Israel’s parliament has approved the first reading of a bill regarding the death penalty for terrorists who kill Israeli citizens. This is the first of three votes required for final approval of this legislation. “We are on the right track to make history. We promised and kept them,” the ultra-right minister rejoiced in a post on Itamar Ben Gvir.
The minister asked us to move forward to “eradicate terrorism and create a strong deterrent effect”. He, who takes pride in taking photos of himself with blindfolded Palestinian prisoners, prone with bound hands, and photos of destroyed Gaza placed in prisons where Palestinians are held, has been trying for years to pass laws on the death penalty. Two attempts in 2022 and 2023 failed, but the release of live hostages in Gaza opened up opportunities.
Netanyahu is pushing for the death penalty
by our correspondent Gabriella Colurusso
The death penalty exists in Israeli law for treason, genocide, crimes against humanity and crimes against the Jewish people in wartime, in 1954 the penalty was abolished for murder, but after that the death penalty Adolf Eichmann there was never another execution. The new law proposes “that a terrorist convicted of murder motivated by racism or hatred of society, and in circumstances where the act was committed with the intent to harm the State of Israel, will be sentenced to mandatory death.” This rule only applies to terrorists who kill Israeli citizens and does not apply to Israelis who kill Palestinians. National authority Abu Mazen called the proposal “a decision that opens the door to extrajudicial executions in the field and clearly constitutes an intention to commit a crime.”
