against attacks on civilians directly participating in hostilities set out in art 51(3) of Additional Protocol I are not binding upon Israel.

According to Israel, this article has not attained the status of customary international law, therefore Israel rejects the time limitation in art 51(3) (attacking civilians ‘for such time’). Therefore, it considers the planning, launching and commanding of terrorist attacks to be direct participation in hostilities. It therefore believes that its policy of targeted killing complies with art 51(3). Finally, the respondents rejected the petitioners’ claim that the targeted killing policy violates the proportionality requirement. Israel argued that targeted killing is only performed as ‘an exceptional step, when there is no alternative’.

 

One of Isr...

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