Former Palestinian Intelligence Official Allegedly Sentenced to Death For Selling Property to Jews

The Palestinian Authority has reportedly sentenced a former Palestinian intelligence official to death after it was discovered he sold a property in the West Bank city of Hebron to Jews.

In a letter addressed to Hillary Clinton, Ban Ki-moon, Benjamin Netanyahu, and other international officials, Jewish community leaders in Hebron wrote:

It is appalling to think that property sales should be defined as a ‘capital crime’ punishable by death.  The very fact that such a ‘law’ exists within the framework of the PA legal system points to a barbaric and perverse type of justice, reminiscent of practices implemented during the dark ages.

It is incumbent upon the entire international community, which views [Mahmoud Abbas] and the Palestinian Authority as a viable Middle East peace partner, to publicly reject such acts of legal murder, when the ‘crime’ is nothing more than property sales.  What would be the reaction to a law in the United States, England, France, or Switzerland, forbidding property sales to Jews?

[...]

We appeal to all international leaders to demand the annulment of the death warrant and pending execution of Muhammad Abu Shahala, to be followed by his immediate release from imprisonment, for he has committed no crime.

Shahala, the man who may be put to death, reportedly "confessed" to the sale after he was tortured.  He cannot legally be executed until the president of the Palestinian Authority, Mahmoud Abbas, signs off on the law, but he has still been tortured and charged, according to reports.

"Is the Palestinian Authority a reincarnation of the Third Reich?" the Jewish leaders asked in the letter, following a description of the Palestinian legal system and how it compares to Nazi Germany.

Though people on both sides of the aisle are outraged that Shahala could be executed, according to Caroline Glick, the editor of the Jerusalem Post, it has long been a tenet of Palestinian law to forbid selling property to Jews.

“The PA was established in May 1994. The first law it adopted defined selling land to Jews as a capital offense. Shortly thereafter scores of Arab land sellers began turning up dead in Jerusalem and Judea and Samaria in both judicial and extrajudicial killings," she wrote.

(H/T: Drudge Report)