Israeli Knesset Passes Death Penalty Bill To Execute Palestinians

Israel’s parliament, the Knesset, has passed the controversial bill that will instruct military courts to impose the death penalty on Palestinians convicted of killing Israelis in acts of ‘terror’. At the same time the bill will not be imposed on Jewish Israelis convicted of killing Palestinians.

The law has been approved in the 120-seat knesset by 62 lawmakers, including Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahi and will enter into effects within 30 days. 48 votes were casted against the bill with one abstention.

The bill passage marks a major victory for Israel’s far right, with National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir having pushed for its enactment as one of the main conditions of his Otzma Yehudit (Jewish Power) party’s coalition agreement with Netanyahu.

The Palestinian Authority called the bill ‘a war crime against the Palestinian people’, saying that it breached the Fourth Geneva Convention, “particularly the protections it guarantees for individuals and the safeguards for fair trials”.

The new law, instructs military courts trying only West Bank Palestinians, who are not Israeli citizens, to impose the draconian sentence for lethal attacks on Israelis.

Under international law, Israel’s parliament should not be legislating in the West Bank, which is soverign Israeli territory in spite of the best efforts of Netanyahu’s far-right coalition to annex the territory to Israel.

Rights group B’Tselem pointed out prior to the Knesset’s approval of the bill that the conviction rate for Palestinians tried in military courts is about 96 percent. “In many cases, these convictions are based on ‘confessions obtained through pressure and torture during interrogations”, it said in a post on X.

“The law is worded in such a way that it targets only Palestinians. And it will turn the killing of Palestinians into an accepted and common tool of punishment through several mechanisms,” said the group.