarchy that every anti-terror government must systematically assess its strategic and tactical options. The victim of this necessary act (a targeted air attack) was a key Hamas planner of the October 7, 2024, assault on Israeli civilians, a murderous terror assault that combined the mass killing of noncombatants with the orchestrated rape of Israeli civilians.
Hamas, like Hezbollah, draws tangible support from Iran. A principal risk of leaving this insidious symbiosis unchallenged would be a direct Iranian attack on Israel that escalates incrementally into unconventional belligerency. Eventually, even if Iran were to remain non-nuclear, an intra-crisis search for “escalation dominance” by Israel and Iran could produce unprecedented nuclear conflict. This sui generis result could be produced suddenly, as a “bolt-from-the-blue,” or in variously hard to decipher increments. Initially, it could “present” as an Iranian use of radiation dispersal weapons (nuclear radiation rather than nuclear explosives), or as a conventional attack on Israel’s nuclear reactor at Dimona.
Under international law, which is binding upon all sovereign states, terrorism represents a crime that should be prevented and must be punished. As was learned originally from Roman law and Jewish law (Torah), a universal rule exists. This “peremptory” rule affirms the core principle of “No crime without a punishment,” or Nullum crimen sine poena. It can be discovered, among other sources, at the London Charter of August 8, 1945. This is the founding document of the post-war Nuremberg Tribunal.
In formal jurisprudence, terrorists are known as hostes humani generis, or “common enemies of humankind.” While the world legal system allows or even encourages certain insurgencies in matters of “self-determination,” there is nothing about these matters that can ever justify deliberate attacks on civilians. In this connection, it is important to remember that an integral part of all criminal law is the underlying presence of mens rea, or “criminal intent.”
On this point, there can be no reasonable comparison of Marwan Issa’s deliberate mass murder of Israeli noncombatants, and the unintended civilian harms now being suffered in Gaza. As a matter of law, responsibility for such ongoing harms falls entirely upon the “perfidious” behavior (i.e., “human shields”) of Hamas and Iran, and not on Israeli forces acting on behalf of legitimate self-defense.
Under the law of war, even where an insurgent use of force has supportable “just cause,” it must still fight with “just means.” Accordingly, the vapid phrase “One man’s terrorist is another’s freedom fighter,” is never more than an empty witticism.
There is more. Ordinarily, assassination, like terrorism, is a crime under international law. Under certain conditions, however, the targeted killing of terrorist leaders can represent a life-saving and heroic example of indispensable law-enforcement. In a more perfect world legal system, perhaps, there could be no defensible justification for any violent self-help expressions of international justice. But this is not yet such a world.
In our self-defense oriented world legal order, the only state alternative to launching precise targeting actions against terrorists would be to allow incessantly escalating terror-violence against the innocent. Among pertinent clarifications, this is because terror-organizations like Hamas and terror-mentoring states like Iran harbor undisguised contempt for all ordinary legal expectations of criminal extradition. The formal term for this ignored expectation is “extradite or prosecute;” or aut dedere, aut judicare.
At first glance, to accept the targeted killings of terrorist leaders as law-enforcing remediation would seem to disregard the usual obligations of “due process.” Still, international relations are not overseen by the same civil protections offered by individual national governments, and terrorist leaders like Marwan Issa undertake barbarous attacks on men, women, and children with undisguised enthusiasm.
In the future, if Hamas and related terrorist criminals are effectively held immune by civilized states, indiscriminate attacks could exploit chemical, biological, or even nuclear elements. For the moment, a nuclear option would be limited to “only” a “dirty bomb” (radiation dispersal weapons), but this could change. To be sure, in the foreseeable future, Iran could fashion and deploy an authentic “chain-reaction” nuclear explosive.
There is more. The willfully indiscriminate nature of jihadist terrorist operations (not just Hamas) is well documented. Such intentional blurring of the lines between lawful and unlawful targets is rooted in certain generic principles of “holy war.” Several years ago, an oft-repeated remark by Sheikh Omar Bakri Muhammad, then a prominent Muslim cleric in London, explained core doctrinal linkages between Islamic terror and “holy war:”
Said the Sheikh, “We don’t make a distinction between civilians and non-civilians, innocents and non-innocents. Only between Muslims and unbelievers. And the life of an unbeliever (a Jew or Christian) has no value. It has no sanctity.”
International law is not a suicide pact, especially when an adversary remains indifferent to its unassailable claims.
As was learned yet again on October 7, 2023, jihadist attackers add gratuitously barbarous effects to their corrosive primal ideologies. At “bottom line,” these are belief systems that gleefully embrace the sacrificial slaughter of “unbelievers.” To wit, for Hamas and related terror groups, “military objectives” have “normally” included elementary schools, bomb shelters, ice-cream parlors, civilian bus stops, and elderly pedestrians. In law, these perpetrators ought never to be called “militants.” Whatever their alleged cause, they are criminals of the irredeemably worst sort.
There is a related point. Though jihadists may call themselves “martyrs,” the personal death such terrorists seem anxious to suffer is presumptively just a transient inconvenience on the path to “paradise” and immortality. As this path is “glorious,” these jihadists are not “merely” aspiring mass murderers. They are also consummate cowards.
Hamas, Hezbollah, Islamic Jihad, and other terror groups remain dedicated to the idea that any peace agreement with Israel must represent an intolerable abomination to Islam. Facing these implacable enemies within a self-help system of international law, Israel deserves the self-defending right to target refractory terrorist leaders. Determining whether such self-help remedies are also militarily sound raises another question altogether.
In the final analysis, what is most noteworthy about the targeted killing of terrorist leaders is not its permissibility in law, but the widespread global unwillingness to endorse or even acknowledge this critical right.
In current jurisprudence, an ancient principle still holds true: Ubi cessat remedium ordinarium, ibi decurritur ad extraordinarium — “Where the ordinary remedy fails, recourse must be had to an extraordinary one.”
Under international law, every state maintains the inherent right and corollary obligation to protect its citizens from transnational criminal harms. In exceptional circumstances, this dual responsibility can extend to the targeted killing of terrorist leaders. Otherwise, on its face, world law would in fact be a suicide pact.
Targeted killings, subject to applicable legal rules of distinction, proportionality, and military necessity, could sometimes offer the least unwelcome form of national self-protection. In such cases, especially where additional terror-crimes are still in a planning stage, the legal acceptability of violent self-help measures is greater ipso facto. In our continuously anarchic system of international law, this proposition is beyond any logical doubt. The world legal system is designed to protect us all from foreseeable infringements of human rights. Ironically, however, this same decentralized system still has no independent means to meet such a primary obligation.
In the best of all possible worlds, targeted killing could expect no defensible place in law-based counter-terrorism. But we do not yet live in the best of all possible worlds, and the negative aspects of any such action ought never to be evaluated apart from alternative policy outcomes. If Israel had chosen not to target Marwan Issa so as not to injure the sensibilities of “civilized nations” (a phrase codified at article 38 of the Statute of the International Court of Justice), it would have brought extensive injury to many innocent human beings.
Counter-terrorism should always be governed by rational and justice-oriented decision-making processes. If the expected costs of a targeted assassination appear lower than the expected costs of all other plausible self-defense options, such a self-defense operation must emerge as the patently rational choice. However odious it might first appear in vacuo, targeted killing in such circumstances could offer a beleaguered state the least injurious path to security from terrorist criminality.
Inevitably, targeted killings, even of Hamas leaders like Marwan Issa, will elicit righteous indignation from many quarters. For now, however, the philosophic promise of centralized international law remains far from being realized, and continuously beleaguered states such as Israel will need to consider multiple operational choices. In facing such bewildering choices, states would soon discover that all viable alternatives to targeted-killing also include violence, and that these alternatives could plausibly exact a much larger human toll.
Sir William Blackstone’s 18th century Commentaries, the foundation of United States jurisprudence, explain that because international law is an integral part of each individual state’s “common law,” all states are “expected to aid and enforce the law of nations.” This must be accomplished “by inflicting an adequate punishment upon the offenses against that universal law.” Derivatively, by its precisely targeted removal of Hamas terrorist leader Marwan Issa, Israel acted not in violation of the law of nations, but in its indispensable enforcement. Presently, this neglected clarification of global justice should not be undervalued or overlooked.
Louis René Beres was educated at Princeton (Ph.D., 1971) and is the author of many books and scholarly articles dealing with international law, nuclear strategy, nuclear war, and terrorism. In Israel, Professor Beres was Chair of Project Daniel. His twelfth and latest book is titled Surviving Amid Chaos: Israel’s Nuclear Strategy (Rowman & Littlefield, 2016; 2nd ed., 2018). A version of this article was originally published by Israel National News.
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Anti-Zionists Are Excluding LGBTQ+ Jews From Pride Spaces, New Report Says
Jews of Pride members are seen marching in the Pride parade 2025, part of LGBTQ+ community’s Midsumma Festival. Photo: Alexander Bogatyrev / SOPA Images via Reuters Connect.
Anti-Israel activists in the LGBTQ+ community are subjecting Zionist Jews to extreme levels of discrimination, including expulsions from major progressive groups and even physical assault, according to a new report by the nonprofit A Wider Bridge.
The release of the report — titled “Unsafe Spaces: Addressing Antisemitism Against LGBTQ+ Jews and Ensuring Pride Safety” — comes as LGBTQ community members across the Western world observe Pride Month, a period of festivities which celebrate the expansion of social and legal rights that have allowed gays to live more freely and authentically than ever in human history. For pro-Israel Jews, however, Pride Month 2025 is a challenging moment, as anti-Zionism has creeped into and crowded out many queer spaces which once welcomed them with open arms.
From online forums to the streets, the maltreatment and “erasure” of Jewish queer identity is severe, the report explains. Eighty-two percent of LGBTQ Jews have reported being expelled from social media channels or harassed on them, A Wider Bridge noted.
Earlier this year, NYC Dyke March, a public demonstration held by members of the lesbian community in New York City, banned self-proclaimed “Zionists” from its annual event, citing a desire to stand against the so-called “genocide” occurring in Gaza. Last year, the NYC Dyke March came under scrutiny after organizers settled on “genocide” as the theme of its 2024 event. In a statement, decrying “ethnic cleansing, violence, and dehumanization,” the organization compared the ongoing war in Gaza, to mass killings occurring in Ethiopia, Myanmar, and Sudan.
Also in 2024, the Dyke March Committee formally barred “Zionists” from participating in the Pride March, and during the event Jews were attacked and heckled after being seen wearing the Star of David on their clothing. That same year, an LGBTQ-friendly bar in the Brooklyn borough of New York City refused to hold a screening party for the Eurovision talent competition due to the participation of an Israeli contestant.
Forced, mass exiles are taking place in response to this new reality, the report added. Forty-three percent of queer Jews say they are leaving online forums; 40 percent abstain from participating in LGBTQ social events; and 30 percent said their decision was driven by precipitous deterioration of the manner in which they are treated. The only conclusion to draw, the report said, is that the Pride movement is “no longer universally safe or inclusive.”
“What we have found since Oct. 7 and what the report points to is that the explosion of antisemitism that the whole Jewish community has experienced has in some ways grown even more exponentially in the LGBTQ community,” Rabbi Denise Eger, interim executive director of A Wider Bridge and former president of the Central Conference of American Rabbis, told The Algemeiner during an interview on Friday. “What we’re seeing around now as Pride marches and organizations put on their celebration s is institutional discrimination and outright boycotts.”
Eger went on to note that antisemitism in LGBTQ communities is all the more distressing due to the outsized contributions, legal and political, which Jewish gays and lesbians have made towards fostering a society that is more inclusive of non-heteronormative identities and relationships.
“Look at who were the early leaders of the LGBTQ civil rights movement — Harvey Milk, one of the first openly gay elected officials in the US, was a Jewish man. Edith Windsor, who brought one of the first marriage equality cases that we won at the Supreme Court, and her attorney, Roberta Kaplan, who won it — these are LGBTQ heroes, not just LGBTQ ‘Jewish’ heroes and heroines,” Eger continued. “So, for LGBTQ Jews to be continually shut out of these spaces is paralyzing, shocking, and horrifying, and LGBTQ Jews are asking where is their home.”
She added, “These are difficult times, but together, the whole Jewish community, including the LGBTQ part of the Jewish community, can stand strong and be resilient in the face of all this, just as the Jewish people have done throughout our history. We have the tools within our tradition to keep us strong and to help us educate. And yes, I believe so much, as a rabbi, that we can and must help change the world for the better. That’s what we are called to do as the Jewish people.”
As previously reported by The Algemeiner, recorded incidents of antisemitism in the US continue to increase year over year, breaking all previous annual records.
In 2024, as reported by the Anti-Defamation League’s (ADL) annual audit, there were 9,354 antisemitic incidents — an average of 25.6 a day — across the US, creating an atmosphere of hate not experienced in the nearly thirty years since the ADL began tracking such data in 1979. Incidents of harassment, vandalism, and assault all increased by double digits, and for the first time ever a majority of outrages — 58 percent — were related to the existence of Israel as the world’s only Jewish state.
The Algemeiner parsed the ADL’s data, finding dramatic rises in incidents on college campuses, which saw the largest growth in 2024. The 1,694 incidents tallied by the ADL amounted to an 84 percent increase over the previous year. Additionally, antisemites were emboldened to commit more offenses in public in 2024 than they did in 2023, perpetrating 19 percent more attacks on Jewish people, pro-Israel demonstrators, and businesses perceived as being Jewish-owned or affiliated with Jews.
“Hatred toward Israel was a driving force behind antisemitism across the US, with more than half of all antisemitic incidents referencing Israel or Zionism,” said Oren Segal, ADL senior vice president for counter-extremism and intelligence. “These incidents, along with all those documented in the audit, serve as a clear reminder that silence is not an option. Good people must stand up, push back, and confront antisemitism wherever it appears. And that starts with understanding what fuels it and learning to recognize it in all its forms.”
Follow Dion J. Pierre @DionJPierre.
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Two UK Men Convicted, Jailed Following November Antisemitic Harassment
Illustrative: A pro-Hamas march in London, United Kingdom, Feb. 17, 2024. Photo: Chrissa Giannakoudi via Reuters Connect
A court in the United Kingdom on Thursday sentenced Hussein Altamimi, 22, and Ali Alanzi, 30, to prison sentences of eight months and seven months respectively, for charges stemming from an incident at London’s Western Marble Arch Synagogue in November 2024, according to British media.
The two men received convictions for yelling at four Jewish worshipers such phrases as “Jews aren’t welcome here,” “you don’t belong here,” and “f—king Jew.” They also repeatedly screamed “free Palestine.”
The incident grew violent when Altamimi hit one victim’s arm to try and prevent her from filming the abuse. Alanzi also hurled liquid from an alcoholic drink toward one person. When police arrived to arrest the pair, he assaulted one of the officers.
The court convicted both men of four counts of religiously aggravated public order offenses and religiously aggravated assault. Alanzi also received a conviction for attacking the officer and will endure an additional 12 weeks’ incarceration due to a previous suspended sentence.
On Friday, the Campaign Against Antisemitism (CAA) described its reaction to the hate crime prosecutions on X in one word: “Vindicated.”
Altamimi also faced additional charges and guilty verdicts related to a July 2023 incident which included racial abuse and striking a police officer.
“The CPS is working closely with the police to tackle hate crime, making sure that perpetrators who target victims because of their religion, race, sexuality, gender identity, or disability are brought to justice,” Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) lawyer Anna Hindmarsh said following the trial. “We know that hate crimes have a significant impact on victims and the wider community, and we will continue to support victims and witnesses who come forward to report any examples of hate crime they have experienced.”
The convictions against Altamimi and Alanzi are part of a historic surge in antisemitic acts in the United Kingdom.
The UK experienced its second-worst year for antisemitism in 2024, despite recording an 18 percent drop in antisemitic incidents from the previous year’s all-time high, according to a report released in February.
The Community Security Trust (CST), a nonprofit charity that advises Britain’s Jewish community on security matters, released data showing it recorded 3,528 antisemitic incidents for 2024, a drop of 18 percent from the 4,296 in 2023. These numbers compare to 1,662 antisemitic incidents in 2022, 2,261 in 2021, and 1,684 in 2020.
In the 12 months following Hamas’s Oct. 7, 2023, invasion of and massacre across southern Israel, CST counted 5,583 antisemitic incidents in the UK, an increase from 204 percent from the same period the previous year.
Many of the incidents involved violence targeting the Jewish community.
Last month, On May 26, a group of six or seven men attacked three Jewish boys at the Hampstead Underground Station in North London, requiring hospitalization for one. CAA said that “this report is yet another stark reminder of the growing threat facing Jewish communities, including children.”
Another antisemitic assault occurred in Manchester in February, when an unidentified individual hit a Jewish man with what was believed to be a bottle, shattering the victim’s glasses.
The heavily Orthodox Jewish neighborhood of Stamford Hill in Hackney saw an antisemitic act last week when vandals targeted a Jewish-owned investment firm, smashing its windows and splashing red paint. The group Palestine Action claimed responsibility for the crime, as it had done previously for similar acts at the University of Cambridge’s endowment fund headquarters and the BBC’s New Broadcasting House.
“This should be treated as [an] antisemitic incident without any doubt. [The owners] are visibly Jewish people; the people who run the business and this business itself have nothing to do with Israel,” said Rabbi Herschel Gluck, president of Jewish security service Shomrim’s branch in Stamford Hill.
Days earlier, residents of Brighton in southeastern England discovered antisemitic vandalism at a memorial created to honor the victims of the Hamas-led Oct. 7 terror attacks.
“There have been over 40 attacks on the site including vandalism, theft, and graffiti. The abuse has been relentless,” Heidi Bachram, who volunteers to maintain the memorial, told The Jewish Chronicle at the time. “It’s shocking that grief for innocents is met with such violence. The hate won’t stop us, and every night, a different victim’s story will be told [at the memorial]. We will never let them be forgotten.”
In April, according to prosecutors, Abdullah Sabah Albadri, 33, attempted to climb a wall outside of the Israeli embassy in London while carrying a “martyrdom note.”
Prosecutor Kristel Pous said that Albadri told police that he wanted to “do something to send a message to the Israeli government to stop the war.”
The Israeli embassy stated in response to the foiled attack that “we thank the British security forces for their immediate response and ongoing efforts to secure the embassy.” It vowed that “the embassy of Israel will not be deterred by any terror threat and will continue to represent Israel with pride in the UK.”
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Large Pro-Israel Event in Texas ‘Indefinitely Postponed’ Due to Threats of Terrorism
A protester holds a sign that reads, ”From the river to the sea Palestine will be free” during a pro-Palestinian emergency demonstration outside the Consulate General of Israel in Houston, Texas, on March 19, 2025. Photo: Reginald Mathalone via Reuters Connect
The 2025 Israel Summit in Dallas, Texas has been indefinitely postponed in response to what organizers described as intensifying threats of terrorism.
Prior to the cancellation, the event was expecting over 1,000 attendees. The Israel Summit had already undergone a last-minute venue change due to mounting safety concerns. The gathering, scheduled for June 9–11, was set to feature prominent voices from both the Jewish and Christian pro-Israel communities.
Former US Ambassador to Israel David Friedman, who had been scheduled to speak at the event, commented on the cancellation on social media: “This is what America looks like in 2025. A peaceful pro-Israel gathering with more than a thousand participants had to be scrapped because of threats from violent extremists.”
Ten days prior to this year’s event, local police and intelligence officials in Dallas alerted organizers that the gathering had been upgraded to a “high-threat event.”
According to Josiah Hilton, host of the Israel Guys show, which was scheduled to co-host the event with HaYovel, the organizers had to produce “a mandatory security plan with a substantial budget estimated in the hundreds of thousands of dollars.”
The organizers then moved the Israel Summit to a facility in an isolated area of Kenneth, Texas. However, the event was forced to cancel after the Palestinian Youth Movement Dallas and Jewish Voice for Peace, a pair of anti-Israel, pro-Hamas organizations, revealed its location to their followers.
“[T]he Genocide Summit had to change plans last minute in desperation due to them claiming to be ‘under attack.’ The reality is they understand DFW’s commitment to confronting the extremist ideology that is Zionism,” Palestinian Youth Movement Dallas wrote on Instagram.
However, the organizers stated that they are going to hold the pro-Israel event “in the near future,” and vowed to “come back bigger and stronger, with more people.”
Hilton said that the cancellation reflects “the growing normalization of antisemitic threats and anti-Israel extremists, which are fueling intimidation and silencing voices of support for Israel across the United States.”
The cancellation of the Israel Summit also reflects growing concern regarding potential violence against supporters of the Jewish state. Last month, two Israeli embassy staffers, Yaron Lipschinsky and Sarah Milgrim, were murdered while exiting an event hosted by the American Jewish Committee (AJC) at the Capital Jewish Museum in Washington, DC. Then this past Sunday, an assailant firebombed a pro-Israel rally in Boulder, Colorado, injuring 15 people and a dog.
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