Capital punishment in the Gaza Strip has been enforced by multiple governments, militaries, and irregular militias throughout the area's history.
[1] The State Security Court in Gaza (Arabic: محكمة أمن الدولة في غزة), which was formed in 1995, issued several death sentences against eight people, as follows: 3 in 1995, 3 in 1997, and 2 in 1999, all of which were in murder cases.
[9] According to an Amnesty International report, 23 Palestinians were executed by Al-Qassam in the course of the 2014 conflict, and 16 of those people had been in prison since before the war began.
Amnesty claimed that Hamas used the cover of the war, which had a very heavily death toll,[7] to carry out summary executions, to settle scores against opponents under the pretext they were collaborators with Israel.
[17] In February 2016, Al Qassam claimed they had executed of Mahmoud Rushdi Eshtewi [ar] (Arabic: محمود رشدي اشتيوي),[a][19][20] one of the group's leading commanders, for very ambiguous reasons.
[22][23][19][24] The stated reason was "for behavioral and moral violations to which he confessed" (Arabic: تجاوزاته السلوكية والأخلاقية التي أقر بها).
[24] There is some suspicion that Eshtewi died in custody and was shot after death, from reports of people who saw his body before burial and thought the bullet wounds looked suspicious.
Reportedly, the execution defied protests from the United Nations and "will likely" deepen tensions with the Palestinian government in the West Bank.
[25] Hamas defied an agreement with Fatah, the ruling party in the West Bank, by carrying out the executions without the approval of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas.
Hamas' Al-Qassam Brigades militant wing have been credibly accused of numerous war crimes including various extrajudicial killings, but commonly told stories about executions in the Gaza Strip have been over simplified, exaggerated, distorted, or completely fabricated.
No laws currently in peace in the Occupied Palestinian territory directly prohibit sex between consenting adult women.
[39] But there are differencees between the Gaza Strip and West Bank governments regarding the legal status of sex between consenting adult men.