Ref: 28/2015

On Sunday, 07 June 2015, the Palestinian Center for Human Rights
(PCHR) organized a workshop on the death penalty and extra-judicial execution
in the Palestinian Authority in cooperation with the Basmat Amal Association in
Gaza City. The workshop targeted a group of activists from the aforementioned association
and was attended by 21 persons, including 14 women. The participants discussed
opinions and perspectives related to the death penalty and the need to abolish
it.

The workshop addressed a number of topics, the most prominent of
which were: the death penalty in domestic and international laws; guarantees of
the application of the death penalty under domestic and international
standards; controversy over the abolishment of the death penalty; and the legal
and objective justifications for PCHR’s rejection for the death penalty in
Palestine. Moreover, the workshop addressed the application of extra-judicial
executions for suspicions of collaboration with Israeli forces and how they
pose threats to the safety and security of the Palestinian society and the rule
of law. Mohammed Abu Hashem, a legal and human rights researcher at PCHR,
facilitated the workshop.

This workshop is part of PCHR’s efforts to abolish the death
penalty and end the phenomenon of extra-judicial execution in addition to
mobilizing the public opinion in order to pressurize the Palestinian Presidents
to sign the Second Optional Protocol to the International Covenant on Civil and
Political Rights 1989, aiming at the abolition of the death penalty.

PCHR usually cooperate with the grassroots associations for their
important role in building the society’s culture. PCHR aims to raise awareness
of and disseminate the culture of human rights.

It should be noted that this workshop is part of a project
implemented by PCHR in cooperation with the Representative Office of the
Federal Republic of Germany to the Palestinian Authority.