Hamas executes five in Gaza, including two accused of spying for Israel

Hamas executed five Palestinians in Gaza, including two on charges of cooperating with Israel, the militant group announced on Sunday – the first known executions in Gaza in more than five years.

In a statement, the Ministry of Interior said the two were convicted of communicating with “hostile foreign parties,” a reference to Israel.

In one case the information allegedly led to the “targeting and martyrdom of citizens,” while another was accused of supplying information on “resistance men, their places of residence, many of their jobs, the locations of launching rockets and blacksmithing workshops.”

The other three individuals executed were convicted of murder. The five executions announced Sunday bring the total executed by Hamas to 33 since the group took power in the coastal enclave in 2007.

The Ministry of Interior in Gaza said the executions were carried out “after all degrees of litigation have been exhausted,” and that the “convicts were granted their full right to defend themselves in accordance with the litigation procedures.”

It is unclear what form the trials took.

The last time Hamas is known to have executed people accused of collaborating with Israel, in April 2017, the human rights group Amnesty International criticized their trials as “unfair proceedings in military courts.”