Israel passes controversial death penalty law

Israel has enacted a law that makes hanging the default punishment for West Bank Palestinians found guilty of murdering Israelis.

The UK, Germany, France, and Italy described the move as “de facto discriminatory,” warning that Israel risks undermining its commitment to democratic principles.

A joint statement called the death penalty “an inhumane and degrading form of punishment without any deterrent effect”.

UK Foreign Secretary Yvette Cooper posted the statement on X, adding: “The death penalty is wrong and we oppose it around the world.”

Israel’s far-right national security minister, Itamar Ben-Gvir, known for wearing noose-shaped lapel pins ahead of the vote, has pushed for harsher penalties for Palestinians found guilty of nationalist offenses against Israelis.

“We have made history,” Mr Ben-Gvir said, in a post on X. “Any terrorist who goes out to kill should know – he will be sent to the gallows”.

He was also scathing about criticism from the European Union, adding: “We are not afraid, we do not yield”.

The Palestinian ministry of foreign affairs said the law “constitutes a decision to carry out institutionalised extrajudicial killings according to racist standards”.

“The ministry affirms that Israel has no sovereignty over Palestinian land and that Israeli laws do not apply to the Palestinian people,” it added.

Opponents of the bill, under which executions should be carried out within 90 days of sentencing, said it was racist, draconian and unlikely to deter attacks by Palestinian militants.

Critics include Israelis and Palestinians, international rights groups and the UN, some of whom fear the death penalty could be applied solely to Palestinians convicted of murdering Jewish citizens of Israel.

The sentence will be applied by a military court to anyone convicted of murdering an Israeli “as an act of terror”.

These courts handle cases only for West Bank Palestinians, who aren’t Israeli citizens. The bill states that in “special circumstances,” military courts can change the sentence to life imprisonment.

Israel’s courts, which try Israeli citizens, including Palestinian citizens of Israel, can choose between life imprisonment or the death penalty in cases of murder aiming to harm Israeli citizens and residents or “with the intent of rejecting the existence of the state of Israel”.

Amichai Cohen, a senior fellow at the Israel Democracy Institute’s Centre for Democratic Values and Institutions, said the distinction is discriminatory as it means, in effect, Jews “will not be indicted under this law”.

In addition, the West Bank is not sovereign Israeli territory, so under international law, Israel’s parliament should not be legislating over it, Mr Cohen said.

The Association of Civil Rights in Israel said it had petitioned the country’s highest court to challenge the law, calling it “discriminatory by design” and “enacted without legal authority” over West Bank Palestinians.

Israel has the death penalty on its books, but the country hasn’t put anyone to death since Nazi war criminal Adolf Eichmann in 1962.

The bill will not apply retroactively to any of the militants Israel currently holds who attacked the country on 7 October 2023.