Today the Supreme Court will consider the petition of the organization, which demands that the State act to prevent the execution of Imad Mahmoud Sa’ad, whom a court in the Palestinian Authority convicted of collaboration with Israel and sentenced to death.

The organization says that Israel’s behavior indicates a moral failure of the first order: leaving a collaborator to the mercy of terrorist elements, to the point of endangering his life.

In response to the petition, the State says that according to an investigation that has been performed, Sa’ad’s death sentence is not expected to be carried out over the coming days, and this is a matter that must be settled through political channels rather than via the court.

—IDF Radio, 14 May 2008

In keeping with national morals and for the sake of Israel’s security, it is important to the Almagor Terror Victims Association that those people who endanger themselves for the sake of the citizens of Israel receive the gratitude and protection that they deserve.

In April 2008 it was published in the media that the PA had sentenced security officer Imad Mahmoud Sa’ad to death for collaborating with the IDF and helping to find wanted individuals. The commander of the PA security forces commented on the verdict: “This will set an example for all those who sell out their homeland and people.”

Almagor intervened to save Sa’ad. Naftali Werzberger, attorney to Almagor, send two letters to the government demanding to be told what efforts were being expended to save Sa’ad—if any.

After the government ignored the letters, Almagor submitted an urgent petition to the Supreme Court requesting that the government be served an order to appear and explain why it was not acting to prevent the verdict from being carried out. Almagor’s petition was heard on 14 May, one day before the verdict was to be executed.

The State of Israel, through the agency of its government, is responsible for the well-being of those who act in its behalf and in behalf of its citizens against terrorism. Silently abandoning them to death sentences, aside from being immoral, broadcasts a message of treacherousness that will impede action in behalf of Israel in its war against terrorism and will lead directly to increased strikes against innocents by terrorist organizations in the future … The State of Israel itself has a significant ability to control what goes on in Judea and Samaria (the West Bank), including Area A. It is incumbent upon the State to do everything possible in order to avert the moral and ethical disgrace of an execution.

This stance is based on the conclusions of the Kahan Commission on the responsibility of the State of Israel for the actions of neighboring forces not under direct Israeli control… Standing aside at a time when legally sanctioned murder is about to be carried out runs counter to the values of the State of Israel as a democratic, Jewish state.

—From Almagor’s petition to the Supreme Court to save Sa’ad

Following Almagor’s lawsuit, the Israeli government was forced to intervene and seek “clarifications” from the PA with regard to the execution of Sa’ad’s sentence.

As a result of Almagor’s work, it was decided that the sentence would not be carried out. Sa’ad’s life was saved.