Or HaChaim on Genesis 34:25/אור החיים על בראשית ל״ד:כ״ה

1 ויהרגו כל זכר. They killed every male. Why did they kill people who had not actively committed a sin? Why did they not first kill the truly guilty, i.e. Shechem?

2Actually, the sons of Jacob did not intend to kill anyone except the guilty party; however, all the inhabitants formed a human barrier to protect their king and prince. As a result the sons of Jacob were forced to kill the townspeole under the heading of killing a רודף, a pursuer, someone who endangers the life of the avenger. When the Torah states that they killed all the males this means that they succeeded in killing Chamor and his son only after killing the other males in the town. Had they not done so they could not have executed someone who was guilty of death.

3Another reason they killed all the males in the city was that they had all been accessories to the crime by keeping Dinah captive after the rape. This was tantamount to kidnapping. According to the Noachidic law the penalty for kidnapping is death. Gentiles are not guilty of the death penalty for sleeping with an unmarried girl.

4You will note that the Torah (or the brothers) describes all the people of having "defiled their sister" (34,26). This shows that they all shared equally in the guilt of kidnapping. The reason the Torah does not speak about these people having "stolen" their sister is that the principal sin they were guilty of was that it was the kind of robbery which could not be made good. [If you kidnap a virgin and you give back a woman who has been defiled by sexual intercourse out of wedlock this is not a proper restoration. Ed.] The Torah makes it plain by using the term "they had defiled," that if the sin had not been one that could not be reversed the brothers would not have killed all the males in the town. While it is certainly true that the people of Shechem were not the only ones in the world guilty of such crimes, and Noachides who have committed robbery are all guilty of the death penalty, the brothers could certainly not be expected to play executioners in all such instances. They lacked the power to do so. Jacob himself alluded to this when he accused Shimon and Levi as "distressing" him, especially in view of the fact that his family was "numerically weak" (verse 30).

5Another reason why the Torah speaks of "who had defiled" is to justify the brothers looting the belongings of the inhabitants of Shechem. Their property served as דמי בושת, compensation for the humiliation Dinah had suffered at the hands of these people. The amount of such compensation is determined in accordance with the relative stature of the victim as well as the perpetrator of the crime. In this instance both Shechem and Dinah were of very elevated stature so that the compensation due was of the highest category. The entire possessions of the townspeople may not have sufficed to provide adequate compensation for the shame Dinah had suffered. She was a person who was unique in the whole world. When I mentioned earlier that a self-confessed sinner is free from financial penalties, this does not apply to the money paid as compensation for shaming someone (Ketuvot 41).

6In his Hilchot Melachim chapter 9,14, Maimonides explains that the reason all the inhabitants of Shechem were guilty of death was that they had failed to establish a judiciary which would deal with the robbery committed by Shechem. Whence does Maimonides know that the common people had to judge their king or crown prince? Is it not a fact that even amongst the Israelites individuals do not have to testify against the King, and one does not sit in judgment of him (Sanhedrin 16)? Accordingly, we are forced to conclude that the guilt of the people of Shechem consisted in their being active accessories to the crime. They may even have advised Shechem how to successfully rape Dinah. Nachmanides refutes Maimonides' argument claiming that the Noachides were not commanded to establish a permanent judiciary but to settle matters that come up for litigation. He claims that the death of the people of Shechem was primarily for the sin of idolatry which all of them had been guilty of for a long time. His words require proof, and they do not account for the brothers looting the town.