Israel’s planned release of hundreds of Hamas and Islamic Jihad prisoners is not only a bad thing for the safety of Israeli citizens (does anyone really believe these killers will now put down their AK-47s and take up macrame?)—Professor Louis Rene Beres makes a strong case that the release also violates international law. (Hat tip: Juddah.)

NO government has the legal right to free terrorists as a “goodwill gesture.” Terrorism is a criminally sanctionable violation of international law not subject to ad hoc nullification by individual countries, even if they are organized into a “Quartet” that includes approval by the United Nations. In the United States, it is manifest from the Constitution that the President’s power to pardon does not encompass violations of international law, and is always limited to “Offenses against the United States.” This limitation stems from a wider prohibition that binds all states, namely the claims of a “Higher Law.” These claims, of course, are the very basis of American law.

In apprehending and punishing Palestinian terrorists, Israel acted wittingly or unwittingly, it doesn’t matter - on behalf of all states. Moreover, because some of the pertinent terrorists committed crimes against other states as well as against the State of Israel, Prime Minister Sharon certainly cannot pardon these offenses against other sovereigns. And although Israel’s release of terrorists is not, strictly speaking, a “pardon,” it will have exactly the same effect.

Israel possesses no authority to grant any sort of pardons for violations of international law, especially the uniquely heinous violations generated by Palestinian terrorism. No matter what might be permissible under its own Basic Law, any political freeing of terrorists is legally inexcusable. Indeed, the fundamental principle is well-established in law that by virtue of such releases the state would assume responsibility for past criminal acts and even for future ones. Such a fundamental principle is known formally as a “peremptory” norm. Codified at Article 53 of The Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties, it means a rule that “permits no derogation.”