Is Capital Punishment a Deterrent? And Should we Even Care?

By Sherwin Pomerantz

My blog of Tuesday elicited more responses than normal. Many people felt that history has shown that capital punishment is generally not a deterrent to crime so there is, therefore, no value in Israel’s using that in the future as it will not buy us anything. Should we really care whether that works as a deterrent or not? I’m not sure.

One of my readers thought that my blog was good but that, in a word, he says “I think you guys are screwed. Deterrence requires a value proposition where both sides threaten something of value on the other side. The gap between what your enemy threatens (based on this prisoner exchange) and what you threaten is so wide that you lose either way, and therefore you have no deterrence. You guys need to get outside the box and figure out how to threaten something of value that the Palestinian leaders, terrorists, and the world will understand. The Palestinians have and hold little of value, including people. You have just validated a cheap, easy, effective tactic for your enemy. I would have done the same thing as the return of another 1000 Palestinian heroes will not change the military equation. So, what do you threaten? What can you threaten that your friends will understand and support? Time is short.”

Another reader indicates that “The underlying factor will not go away - our enemy does not value life. A life lost for them at the hands of an enemy may be sad for the immediate family but they will be told and taught they were martyrs to a glorious cause. A person sitting in a prison is a martyr. An executed person is a martyr. A life lost for us, even in the line of duty, is a disaster.”

Someone else wrote “Executing captured perpetrators of terrorist acts will create a price tag. As an example, (our enemies will send) one suicide bomber for every executed terrorist. For us, each life lost is a disaster. This prisoner exchange only underlines how much we value life and how little they do. They understand this and that is why they held him (i.e. Schalit) so long. Until our enemy changes its ways, there will be no great enough deterrent.”

Another writes, “Though I feel sick that these people are being released, the thought of execution, though it may seem somewhat logical if not a gut reaction, leads me to the question Will we challenge our own moral fabric with the introduction of the death penalty?
Further, flattening 1 square kilometer around an area fired from by terrorists is collective punishment. Are we ready to say that a Gazan is an automatic terrorist? Is not our morality the back-bone that keeps this country alive in its fight against its enemies?”

Not to be outdone, of course, the New York Times in an editorial today congratulates Prime Minister Netanyahu for making the deal, for having “twisted himself in an ideological knot to get this deal.” And then, as only the Times can do, it makes the leap to the following conclusion:

“One has to ask: If Mr. Netanyahu can negotiate with Hamas — which shoots rockets at Israel, refuses to recognize Israel’s existence and, on Tuesday, vowed to take even more hostages — why won’t he negotiate seriously with the Palestinian Authority, which Israel relies on to help keep the peace in the West Bank?.... Why can’t he make a similarly impassioned appeal for a settlement freeze for the sake of Israel’s security?” Amazing is it not that there is no reference at all to the fact that Abbas and his cronies have refused to sit down with Israel, even after a 10 month settlement freeze, unless Israel pre-agrees to give up all of its bargaining chips before the dialogue begins?

But the facts are:

»Our enemies seem to place a very low value on the worth of a human life.
»Executing admitted killers who have been convicted in an Israeli court may not be a deterrent.
»Israel does not want to be in a position yet again to have to release convicted murderers in order to redeem our captives.
»We have a limited number of options open to us.
»Things will probably get worse before they get better.
»Our enemies have captured the narrative and made us into the bad guys.

So the options open to us are limited. Given that and considering the financial cost as well of feeding and housing convicted killers (i.e. about $ 40,000 per person per year according to local estimates) I would stand on my earlier position. That is if we apprehend perpetrators of terror attacks where Israeli citizens have died as a result, and if they admit to their crime and are found guilty in an Israeli court then such individuals are guilty of genocide (i.e. as defined, the intentional killing of a [large] group of people, especially those of a particular ethnic group or nation) then we have a right to inflict capital punishment on the guilty parties. Israel endorses capital punishment under such circumstances and we would do ourselves a service by letting one and all know that from a certain date, this will be our policy.

Critics may be right that this will not be a major deterrent, but it will be a clear statement to those who choose terror as their vehicle for protest, that we place the same value on their lives as they place on ours. No more, no less. It’s time we drew our own red lines and stood by them.