Moral immunity and innocent attackers

Moral boundaries in the circumstances of self-defense are determined, among other things, by the moral status of people who happen to be in those circumstances. Someone who possesses moral immunity retains the right not to be attacked and is thus protected from potential defensive harm. In this paper, I consider the role of moral immunity in the context of the problem of so-called "innocent attackers". While some believe that it is not morally permissible to kill innocent attackers in self-defense due to their lack of responsibility for the threat, I show that the arguments put forward fail to establish that conclusion. Finally, I also side with those authors who argue that the innocence of the attackers in these cases is not an obstacle to justifying their killing.