Israel approves initial stage of law imposing death penalty on Palestinians

The Israeli Parliament approved, in the first vote, the bill that institutes the mandatory death penalty for Palestinians convicted of killing Israeli citizens. The proposal, authored by the Minister of National Security, Itamar Ben Gvir, leader of the far-right Otzma Yehudit party, received 39 votes in favor and 16 against in a house of 120 members.

The text still needs to go through another three votes before becoming law.

The bill amends the Israeli penal code and provides for the execution of anyone who kills Israelis out of “racial hatred” or “with the aim of harming the State of Israel and the rebirth of the Jewish people in its land.”

In practice, the measure applies only to Palestinians, without providing for equivalent punishment for Jewish extremists who commit attacks against Palestinians.

After the vote, Ben Gvir celebrated the result and stated that the measure is a “response to the war against Arab terrorism”.

“This is how we fight terror; this is how we create deterrence. When the law is finally passed, terrorists will only be released to hell,” the minister said. Opposition leader Yair Lapid declared that he will not vote in favor of the project, while several parties boycotted the session.

The proposal provoked immediate reactions among jurists, human rights organizations and Palestinian leaders.

The president of the Palestinian National Council, Rawhi Fattouh, classified the text as “a political, legal and humanitarian crime”. The Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) and Hamas also condemned the vote.

For the Islamic movement, the project “embodies the fascist face of the Zionist occupation and represents a flagrant violation of international law”.

Nine Palestinian human rights organizations published a joint document warning that the law could be applied retroactively, which could lead to mass executions of Palestinian prisoners.

“The essence of the proposed legislation is to respond to motives of revenge or retaliation, and not to prevent future crimes”, say the entities, including the Al-Mezan Center and Addameer.

“The law applies only to Palestinians, revealing yet another aspect of the system of racial discrimination in Israel,” says the center.

Historical context and political use of the proposal

Israel abolished the death penalty for murder in 1954, and only one person has been executed in a civil trial: Nazi Adolf Eichmann in 1962. Previous attempts to reinstate the death penalty have failed.

Now, under the government of Benjamin Netanyahu, the Israeli far right has consolidated enough strength to reopen the issue and transform it into a political banner.

Ben Gvir’s project was presented as a response to the Hamas attack on October 7, 2023, which left around 1,200 people dead — mostly civilians — and resulted in the capture of 251 hostages. Since then, the governing coalition has hardened its punitive discourse and sought to justify new repressive measures under the argument of “national security”.

Representative Tzvika Foghel, from the same party as Ben Gvir and chairman of the Knesset National Security Committee, stated that the adoption of the death penalty “will prevent new prisoner exchange agreements”.

He was referring to negotiations like the one in 2011, when Hamas leader in Gaza, Yahya Sinwar, was freed in exchange for an Israeli soldier.

War in Gaza and humanitarian worsening

The discussion takes place during the ceasefire signed in October, but Israel continues to violate the agreement with daily attacks on the Gaza Strip and the West Bank. Since the start of the Israeli offensive on October 8, 2023, more than 69,000 Palestinians have been killed and 170,000 injured, according to local authorities.

Around 90% of Gaza’s civilian infrastructure has been destroyed, and the entry of food and medicine remains blocked.

More than 10,000 Palestinians, including women and children, are detained in Israeli prisons — many without trial.

Human rights organizations report torture, starvation and medical neglect, practices that have resulted in the deaths of dozens of detainees. For Palestinian entities, the new law would give a legal appearance to what they call “systematic executions” already carried out by Israeli forces.

International criticism and implications

Legal experts claim that the project violates the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, as it allows retroactive and selective punishments. The measure also reinforces accusations of apartheid and racial discrimination against Israel.

International law experts interviewed by the press warn that the proposal transforms the judicial system into an instrument of ethnic persecution.

For Palestinian observers, the advancement of the law marks a turning point: the Israeli state begins to convert revenge into public policy.

Ben Gvir’s gesture of distributing sweets in the plenary after approval — compared by the press to the celebrations of Palestinian militants after the 2023 attack — is interpreted as a provocation and symbol of the extreme right.

“The project not only normalizes the murder of Palestinian civilians, but also formalizes legal inequality between peoples,” wrote the Palestinian Center for Human Rights. The processing of the law, according to analysts, deepens Israel’s international isolation and exposes the radicalization of the Netanyahu government in the face of internal and external pressure.