As Israel reckons with the mass atrocities of October 7, a central question arises: How should justice be carried out? How should the crimes of mass murder, sexual violence, hostage-taking, and torture be prosecuted? What legal forum can credibly host such a process for acts that deeply shock the conscience of humanity?
The current debate within Israel between the Justice Ministry and Knesset members exposes a deeper crisis: the inadequacy of existing legal mechanisms to undertake such an endeavor. With hundreds of alleged perpetrators in custody, Israel faces a momentous legal and moral challenge. Domestic courts alone may lack the legal adequacy, structural tools, or international legitimacy to prosecute these grave crimes comprehensively.
The Hamas-led massacre left not only devastation but also a profound rupture in the moral and legal order, violating fundamental norms of international law and affecting victims of multiple nationalities. It appears to involve a complex web of actors, including direct perpetrators, commanders, leaders operating from third countries, affiliated armed groups, and state and non-state entities that financed, armed, coordinated, or amplified the violence.
It demands a similarly multi-layered and transnational accountability strategy, transcending the boundaries of domestic courts and domestic jurisdiction. What is needed now is a prosecutorial model that meets international standards, centers on the rights and dignity of victims, and restores faith in the rule of law.
So far, Israeli lawmakers have proposed various approaches, from amendments to the penal code to adopting new legislation. Yet these proposals remain largely procedural and punitive, insular in nature, and lacking in collaborative international frameworks. While well-intentioned, they often remain confined within domestic legal constructs and fall short of addressing the full scale and nature of the crimes.
A more principled approach must be grounded in the international legal response to past atrocities and the lessons learned over decades of prosecuting and adjudicating such crimes. The challenges Israel now faces are not unique; the global legal community has developed tools precisely for addressing atrocity crimes.
There is a compelling need for a framework that integrates international legal standards while also remaining closely tied to the site of the attack, the nature of the crimes, and the proximity to the victims. A hybrid tribunal or an internationalized model of prosecution, combining international standards with Israeli legal authority, should now be seriously pursued as the most credible and appropriate path forward. This is not merely a legal preference; it is a moral and legal imperative.
The pursuit of accountability must rise to meet the gravity of the offenses and ensure that the voices of victims are heard on an international stage.
One recent precedent is the Special Tribunal for the Crime of Aggression against Ukraine, spearheaded by the High Level Working Group on the Crime of Aggression in Ukraine, of which one of us was a member, and supported by the Raoul Wallenberg Centre for Human Rights in collaboration with other organizations and Ukrainian legal bodies. This tribunal, designed to prosecute senior Russian officials for initiating the 2022 invasion, operates through an agreement between Ukraine and the Council of Europe.
We have drawn on extensive experience engaging with human rights and accountability mechanisms. Over the years, we have collaborated closely with international bodies and hybrid tribunals addressing genocide and grave human rights violations. These experiences have demonstrated the enduring value of mechanisms that combine international legal standards with local legitimacy.
When properly designed, such tribunals do more than deliver legal retribution. They address the needs of traumatized communities, empower victims, facilitate reparations, help establish authoritative historical records, and offer pathways to restoration and justice.
Israel nevers shies from legal innovation
ISRAEL HAS never shied away from legal innovation. Nazi leader Adolf Eichmann’s trial in 1961 helped forge the modern architecture of human rights law and universal jurisdiction.
The crimes of October 7 demand a similarly groundbreaking legal response. Even before October 7, Hamas repeatedly called for the destruction of Israel and the genocide of Israelis, conduct that may constitute incitement to genocide under Article III(c) of the Genocide Convention.
A hybrid tribunal model, comprised of Israeli and international judges, prosecutors, and defense attorneys, would bring global standards and expertise to bear while remaining rooted in the communities most affected. Such a tribunal would not only try perpetrators but also elevate these atrocities from local tragedy to global reckoning.
In this context, one of the darkest chapters of October 7 was the systematic use of sexual violence as a weapon of terror. Precedents from Rwanda and the former Yugoslavia have shown that such acts must be prosecuted with diligence and victim-centered care.
The sexual violence we have documented for months now at the Civil Commission on October 7 Crimes Against Women and Children underscores the necessity of international law in addressing such atrocities.
Over the past decades, the international legal framework has become essential for uncovering and prosecuting these crimes. Hamas’s use of sexual violence on October 7 must be understood within this context. A hybrid tribunal, equipped with trauma-informed procedures, as well as international best practices and liability models, can ensure that these crimes are understood and neither minimized nor forgotten.
October 7 also included the deliberate targeting of families. Our findings reveal distinct patterns: families murdered together and subjected to similar forms of torture; victims forced to witness atrocities committed against their loved ones; entire families abducted; violent and intentional separations of family members; and the use of digital and social media to broadcast abuses directly to the victims’ families and the general public, including through the victims’ own devices and social media accounts.
These were not isolated incidents. Hamas used tactics designed to weaponize the most fundamental human bonds. Above all, this conduct represents an emerging threat in the landscape of modern terrorism that demands urgent international recognition and accountability.
Recognizing and condemning this family-targeted terror, which we have named kinocide, could play one of the most critical roles in legal proceedings for justice, both for the victims and for the world, in the aftermath of the attack. These prosecutions could set a vital precedent that enables the international community to understand this form of cruelty.
SOME WILL say such a tribunal is politically unfeasible. Israel is deeply divided internally, with growing mistrust in institutions and no clear political horizon. Internationally, it faces increasing isolation as the war continues. In addition, questions will arise: What about the crimes allegedly committed by Israel?
However, prosecuting October 7 does not preclude other accountability efforts. Justice is not mutually exclusive, and deferring prosecution in the name of symmetry risks rewarding the gravest atrocities with silence.
A credible legal response to Israel’s conduct will depend on future developments, most critically, whether Israel’s leadership undertakes the necessary steps to investigate alleged violations, establish an independent and effective state commission of inquiry, and prosecute war crimes.
The immediate legal reality cannot be escaped: Israel currently holds hundreds of suspects in custody for the worst crimes committed on its soil in decades. To delay prosecution is to deny victims their rights and to abandon the rule of law when it is needed most. Justice does not always require consensus. In its earliest stages, it requires resolve and clear vision.
Democratic allies in the US, European Union, UK, Germany, Canada, France, and beyond – several of whom have already launched investigations to pursue the perpetrators of October 7 – can serve as crucial partners in establishing an international mechanism.
Such a court, designed in cooperation with trusted international legal experts, would bypass political gridlock and embody the very principles it seeks to uphold: impartiality, justice, and the dignity of victims whose suffering demands recognition and redress.
The Nuremberg Trials didn’t just prosecute criminals; they redefined how the world responded to atrocity. The same is possible now. A hybrid tribunal for October 7 can deliver more than justice. It can deliver history, memory, and perhaps, healing.
Dr. Cochav Elkayam-Levy established the Civil Commission on October 7 Crimes by Hamas against Women and Children. She was awarded the 2024 Israel Prize, teaches at Reichman University, and is a senior fellow at the Shalom Hartman Institute.
Prof. Irwin Cotler served as Canada’s justice minister and attorney-general and is the international chair of the Raoul Wallenberg Centre for Human Rights.