Israel's Targeted Killings in the Gaza Strip: Israeli Justifications and International Law

The purpose of this paper is to analyze how Israel justifies its use of targeted killings. Israel's targeted killings became prominent during the Second Intifada and became an official part of Israeli counterterrorism. Shortly afterwards, in 2002, the State of Israel was sued by the Public Committee Against Torture in Israel and the Palestinian Society for the Protection of Human Rights and the Environment. They asserted that Israel's policy of targeted killings was a human rights violation because Israel was not involved in an international armed conflict with Hamas. However, the Israeli Supreme Court ruled that the policy is legal because Israel is involved in an international armed conflict, and therefore, targeted killings can be used as a method of warfare. According to IHL, there are two paradigms that are applicable to targeted killings. The law enforcement paradigm is used during times of peace to deal with domestic threats while the hostilities paradigm is used during international and non-international armed conflicts to achieve concrete military advantages. Therefore, because the Supreme Court claims that there is an armed conflict present, the hostilities paradigm is used, and IHL is needed to interpret Israel's targeted killings. Based on the laws and the case studies of five high-ranking Hamas militants who are representative of Israel's usual targets, I found that Israel generally abides by the Israeli Supreme Court rules and IHL but often encounters problems with the proportionality requirements. This leaves the legality of the cases dependent upon the person analyzing the killings. If one argues that there is no armed conflict present, then the law enforcement paradigm must be used, in which case Israel's actions would be illegal according to human rights law. Also, a critic can argue that the value of the targets killed during the strikes is not worth the civilian collateral damage and thus claim that the strikes are illegal. Based on my research, I concluded that Israel is in an international armed conflict, and therefore, IHL is applicable, under the hostilities paradigm. I also believe that Israel can argue that the strikes that incurred collateral damage were proportional due to the military value of the targets. However, an international court must clarify the laws concerning the use of targeted killings. This is because in cases like the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, the legality of the strikes strongly depends upon the person interpreting the law, and therefore, there can be disagreements over which paradigm is applicable. In addition, because targeted killing is becoming a global trend, the ambiguity of the law will continue to cause problems, and so the international community will need to address this issue carefully.